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Posted By: martin dalziel

These upfront/catalog fee's are nothing new and certainly not confined to Mastro alone - the more traditional auction houses (read - fine arts, antiques, etc.) Sotheby's, Christies, Parke-Bennett, etc. all charge for them and have been for a long time - decades. There are many collectibles auction houses that do the same thing - Hunt and Lelands for example. Once you've been around for a while and have built a solid reputation then you become the preferred/desired place to shop - you can then charge for the privilege of shopping there and people will pay for that.

The Mobil gas station analogy doesn't work for me - gas in a necessity (yes, I know you can argue that it isn't, but..). Items at auction are not - they're luxuries. If you tell people they have to pay for the privilege of buying a necessity, then yes, people would be upset. Putting the same plan in place for a luxury, is a lot more palatable for most people. How many people pay a cover charge for a bar or nightclub? What are you getting for that money? - the ability to spend money at said bar or nightclub, but that’s about it. When you buy an item from Tiffany's, what do you get for the premium you are paying - intrinsically, nothing. Yes, there are people who won't go to a bar that charges a cover merely to walk in the door and yes there are people who won't pay the premium at Tiffany's, but there are many more that gladly do so. Same here with Mastro and all the other auction houses who have gone this route.