Obviously auctions are a total crapshoot so you never know what you are going to get, but another thing that I considered was given how K&L doesn’t ship to certain states, someone like me would bid on Winebid, but not on K&L. So even though the commission rate is lower with K&L, I just thought Winebid would ultimately have a bigger pool of bidders.
My experience with K&L low estimates are just that - low estimates. I’ve sold 15 or so cases over the years through K&L and usually get quite a bit higher than low estimate. It really depends though on how in demand your wine is. If you want to get a feel for sale prices K&L is very open. Check out the link below - you can see how frequently they’ve moved wine like yours and what the actual sale prices have been.
https://www.klwines.com/Auction/Information/AuctionPastLotsList.aspx
I haven’t sold through Winebid, but I have bought a lot from them. Both companies are high quality operations. Seems like Winebid is still a place where one can bottom feed on wines with low demand. Hotter stuff gets bid up a lot though. My SWAG is that for the latter types of wines the two sites would yield similar results.
Though I think it’s a real plus on one’s resume if you run for Congress.
I have had very good luck with lots as small as a single bottle at Spectrum Wine Auctions. I suggest that you call Dan Rhodes at Spectrum and advise of the specific wines. It’s rare now that an auction at Spectrum doesn’t have something consigned by me. I suffer the same problem as many on this board - wines purchased in my reckless youth a few decades ago are obscenely appreciated in value. With kids in college, can’t really justify pounding down a 25 year old grand cru at pizza nite. My experience with retailers is that the margin they are looking for significantly depresses what actually winds up in your pocket.
I ended up doing WineBid because of the free pickup kicker. I watched auctions for a few weeks, and it does look like K&L generates more bidding (whereas a lot of WB lots end up selling for a single bid of the reserve price). The significantly lower buyers premium I’m sure helps (though it also explains why their margins are tighter and they don’t offer free pickup).
I put in just enough to hit the $10k threshold for free pickup and held a few bottles back (the pricest ones) and may do a K&L consignment in the Fall. By then I can do 3-day air shipping. Sending a single case or two of $300+ wines via 3-day air is a lot more palatable than sending 15 cases by overnight shipping when lots of those wines are in the $30-80 bracket.
Hi Justin and all- you just put your finger on a very funny behavior of wine sellers. Would you rather list a wine at $80 and see lots of bids up to $90, or list the wine at $95 and see one bid at $95? That’s the benefit of 20+ years of data at WineBid- knowing how to price wines for maximum return to the seller, while still offering a fair deal to buyers. Don’t be fooled by “bidding action” or low commissions- what matters most is absolute hammer $ and net to you. Feel free to ping me directly for more info. Thanks for your support. Happy tasting and sharing everyone.
That’s definitely a good point. I’m excited to see how the auctions go! I should’ve also been more clear that I hadn’t definitely decided to use K+L for remaining wines — just that I will have more options in the fall. I’ll probably try and compare alike bottles hammer prices before moving forward with the fall consignment somewhere.
Aren’t the AFWE wines the ones Jay wants to keep.
Are you willing to share what percentage of bids you see mid-week vs in the last few hours (or even minutes) of bidding?
In a live auction format, it’s really much easier to follow the logic of the process … the wine usually goes for somewhere in the estimate range unless you have 2 or more bidders who really want something and/or have something very difficult to find. Either way, the process plays out live, and nobody has a chance of getting “beaten by the buzzer” because the bidding doesn’t stop until everyone but the high bidder cries uncle.
In the weekly auction format, I’m curious of the logic and wonder if you’d be willing to share. Thanks for being an active participant in a public forum!
Hi Justin, great question. Unfortunately, I have to beg off a detailed public answer on that one, as it is competitive information and it’s not lost on me that other auction houses are trying to go online, trying to go weekly and even trying to do Sunday nights earlier than WineBid. Others are now copying us, even down to their email messaging. I guess it’s like that old quote, “imitation is the sincerest form of flattery.” What I can tell you is that the bidding is well spread throughout the week, with some level of uptick on Sunday night, as one would expect (but maybe not as much as you would think) for auction close. And as I have said publicly before, the best bet to win the items you want is to bid early, and set your max bid at what you’ll feel good at, so you don’t lose something at the last second. Max bid does not automatically bid that amount, it only bids up if someone bids against you. Hope that helps.