Robert Opfer Auction results

It was interesting to watch the Robert Opfer Auction yesterday. There were some nice lamps that sold. I thought generally the prices were a bit higher than the Julia auction. I bought a couple of burmese shades that I needed and am hoping for the best with shipping and delivery. My thinking is that it may be a while before so many nice lamps come up for sale at one time as with these two auctions. I would like to have bought more, but the budget is stretched. I hope Fairy Lamp Club members were able to get something they had been looking for. I was hoping to find a straight-sided pyramid size Clarke's cup. There were two lamps with the straight-sided pyramid cup that sold, but they went for too much money to cannabilize just for the cup. Genene

I have put all the fairy lamp auction results in a separate document for future reference. It is on-line at:

http://www.fairy-lamp.com/Fairylamp/Opfer_Fairy_Lamp_Sales_062908.pdf

Jim.

I agree that the prices were slightly higher than Julias auction. Is that because some people didn't spend all thier money there, so they decided to use up the play money at the Opfer auction. I think this auction had prices closer to book prices than many before. Several went over book, which is a good and bad sign. Good if your selling, bad if your buying. I tried bidding online this time and lost out. Several of the items closed before my bid was recorded. I would still like to know who ended up with #580, maybe we could talk a trade.
I was also surprised to see the prices on some of the married or incomplete pieces go so high. The other question I have is why did one Puffy lamp go so much higher than the other. The complete and correct lamp was the cheapest of the two.
There were also some lamps I looked at for the pieces, but the prices were just a little to high to start breaking up lamps for bits and parts. (Like a pair of shoulders from the Childs Head / Monks Head lamp). This might be a lesson I soon forget (again), buy what you can when you can, worry about everything else later.

Somebody got a good deal on #580. I am sorry you had trouble with getting your bids in online. I don't know what the difficulty might have been. For me the bids registered immediately and I got two lots in the Julia auction and one in the Opfer auction online without trouble. Maybe it depends on how fast the bidding is going. The trouble I did have is that my power kept going on and off. I was so afraid that it would go off just before what I needed to bid on, but I lucked out. I have been collecting antiques for years as I have been furnishing and decorating our restored victorian home. I have found that I feel a lot worse about the one that got away than paying too much for something. I still agonize about price though as I make a decision about buying. I am always worried that the same item will come up for less money. Sometimes it happens, but more often than not it is a long time, if ever, before I see that item again. I have found that if I see an item I have been waiting for, it is better to buy than not. Genene

You were lucky to get your bids in. I phoned Opfer's last week and left an absentee bid. They failed to execute it and the lot sold for under my bid.

When I called them to leave bids, they told me I had to fill out the absentee bid form from thier web site and fax it in by Thursday at the latest. I was told they don't take bids over the phone. I wonder if that might have been the issue with your bids.

Interestingly we left commission bids on 6 lots a week before the auction. We bid what we believed to be reasonable bids all above the estimates but nevertheless "not crazy I must have at any cost" bids. Its now appears we were out bid on every lot by $25 (one bid morethan ours). Now I am not saying that anything unscrupulous was happening but it does seems very odd ! Maybe they did not want to ship to the UK !!

My experience with absentee bids has been the same. I have been outbid by the next increment. I decided that floor bidders have the advantage. Though they don't know what the absentee bid is, the auctioneer can encourage the floor bidder to make one more bid. I have decided that online bidding works best for me. This isn't perfect either because sometimes the online bid is too slow to register. It is best to be there, but not possible for me. Genene