Remember the days when you would get up on a Saturday morning and drive to a live auction? It was a great place to grab a hotdog and coke and catch up with the neighbors under a tent while, at times, trying to outbid the same neighbors when the item you both wanted came across the block. The atmosphere was electric. The chant of a great Auctioneer is mesmerizing, exciting, and enticing. Any auction that could pull 100 bidders to attend was considered a huge success!

That all changed in 2020 when Covid hit. While the online auction platforms had been growing steadily since the mid-1990’s, they went into overdrive with the onslaught of Auctioneers needing to market their customer’s goods but not having the ability to have a crowd present. Honestly, everyone thought that this would be temporary and that most auctions would go back to the old way of business after things settled. However, there were unanticipated benefits to moving the bidding online; The reach of the auctions went global!

People ask us “Will you ever start doing live auctions again?” Aside from a unique circumstance that would be in the best interest of the seller, we do not see the live auction days returning.

As much as we miss the atmosphere and all that goes with the live auction, we believe that online auctions are the future of the industry. We have seen both growing and lasting benefits to online auctions. Among those is that auction registrations have risen from around 100 (at a good live auction) to a point that it is more common than not to have 500 plus bidders for an auction. The pool of bidders has also expanded to the entire world.

We have also observed that we are reaching a new market of younger bidders who will stay on their phone or computer all day long to watch items that they are interested in. In the latter years of live auctions, it was difficult to maintain a strong crowd presence after only a few hours. I am thankful that so many of our long-time bidders have easily made the transition to bidding on their phone or computer. I recently helped a 95-year-young woman set up her iPad to be able to bid at an auction. She showed up on pick-up day and, when I asked her how it went, she said “It was a blast!” with a huge smile. For my part, I have to say, it is pretty nice to sit in my easy chair and bid on something that I am interested in, especially when the weather is bad.

We will continue to have open house events for our auctions. We believe this is a true benefit to our local buyers who have the chance to walk through the auction and personally inspect the items that they are interested in.

Auction customers who sell with The Steffen Group receive the benefit of our in-house shipping service. This gives us an opportunity to ensure things are safely packed and affordably shipped which, in turn, helps create customer loyalty to our auctions. We have multiple out-of-state buyers who regularly buy from our auctions, and we have shipped items all over the world.

So, as we consider all that has changed in the auction industry in the past five years, we see that auction industry is healthy, strong, and continuing to grow. With eight Auctioneers and a complete support group to help with everything from setup and clean up to photography and marketing, we have the ability to help you market your merchandise to the world.

Rod Fetters