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I am considering consigning a group of E122 American Caramels to an auction house. Is there a better time of the year or a specific auction that the knowledgeable members of this forum would recommend.?

More information is needed to give you a good answer. Graded or raw? HOF'ers? Major cards like Ruth or Cobb? Commons? High grade or low grade?

An auction house, that if you contact them, has the courtesy to at least acknowledge your inquiry and gets back to you even if to say they are not interested in the consignment for whatever reason.

Generally, those cards will appeal to a fairly wide swath of collectors. Any of our advertisers would do a good job with them. The time of year doesn't matter.

The time of year doesn't matter, but the condition and popularity of the cards do. Graded cards or those featuring Hall of Famers like Ruth or Cobb will likely perform better. Reach out to reputable auction houses for guidance.

It depends on the players and condition of the card.

But I do actually believe time of the year makes a difference.
I have no data to back up my claim up, just my personal opinion.

But I believe Spring and fall are the best times for auction houses. Then winter.
And then summer being last.

This is just from what I have personally seen. Summertime there are more shows, weather is better so there is more vacations. More activities to do and spend money elsewhere.

Springtime I would say is the best based on tax refunds being sent out, company bonuses being sent out. Weather still isn't that great from vacation or home improvement. Holiday spending is over etc.

I always consigned spring & Fall, excellent results.

I've gotten this question a lot recently from seasoned collectors, so I thought I'd chime in.

From the standpoint of running an auction house, I see no difference between the seasonality of our auctions, in terms of bidder activity. While the sports we collect are seasonal, by and large, the hobby itself is not - collectors collect year-round. I'm unaware of any baseball collector who would see a card they want in an auction catalog and say, "Oh well, it's football season, I can't buy that card."

There are consignors who feel more comfortable consigning a certain time of year, for a variety of reasons, but those reasons are typically personal to the consignor. We have different auctions during the year and some are larger than others, but the size of the auction is related solely to the quality and quantity of consignments we secured for that auction.

There are also times of year that may benefit certain folks - some people are more flush with cash in the spring after tax season, but conversely, others are broke after writing big tax checks. Some folks have year-end bonuses or extra cash to spend at the end of the year, but others are strapped after the holidays. For the hobby, it all sort of comes out in the wash, as there are thousands of bidders from all walks of life who all participate in the hobby - so my advice, which nobody asked for - is not to overthink it. "Analysis paralysis" is a thing I read on this board recently, and I think it's a good descriptive. If you've got something to sell, pick the venue you feel most comfortable with, and let them do their thing.

Good luck!

-Al