uglydukwling
ArboristSite Member
I haven't been to an auction in some time, but I used to go to a lot of them. Things may have changed, but it used to be common for shills to openly bid on behalf of either the owner or the auctioneer. It was also common for an auctioneer to withdraw an item if he didn't like the bidding, whether or not he had announced a reserve. At one sale I remember, the auctioneer had been withdrawing a lot of items. When he put a pair of crutches up, somebody shouted "You better keep them. You might need them before the sale's over".
Another practice I've run into is "chandelier" bidding. (Obviously the term, if not the practice, originated in indoor auction halls.) The auctioneer would gesture toward the back of the room and announce a bid. If there was no obvious bidder, the running joke was that he was taking bids from the chandelier.
Sometimes, at farm auctions, the auctioneer would announce that he would be bidding on a particular item for himself, or for an absentee bidder.
If a piece of junk didn't sell, it would be combined with the next item. If it still didn't sell, it would go in the unsold pile. At the end of the sale, there was always a scrap dealer willing to bid on the pile, so nothing went unsold.
There was one auctioneer in particular who was notorious for his sketchy practices. As well as his rather imaginative descriptions, it was common knowledge that he owned a lot of the things he auctioned. Often a machine would be "sold" and then turn up at the next business he liquidated. As well as doing on-site sales, he had his own yard where he handled consignments, a lot of which were actually his own stuff. Sometimes an item would sit unsold in his yard for weeks until finally, he'd say "Who'll take it for free?" I often found I could make a better deal by approaching him after the sale was over and making an offer on an unsold item, than by bidding against his shills. I kept going back because there were some genuine bargains to be had. People became so wary of bidding that a lot of stuff ended up going for less than scrap value.
Another practice I've run into is "chandelier" bidding. (Obviously the term, if not the practice, originated in indoor auction halls.) The auctioneer would gesture toward the back of the room and announce a bid. If there was no obvious bidder, the running joke was that he was taking bids from the chandelier.
Sometimes, at farm auctions, the auctioneer would announce that he would be bidding on a particular item for himself, or for an absentee bidder.
If a piece of junk didn't sell, it would be combined with the next item. If it still didn't sell, it would go in the unsold pile. At the end of the sale, there was always a scrap dealer willing to bid on the pile, so nothing went unsold.
There was one auctioneer in particular who was notorious for his sketchy practices. As well as his rather imaginative descriptions, it was common knowledge that he owned a lot of the things he auctioned. Often a machine would be "sold" and then turn up at the next business he liquidated. As well as doing on-site sales, he had his own yard where he handled consignments, a lot of which were actually his own stuff. Sometimes an item would sit unsold in his yard for weeks until finally, he'd say "Who'll take it for free?" I often found I could make a better deal by approaching him after the sale was over and making an offer on an unsold item, than by bidding against his shills. I kept going back because there were some genuine bargains to be had. People became so wary of bidding that a lot of stuff ended up going for less than scrap value.
