EVERYONE seems to agree that online auctions are important to the art world’s future. In 2013 Daniel Loeb, an activist investor, seethed over Sotheby’s “inability to even develop a coherent plan for an internet-sales strategy, much less implement one.” Sotheby’s has worked to remedy that, for example by joining forces with eBay and holding five online-only auctions last year. Christie’s holds its own online sales. Add a swarm of startups, and there seem to be ever more web auctioneers selling ever more art. But the ways in which online auctions are not changing art sales are as interesting as the ways in which they are.
Sales of art online reached €3.3 billion ($3.6 billion) in 2014, about 6% of all worldwide sales, according to the European Fine Art Foundation (TEFAF). Sceptics used to predict that collectors would be highly reluctant to buy online because they would want to inspect prospective purchases in person. However, David Goodman, Sotheby’s digital and marketing chief, argues that online sales will keep growing, with buyers “comfortable buying more and more things at more and more price points...Continue reading
Source: Business and finance http://ift.tt/2083LVI
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