REA and other auctions, ridiculous delays

[Sean]

Originally Posted by buymycards

Hi Ken,
For a true morning person the day is half over by 9.

Rick

I remember the old army commercial: "We do more before 8 AM than most people do all day". And they thought this was a selling point.

[sb1]

I guess the question is how did we get to this point?

Various other collectibles from trinkets to multi-million dollar items can be bought at auction, (online and in person) at normal hours of the day, Art, Cars, Coins, Stamps, Wine you name it. NONE of them transact at the wee hours of the morning. Ever see Sotheby's close an auction at 4:00 am, how about Barrett-Jackson or Spectrum?

I guess the auction houses and bidders in sports collectibles are equally to blame, one for setting it up this way and the other for participating in it.

There are a few live auctions annually that receive the same quality of items and same bidders and they last 2-3 hours and everyone is done. Seems like an online auction could be ran the same way. Announce it weeks or months in advance, run it on one night 5-6 hours and end it with an exact time. Actually ending each lot with a predetermined time(one AH actually does this now). Everyone has equal opportunity to bid and bid hard, with an end in sight.

I would be willing to bet that the vast majority of items would realize nearly the same results as any other extended format, in some cases stronger prices due to the last minute bid flurries. In fact the one auction that already does the abrupt planned ending results in heavy last minute max bids, just like Ebay style auctions.

The reason we will probably not see this change happen, actually lies with one party of the auction equation, the consignor. They abhor the thought of their item not getting it's full value and believe that it must be milked out to the last possible second. Most auction houses would feel they had zero chance of getting consignments if they tried to change the existing format. The individual lot ending now used by some AH's had alleviated much of the all night wait, but even then the consignor can feel the item ended too soon and no one can go back and bid later.

Until both the consignor and auction houses both try and accept a format such as the one above and it becomes the norm rather than the exception, we are stuck with the status quo.

[barrysloate]

Agree with Scott. It would be so easy to change the auction format so that they ended at a reasonable time. But nobody wants to change it. Somehow they feel the status quo is best. I always hated the late closings, but some do seem to like it. And I'm a morning person, so staying up all night wasn't something I was able to do.

[Jay Wolt]

Actually REA did tweak it a bit by starting their extended bidding at 4PM, guess Rob didn't realize that it would still be taking on bids over 12 hours later.

[sb1]

Originally Posted by Jay Wolt

Actually REA did tweak it a bit by starting their extended bidding at 4PM, guess Rob didn't realize that it would still be taking on bids over 12 hours later.

it's been 4:00 for several years and has no effect on the ending. Inevitably people will believe that is to their advantage to wait and drag the bidding out until the last possible minute if allowed to.

[AMBST95]

I'd rather they open extended bidding at midnight and then close it the next afternoon rather than the other way around. There are enough people bidding in these auctions and enough lots for the 15 min rule to carry it through the night and then close it down when the whole country is awake.

[sb1]

Originally Posted by AMBST95

I'd rather they open extended bidding at midnight and then close it the next afternoon rather than the other way around. There are enough people bidding in these auctions and enough lots for the 15 min rule to carry it through the night and then close it down when the whole country is awake.

I would be willing to bet that if this were tried, the auction would end at 2-4 am the next night, rather than in the afternoon.

[bobbyw8469]

As bad as Hunt Auctions website is to navigate, THEY GET IT! Run each lot on an individual basis. It forces people to bid or get off the pot, rather than allow one coast to stay awake longer than the other coast. You might as well call it "West Coast style auction", because it defintiely favors the west coast.

[base_ball]

Free shipping makes it all better...

[AMBST95]

Originally Posted by sb1

I would be willing to bet that if this were tried, the auction would end at 2-4 am the next night, rather than in the afternoon.

I'm just saying that if you're going to pick a random time to end an ongoing auction, do it while everyone is awake. What's the harm in letting extended bidding run a few more hours if bids still keep coming in? This way your bidders don't feel like they get taken advantage of based on where they live and your consigners get the extra bidding time to realize a higher profit. By just adjusting the time of the start of extended bidding you would be able to accomplish this. Start it at like 8am EST so the East Coast can get the ball rolling and end it around midnight if bids still are coming in and the whole country is reasonably awake still. No different than the current set up except now you lose bidders due to exhaustion.

[mybuddyinc]

In order to Snipe, you must be a Snark:


"Its habit of getting up late you'll agree
That it carries too far, when I say
That it frequently breakfasts at five-o'clock tea,
And dines on the following day."



Pretty sure I quoted this in the 2012 REA thread, I don't bring much to the table.