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Hello All,
I was present at the last Sheffield auction and although the attendance was as always high, by half time the punters had thinned noticeably. I also noticed a greater degree of holding back on bids with Ian about to drop the hammer on several occasions only to receive a new bidder and the selling value increasing by several tens if not hundreds of pounds!
Shedcodes and some 'plain style' steam works plates have been reproduced many times years gone by and I would not like to decide authenticity on many occasions!! I think this holds back prices when times are hard.
Why do we collect railway items and pay these high prices when disposable income for many is getting far less at the moment? My theory is association with happier times, riding the last peaks, class 40's, etc, and now the class 37's - we long for a piece of our memories, perhaps of happier days with less worry in our lives?? The purchaser of these diesel plates was probably born in the 1960's/1970's so is now 35 - 45, probably married with children growing up and probably has a little more disposable income than 5 - 10 years ago so looks to spend on his 'memories' explaining to his loved ones that these collectors items are an investment for the future! There is still a generation either at this age or coming through who have memories of this era and I feel prices will remain buoyant for diesel/electric items for 10 years or so at least?
What of the "steamy boys" - these tend to be senior age mostly male now at retirement and either feel it is now or never to own that dreamed after item, buying a memory of many years ago, hence comparatively high prices particularly for choice steam items. What happens in the next 10 years? Who knows - collectors forming a collection will replace them but less so those buying a reminder of long ago memories.
As for relative rarity of specific items such as key tokens, then either by reading the current collectors journals, visiting other peoples collections and generally talking to other collectors will build up a picture of what is classed as rare or otherwise.
Two other serious thoughts: It only takes two to bid an item up to a comparatively high value, one of these can be a reserve value or so called 'commission bid', and don't forget about the lottery winners or those with fairly high redundancy pay offs - I feel these are becoming more common than you think in all areas of collecting and almost bid with a 'money is not a problem attitude', feeling in years to come values will reach that level anyway! Will they I wonder??
What are your thoughts? Do you fall into one of these categories and is it all as simple as this? I think maybe not.
Best regards
Alan.
----- Original Message -----From: mp45718Sent: Wednesday, March 22, 2006 1:18 AMSubject: [railwayana_group] Last Sheffield - and some thoughts!I found the results interesting - shed plates seem to have halted the
ever upward moves and wagon plates didn't shine - the ROF Woolwich was
cheap, and so many early steam builders plates at bargain prices, but
totems seemed firm, as did nameplates. Interesting that ex BR diesel
builders plates generally seem to command more than steam plates -
unless with a positive rarity value.
There still seems to be money out there, but I must admit that the
catalogue seems to contain a little more hype than before and
certainly contained some significant errors.
So where are we going? We need new blood coming into the hobby, but I
would be wary of splashing big money on things when I had no real idea
of their rarity or collectability.
How do we help newcomers understand that aspect? For example I am no
expert on single line tokens so I have no idea of the relative rarity
of say a Cambrian main line section versus say one from the Cruckmeol
branch (I could imagine from my professional knowledge that there were
many more of the former than the latter - but that is only a guess)
But if one were offered how does the newcomer gauge the relative value
and how much to spend, (I have seen people buying big into common
stamps only to find that a dealer will offer them 20% of face 5 years
on, whereas if they had invested the same into the top value stamps
they might have turned a dollar), and if a newcomer experiences the
same in railwayana will he want to continue, after all we expect to
recover our investments - don't we?
Comments welcomed!
Malcolm
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