Antiques on the Internet 

*This ran originally in the Champlain Business Journal

By Cybèle Elaine Werts  
CybeleW@aol.com

Once upon a time antique lovers had to traipse about from store to store to find that special something, but these days things in the antique and collectible world are changing. Even while antique stores are experiencing a business boom, another phenomenon is starting to take shape – auctions on the internet. From huge auction sites like eBay.com to smaller local versions that offer on-line and live bidding, the choices are nearly endless. For the person who loves the antiquing experience, the real store version is still their best bet. Vermont dealers say that the internet has not yet significantly impacted their business. “We’re not an eBay type of operation.” says Bill Ehrhart, of the Burlington Center for Antiques. “People want to see and touch antiques, so they come here, although some do come with pencil and pad in hand to compare prices.” George Colpitts of Somerhouse Antiques in Shelburne agrees. “Our customers are finicky and want to see things in person. I haven’t found that internet auctions have cut into our business at all. I think some of it has to do with the fact that collectors enjoy the process of seeing and holding an object. You can’t get that on the internet!”

But for those looking to satisfy their ‘collector’s fever,’ the internet can offer options that antiquers could not have imagined five years ago. Take for instance an unusual item like antique toy cash registers. Travel a few dozen Chittenden county antique shops and you’re likely to find one or two, and both likely over $50. But take a short sojourn to eBay.com, and luxuriate in some five to ten new registers per day to bid on, many of which you can score for less than $20. For the person who wants a specific item, the internet is the way to go. In addition to a huge number of items on this popular web site, you can find a sophisticated search engine that will locate items as broadly or specifically as your imagination. Some local dealers use the internet as an additional income, like Tom Cross of the Champlain Valley Center for Antiques. “I do auction some specialty items on eBay,” says Cross, “especially those kind of things that are hard to find a buyer for.” He adds that this often means more expensive furniture or very unique specialty items that require those special buyers. In addition to eBay, savvy shoppers can place bids on other popular auction sites including Boxlot, America’s Auctions, AAANDS, Ubid, and Skybid. Auction sites are also being developed on Yahoo, Amazon and other well-known web sites. There are even sites that review auction sites, such as Auction Sites of the Future ( http://jauctions.freeservers.com/ ).

Not all auction sites are nationally based however. Thomas Hirchak Auctions ( http://www.thcauction.com/ ) is a popular Vermont site that offers both on-line and live auctions. When they first considered developing a web site, they conducted several auctions on eBay to see what an online auction entailed. They continued this process for about three months, averaging between five to eight items including a variety of items such as civil war medals and other militaria, small antique items, European jewelry, and restaurant equipment. eBay brought them bidders from across the country including a restaurant owner from New Mexico who bought an espresso machine and a man in Hong Kong won the bid on one of their antique quill pens. “It was fun to watch the progression of bidding as the auction end-date got closer.” Says Marcie Vallette, marketing specialist for the Thomas Hirchak company. “Sometimes I would get so curious about our auctions that we’d go to our respective homes in the evenings and check on our auctions from our home computers.”

The Thomas Hirchak Company has been successfully marketing real and personal property through auctions and liquidation sales in the northeastern United States since 1979. “Auctions provide fast turnover, an end to carrying costs, and the highest net profit,” says Vallette. “When it comes to converting property, real or personal into cash, the auction method guarantees the speed, the excitement and the prices that you want.” Auction services include complete market research, direct mailings, extensive advertising, pre and post auction marketing services, and appraisals.

In an effort to keep abreast of changing needs on the web, they are also reviewing a variety of software options that offer expanded auctioning capabilities. The software packages range in price from freeware and shareware, like Every Auction and Auctioneer, to business packages that can run to over to well over $10,000. The ones they are seriously considering are Visual Auction 3.0, JBS Software, and Auction Broker which are made by companies that allows clients to use their server, making server compatibility a moot point. Other high quality software options include C-U-S Business System software and OpenSite Technologies, Inc. who offer significant help in setting up and maintaining. “Our original goal was to have the auction software set up and ready to go by early in the fall, 1999, and we’re right on track.” Vallette adds.

Companies like Thomas Hirchak Auctioneers are not the only ones making money off the internet however. Millions of individuals sell items from small to large on the big auction sites like eBay and Boxlot. Doug Lindsor of South Ryegate is one of those people, although he does also sell items from his Antiques and Collectibles Barn in North Conway, New Hampshire. He specializes in small items which can be mailed at a lower cost such as ephemera (letters), and civil war and farm implementation catalogues. He also regularly offers glass, china, and cloisonné items, most of which average about $30 when sold. While he uses eBay for a large number of items, (You can find Lindsor’s on eBay via his on-line name: “Antiqueman”) he also uses the popular Boxlot auction site ( http://www.boxlot.com/ ) to sell some specialized items. “Boxlot has some advantages in that they don’t charge a listing fee,” says Lindsor. “Also, because they are smaller, your items can get more attention than on a very large site where there is more competition.”

Lindsor adds that business has increased dramatically thanks to the internet auctions, but cautions that there are many hidden costs such as postage and packing materials. He estimates that total time from item-in-hand, to auction, to the mailbox is less than an hour, which makes financial sense for items $30 and up but perhaps can cause a loss for smaller, inexpensive items. Considering that he has some 160 items currently available for bidding on Boxlot, just keeping the administrative work in order can be a challenge, but it’s one that Lindsor enjoys. Like antiques and collectibles in shops, he often buys a large box of items and finds that only a few are high ticket items, but since he has had a 90% sale rate on eBay, even the little items have added up to a good living for him. “I save a lot of time in traveling and costs,” says Lindsor. “Which means I can pass those savings to my customers.”

Even if Lindsor isn’t traveling the byways of New England as much as he used to, he might still be interested in the antique map reproductions of Historical Ink ( http://members.aol.com/oldmapsne/ ) , a company that prints old 1800’s maps of Vermont and other New England towns. Owners of old houses can peruse these maps and find the names of the owners in the 1800’s or even sometimes names of their family. “Maps became increasingly important to business people around the industrial revolution because they needed to know how to get around,” says Kay Gleason, owner of Historical Ink. “The interesting thing is that nearly 95% of all New England towns that we know now, were already in place by the 1870’s. This means that I have a map for just about any town you choose. The maps are reproductions of original town maps of Vermont, Massachusetts, Maine, New Hampshire, Connecticut, Rhode Island and New York. “I’m a big fan of map collecting, which is getting increasingly popular,” Gleason adds. “I loved reading the Gazetteer and learning about the different towns around me, and I knew that other people who love history would enjoy having these maps on their walls.”

The maps are reproduced in black ink on natural-color parchment, slightly reduced in size from the originals. They print between 11" by 14" and 11" by 17" and are matted in a 16" by 20" museum-quality mat, which will fit a standard-size frame. Most maps show the "footprint" of every existing building in a town, and where possible, the owner's name is shown by each building. Many old town maps also include what is called a Business Directory or Subscribers Directory. This may list the merchants, manufacturers, farmers and professionals in a town. The maps are particularly popular with genealogists, local history enthusiasts, owners of old houses, former New Englanders, and retirees. While the original maps cost from $100 to $1500, the reproductions are a reasonable $11 to $14, allowing just about anyone to have a piece of history in their livingroom. “Even now I continue to enjoy collecting old maps, and after ten years I think I’ve hit my stride with Historical Ink,” says Gleason. “And the phenomenal growth of the internet will only increase business!”

The internet may be a technology of the new millennium, but it’s clearly the place to shop for antiques and collectibles.