The Joy of the hunt…

I love going to auction.  But one of the disadvantages of being professional, is you don’t normally get to go just for fun!  Mind you, we have fun…but now I go to auction with a specific purchase in mind.

This week, the purchase was german stein.

The above pictures were posted on the auction website.  After spending several hours researching, I was armed with the information I needed to tell if it was real or a reproduction.

One of the issues with Auction houses and Auctioneers is that they are usually in a hurry.  The little ones are barely making ends meet and the auctioneer rarely has time to research the items the way he thought he would when he got into the business.  The Auctioneer hopes that his steady customers will do the research and therefore provide his consigner with a reasonable profit.  Us steady customers really hope no one else researches the items at all…so we can get a good deal!

Upon arriving at the auction, I casually picked up the mug and took a picture.

O.k. so it wasn’t a clear picture.

Among the other scribbles were the two things I needed to know.  One is under the blue circle.  That would be a very blurry Mettlach stamp.  The other was the 2007 stamp (yellow circle red arrow).  This stamp and that mark meant that this particular mug was from around 1891.

It was a really stormy night, so I had high hopes that no one would show up.

My hopes were horribly dashed.  A really stormy night meant that only the diehard dealers showed up.  And dang it, the old man was one of them.

I don’t know the old man’s name.  He is quite the dapper fella.  Very distinguished.  And if I’ve done my research, and if I’ve picked the very best item in the auction to bid on, and if the old man is there, he is going to win it.

That doesn’t mean I give up.  Nope, nope, nope.   It just means unless I over bid, I’m gonna lose.

I’ve tried sidling up to the old man and striking up the conversation.  Sometime last year, after five or more years going to the same auctions, he actually began to recognize me.  We even exchanged words a few times.  But no indication that he had warmed up to me at all.  The old man seemed to know everyone, but didn’t seem to spend much time talking to anyone.  All business.

I’ve been watching him for years.  Noticing what he bid on.  Figuring I got it right when I bid on the same items before he did.  Discovering I went a little too high, the one time I did actually out bid him.

I didn’t see him at the auction until he bid on a nice quilt.  I have to say I was a little auction blind and excited.  It didn’t occur to me that he was there for my item.  I opened the bid at $10. He countered. We went back and forth until I got to my limit.  He went over it and won the mug.

I was sort of disappointed, but not really. I had been outplayed.  He walked over to me and said, “Are you the one who ran up my bid?”  I answered, “Yes sir.”, He counter “That’s o.k.” and gave me a huge grin.

We then stepped away from the auction and discussed the mug.  Where it was from, how we knew it was real, the issue with the crack in the medialon, all the things we each had discovered before we came to auction.  We had walked a lot of the same paths researching it and some different ones which we shared.  Another dealer came up and said, “You know it’s a reproduction right? It’s marked 2007.”  The old man proceeded to explain that the “2007″ stamp was the model, not the year.  Then he grinned at me and went to gather his mug…and to check the spot where I said it might have been patched or it might just be dirty.

My husband and I ended up walking out right behind the old man.  We’d loss the item we came for.  But I had more fun than I’ve had in a long time and I grinned for days when I got introduced by the old man as the lady who ran up the bid on his mug!

P.S. If you want to run up the bid on his mug yourself, or just see how the story actually turns out, it seems the old man placed it on eBay.

P.P.S.  The Auction finished for a grand total of $307.52.  I won’t tell you what he paid for it…but it twas a handsome profit he made.