Huge Tool Auction

[Papaw]

Metzger Auctions will have a large auction featuring lots of wrenches. Saturday, February 1    10:00 AM

Live Auction Location: Wabash County Fairgrounds  , Wabash, IN- Map- https://maps.google.com/?daddr=Wabash+County+Fairgrounds,+Wabash,+IN
http://www.metzgerauction.com/site_flash/february1.html
 

[rustcollector]

That was possibly one of the weirdest, most unorganized auctions I've ever taken place in. Why have lot numbers if you are going to group anywhere from 2 to 8 lots together and then sell some of those groups by choice of lots and others by all for one money? Not to mention the mis-marked wrenches and pictures that have many wrenches in the picture, with tiny little lot numbers on each wrench so you can barely tell for sure which lot it really is that you want.
All in all, they got good money for that stuff though. The IHC funnel, if it was truly a IHC funnel, was cheap enough, but other common wrenches brought well over what they are worth.

I did end up with lot 735, it includes an Independent Silo wrench, a fairly common but hard to find in my area Avery wrench and a couple that were turned to where I can't see what is on the other side of them but I have a good idea what they should be. If I can get really lucky, they may be some harder to find variants though.

[rustcollector]

I pointed out the bad with the auction....

So I need to point out the good too....

I received my wrenches today in the mail. That is a very good turn around time on their end and does not go unnoticed. I will not hesitate to bid on one of their online auctions in the future due to that. As compared to Aumann auctioneers that took months to get Carl Wagner his stuff last year and an auctioneer I won a lot from last November and am still waiting to receive.

BTW... the lot contained 5 decent wrenches, the Independant silo I was after, A really nice Montgomery wards silo wrench, A nice Avery 251 (low value wrench but it's a nice example) A Janeville C wrench(van brunt style) that I didn't have yet and a R55 moline wrench. Not a steal of a deal, but well worth my bid.

[mvwcnews]

A really well organized auction that does justice to a collection & goes out of its way to make it easy for absentee bidders  (has  clear catalog & decent terms for absentee bidding) is a rare bird indeed. 

If you think about it from the business perspective -- what kind of "gross $$ per hour" does an auction have to realize to pay the help & overhead?    I don't know how many hours Metzgers put into that online exposition & I'll agree the exposition was poorly done.  They should have had more  text description for the numbered lots instead of relying on photos.   How many auctioneers know how to put together a catalog auction or are willing to take that much time?  You start counting the hours it can take to sort a collection, find an expert to identify things & supply accurate descriptions, etc. & preparing a catalog is potentially a very expensive proposition unless you've got some enthusiast who is willing to do it for the love of the thing.    Just ask  "Bus" about doing one a year for the MVWC spring meets.

And when it comes to selling, the same "$$$ per hour" calculus comes into play.  That's the auctioneer's bread & butter -- balance effort & potential hammer price.     

[rustcollector]

I see your point Stan. At the same time, if you can't do the seller justice in doing the auction the way it should be done, bringing both the seller and auctioneer the best returns, then why agree to do the auction? If I had consigned that collection I would be livid with the way it was handled. Guess that's why we have Bus though, he knows how to do it, knows what he is doing in all aspects of it and I don't believe there is a person alive that could do it any better than what he does. Maybe that's why these other ones look so terrible. Martin Donnelly would be a close second just because of the quirky little tidbits he'll add into a description here and there, but I don't think he has the knowledge of wrenches like Bus does.

Guess I'm just stuck on the old saying that if a job is worth doing it's worth doing right. Most of the time that pays 10 fold down the line. Most nowadays are in it for the here and now though I suppose, and I don't mean just auctioneers but people in general.

[Lewill2]

I think Martin Donnelly has a pretty good knowledge of wrenches as he is/was a wrench guy himself, his problem is he is chasing lots of tools to fill his auctions and his workers are doing a lot of the research and catalog descriptions along with input from him. Just my opinion. When it comes to wrenches all by them selves the MVWC auctions are tops for me too. Martin can't live on only wrenches and neither can Clarence Blanchard of Browns auctions.

[rustcollector]

I think Martin Donnelly has a pretty good knowledge of wrenches as he is/was a wrench guy himself, his problem is he is chasing lots of tools to fill his auctions and his workers are doing a lot of the research and catalog descriptions along with input from him. Just my opinion. When it comes to wrenches all by them selves the MVWC auctions are tops for me too. Martin can't live on only wrenches and neither can Clarence Blanchard of Browns auctions.

I should have been clearer... Martin is very knowledgeable of patented type wrenches but I think he either lacks much or just doesn't care about ones in the realm of farm implement and other areas of wrenches. I can understand if they aren't his thing. Just as I could care less about a 1930's craftsman wrench compared to a 1950's craftsman wrench.