A Find Of A Life Time...#32

Hi Hy-Brasil,

Thank you for your input.

The thing with this auction was that the collection was considered the finest Canadian Collection ever assembled. So the owner of the collection, Ron Brigham, decided to open up his own auction company Brigham Auctions, in order to sell his collection. There was a 15% buyers premium as well. So he was the owner and auctioneer. It does say in the terms and conditions that the auction house has a right to withdraw any lot prior to sale. Also, the auctioneer has a right to reject any bid or re-offer any lot at his discretion.

Nothing about the owner allowing shill bidding though!

If you look at all the auctions combined, there were many items, that came up 2-3 times, because HIS OWN RESERVES were not met. Sometimes, you were bidding against yourself. He use to be in the auction business before his own sale. The sheer volume was overwhelming,. He had a lot of items that were really unique, but there was also a lot of filler in there. Like one dealer said to me, you have to buy the block of four for a single stamp and throw the rest out. There was a lot of this in his offerings.

They currently have a big listing of the finest and best Canada Large Queen stamps at https://drive.google.com/file/d/1be...yyilHhY/view

Hi Jogil,

Yes, I saw that, but thank you for posting. I clicked on your link and had a much closer look at the selling page. In two places on that flyer, Maxime lists her email address as

EMAIL: maxime@brighamauctions.com or canadastampfinder@gmail.com

So I guess that explains everything. Canada Stamp Finder is actually just the old Brigham Auctions, who are selling all of their items that did not meet their HIDDEN reserve during the auctions.

I have to admit feeling a little dismayed. In the TERMS and CONDITIONS, it should have stated that failure to reach a reserve will result in the lot being pulled. Granted, I did get the items I wanted from a number of the Brigham Auctions but I do have questions about the ethics of Mr. Brigham and Ms. Herold. I also have to wonder if they were shill bidding on the many lots that I purchased?

If the auction rules allow for reserves, then it is not shill bidding. It is common practice among many auction houses. You are merely bidding against the reserve. If they are claiming it is a no-reserve listing/auction, and they have someone bidding it up, then it is shill bidding.

All the auction houses that I have dealt with, will let you know upon request whether or not the item actually sold. If it didn't sell, some of them will even tell you what the reserve was. And among those, some of them will be willing to negotiate with you a direct sales price, which can often be a non-trivial amount below the reserve.

Case in point -- bidding up to C$475000 didn't meet the reserve, auctioneer gambled on a high reserve and lost, they learned their lesson, now it's listed for C$369000 (and you don't have to pay auction commission).