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Posted By: barrysloate

Cobby mentioned that extended bidding is a pain because it ultimately just makes the consignor more money. As an auctioneer myself, nothing is more important to me than making my consignors more money. If someone trusts me to sell their cards, I have to take that responsibility very seriously. The way I see it, bidders are in complete control of their own destinies. Consignors on the other hand do not have any control over their lots and are at the mercy of the auction system. So any system an auction house can set into motion that helps consignors is the lifeblood of the process. Obviously, ebay, catalog auctions, and live auctions each have their own good and bad points. But in the end the lot goes to the highest bidder. That would happen on ebay every time too if sellers didn't get so nervous and impatient. I am actually amazed by how many bids certain lots get the first couple of days. In theory, every ebay lot should be at zero with a minute to go. You don't need to qualify and there is no advantage to bidding early, with the one exception that a lack of bidding spooks inexperienced sellers. That is the strange idiosyncracy of ebay. It doesn't pay to bid early, yet a seller starts freaking out when he sees no early bids. Some fine tuning is necessary there.