Make Money Buying and Selling Antiques: Art Pottery

Rookwood Pottery. (Photo from www.bargainjohn.com)

When you're looking to make money buying and selling antiques & collectibles, it's important to take note that Collectors of art pottery will usually stop at nothing to purchase the pieces they desire.

So pottery is second to fine art on my list of treasures to find. I have many success stories to share with you and hopefully after reading this blog you will be sharing yours with me in the future. It was only after attending an auction at the Cincinnati Art Gallery that I became a true believer in the business of buying and selling art pottery.

Sitting in my seat on the third row so that I could see everything that was going on at the auction, I began to plan my strategies for purchasing the items that I had circled in the catalog. One item really caught my eye because I hadn't ever seen one like it. It was a plaque showing a steamship pulling out of port. It was a rather large plaque and I figured it would bring some nice money but did I ever underestimate it! This piece, that could have possible been purchased at a house sale for five to seven thousand dollars, never looked back as it passed $50,000. The audience, including me, was holding its breath at $75,000 and people were applauding as it sailed past $100,000. Who says you can't make money in this business?

It wasn't that dramatic but I attended a house sale where there was a Grueby vase being offered. Every dealer in Chicago was ahead of me in line so I returned home thinking that I might return to the sale later, which I did. The vase was still there with its $5000 price tag and I was asked if I would like to purchase it. My answer was “Why should I when everyone else has passed on it?” I was able to negotiate a deal by putting four other items with it, and the total I paid was $3200. Do you see where I follow my own rules? The four pieces sold for around $2000 but, are you ready for this? The Grueby vase sold in Cincinnati for $13,500. I ask, can you make money with art pottery? I walked into a shop in Glencoe, Illinois and spotted a rather plain Rookwood small vase. What made it special was that the vase was carved. It was uncrazed and by one of the top artists at Rookwood pottery, so I figured that I would make a pass at it for around $300. The price tag read $600 and after some lengthy negotiations I was able to purchase it for $350. I feel I made a fair return on my money as it sold for $4500 at auction.

But this isn't about me so how can I help you? First I would like to give a list of what I think the leading potteries are. These are not in any particular order: Rookwood, Grueby, Newcomb, George Ohr, University of North Dakota, Marblehead, Teco and believe it or not, Tiffany. A great book to study on is American Art Pottery by David Rago. It should be purchased at Abebooks.com or Amazon.com and it doesn't matter if it is used. Also you have heard me say many times that you should always keep your Kovels Book of Marks close at hand.

Here are the steps that I take to value a piece of pottery. First, who made it and who is the artist? Second, I evaluate the condition. It should be mint to bring top dollar as damage can take 75% of the value away. Then I look at the size--the larger the better is a general rule (in fact some pottery is valued by the inch). Last, is the market for this pottery increasing or decreasing? Why did I include that last step? Here is an example: Roseville was one of the favorites of the dealers but the market has gone down dramatically for Roseville pieces so I didn't include it in my list. Yes, if you can buy them cheaply enough they are still a buy, but not at the prices of past years. You see we want to make money and not let others set the prices for us so, yes the market is important.

When you want to make money buying and selling antiques & collectibles, staying with pottery makes sense, because there is an ample supply to be had and there will always be collectors for the better pieces.


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Daryle Lambert: Art Glass, Pottery and Paintings make money.

Our wish should be to compound the money we start with until our goals are reached. So to make real money you have to follow a plan and ours is to compound our capital on each transaction we make. My thinking is that we shouldn't try to reinvent the wheel but to follow the easiest route to success. By that I mean we should deal in items that are the most popular in the field of Fine Art and Collectibles.

Yes the rare and unusual command the higher prices but you will find that those in certain areas appear most often and will bring you the greatest rewards. The nest of the bald eagle might be extremely rare but how many people are looking for one? On the other hand a rare vase by one of the better artists at Rookwood Pottery will be sought after by everyone that appreciates great pottery. No, everyone won't be able to afford it but if their circumstances change they may well be a future buyer.

With this reasoning, I have honed down my list to four areas of antiques and collectibles that I spend most of my time researching. Art Glass, Pottery, Paintings and Porcelain seem to be where the biggest bucks are, so these are the ones I concentrate on. I will try to break these down to a list in each area that will allow you to make money and have fun.

First, in the area of Art Glass, you must start with Tiffany because it is still the number one glass in the world for collectors. Be careful of reproductions and false signatures with Tiffany because there are many out there. You can't go wrong with a piece made by Tiffany if you purchase it right. There are some items made by Tiffany that are unsigned but you should let the buyer decide whether it is a real Tiffany or not. I once purchased a small vase, unmarked, for $40 and put it on eBay and it sold for over $1800 even though my reserve was just $400. The purchaser said that it was an unmarked piece of Tiffany and that was perfectly okay with me. Any red piece of Tiffany will bring extra money because of its rarity.

My second favorite Art Glass is enamel and etched cameo glass such as Galle and Daum Nancy. These pieces, depending on the quality of the workmanship, can start at $10,000. The top end is unlimited. A great source of information for you should be Victor Arwas book on glass, Art Nouveau to Art Deco. You might find a great art glass treasure and it could come in the form of a miniature piece by these companies. I once bought a vase by Daum Nancy that was less than 2” tall for a couple of hundred bucks, but after my research I was able to sell it for more than $3500. As with all glass, check for reproductions.

Two other companies that I keep an eye out for are Steuben and Lalique. I have been asked to write on Steuben and I will do that in the future. Frederick Carder was the most famous designer at the Steuben studios and any piece marked by him will be a great treasure. Steuben made many different types of glass and you can read about them in Victor Arwas' book. Lalique is also a very respected producer of fine glass, but don't get carried away with the contemporary pieces. Newer pieces that might retail for $5000 can often be purchased in the open market for under $1000. Color does count with the newer pieces of Lalique and they usually do better than the clear pieces. Rene Lalique pieces are the ones you want to find and they are top collectibles. You will find the real buyers searching for these pieces and if you find any the rewards will be fantastic. To make money, remember you need to find the pieces that others are searching for.

This blog has proven to be longer than I thought it would be so I will continue with Pottery, Paintings and Porcelain in my next three blogs.



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Daryle Lambert: We want to make money but with what?

Thanks to Flicker



The first comment I want to make is that there is still plenty of money out there to purchase the treasures you find. People still have money. They might be less inclined to spend it, but for the right things they still can be persuaded. But what might they buy you are asking?

Let me share with you what can make money in these times regardless of the economic conditions. Things that remind them of good times and happy events in their lives will always sell. People like to have items in their homes that bring back memories spent with family and good friends. Baseball memorabilia is one of the best examples of this phenomenon. Little boys played ball as children and had their heroes such as Babe Ruth and Willie Mays so anything that pertains to these individuals is highly desirable.

It is always best to remember that you are buying for others not yourself so it is best when buying to put yourself in their place. No you may not like 19th century uncut paper dolls but I will guarantee you that if you see any you should buy them. They can bring you great rewards. As a general rule today, anything that was made before 1960 should require your attention. This doesn't mean that everything made before that date has value but it is worth looking into. Here is a tip “ everything that is old isn't necessarily valuable because if it was junk when it was made it is probably junk today, But if it is old and was valuable when it was made its value today could be huge.”

One of my rules is that if I haven't seen it then there is the possibility that it is rare. You will be able to say this yourself as you continue to search places like antique shows, flea markets, house and garage sales and other venues you use to search for your treasures in an effort to make money.

Also you can accelerate your progress in reaching your goal by buying whole collections when you find them This is true because when you buy collections your price per piece will be reduced. The seller will look at your offer because it will seem larger than if you bought just one piece. For instance, let’s look at one item with an asking price of $1000. There are ten pieces in the whole collection but this is the one you really would like to buy. You have decided that the other pieces also could be easily sold so what should your offer be? If the seller is asking $500 each for the other nine pieces his total price is $5500. After examining them to see there isn't any damage, you estimate that the price that they may be sold for is $12,000 even though the retail might even be higher. Under these conditions I would offer $4000. This amount will seem to be a much larger total to the seller but actually you will be getting the $1000 item much cheaper. Your average cost will be only $400 per item including the one that was priced at $1000. If you purchase the collection and they are sold for $12,000 you have just achieved more than one step in your race to the million.

Just to give you a little to chew on, let’s assume you completed this transaction and then duplicated it on your next transaction. $12,000 then becomes $48,000. Now that makes me smile and I hope that it does you too. Yes, these are big figures, but even if this is just your first transaction of spending the $100 in your account then the first step is $300 and the next is $900. So no mater where you are in the journey you’re going to arrive with a bucket full of money. Isn't it time for you to make money for yourself?


Put a Turbo Charge on your Antique & Collectible Treasure Hunting Skills. Join Daryle Lambert's 31 Club.

Get FREE MENTORING. Learn Inside the Industry Secrets that help you make money buying and selling antiques & collectibles. Then Learn to Grow Your Money Exponentially with Daryle's Strategic Business Plan on How to Make Money Buying and Selling Antiques & Collectibles. Our Members are Newbies to Seasoned Dealers, making more money than they thought possible. Join Daryle Lambert's 31 Club, today.

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Check out the new Paintings and new items in our Gallery and Marketplace here.

Daryle Lambert: The first step to help you make money

COMPOUNDING MAKES MONEY

Thanks to www.buildyourlifetoorder.com


If you have read the book that I have written then I would assume that you have opened your new bank account with $100 or slightly more if you wish. This has to be an amount that you will not need until your goal is met. This can't be an account that you co-mingle with your other personal accounts because that would defeat the purpose of what we are going to be doing--compounding the amount of money in our account. You have now entered the Million Dollar Race with the other members of the 31 Club. Our purpose is to make money and have fun while we're doing it.

I just received an email from one of our members stating that the market for even the rare and unusual items is beginning to drop. That may be true but that doesn't change our plan one iota. We must adjust the price we are willing to pay for an item to reflect the new retail price. I will give you an example. Last week I received an email from a gentleman that wanted to sell a very desirable T. C. Steele painting with impeccable provenance. I think that his asking price of $58,000 might have been a reasonable price a year ago but not today. After talking to him at great length about the painting and finding out that it came directly from the family, I told him that $20,000 would be my best offer.

Never over the last few years did I believe that a fantastic T. C. Steele painting of real quality would ever be bought for this meager sum, but things do change don't they? No, I haven't bought the painting yet and I may not, but when I spend the money in my 31 Club account it will only be spent if I can buy following the rules that I have set. I don't have to be in a rush because my goal is to compound my money at least twice a year so I have six months each time to do that. We also have to be willing to change our ideas of what an item is worth to make money. You see even if I thought that I could buy the painting for $38,000 and sell it for $40,000 it wouldn't meet the goals that I have set for purchasing and unless I had it pre-sold I would have to pass.

So today the first step to is to open our account understanding that this account is not to be used for any other purpose other than our new business and never is there to be a withdrawal from it unless it is for a purchase or an expense pertaining to that purchase. Also, our goal is to buy at 25% of the current retail value and not to break this rule unless the item we are purchasing is pre-sold.

Tomorrow we will talk about what to buy and why so that we can continue to make money.


Put a Turbo Charge on your Antique & Collectible Treasure Hunting Skills. Join Daryle Lambert's 31 Club.

Get FREE MENTORING. Learn Inside the Industry Secrets that help you make money buying and selling antiques & collectibles. Then Learn to Grow Your Money Exponentially with Daryle's Strategic Business Plan on How to Make Money Buying and Selling Antiques & Collectibles. Our Members are Newbies to Seasoned Dealers, making more money than they thought possible. Join Daryle Lambert's 31 Club, today.

My 220 page book about how to make money buying and selling antiques & collectibles is FREE with your membership. Join Today!

Check out the new Paintings and new items in our Gallery and Marketplace here.

Daryle Lambert: It is time - to make money

I have been visiting with you going on two years now and we have shared many ideas together but if you aren't in a better position to make money today than you were two years ago I have failed. This is a time when people are having a hard times getting by and it is my desire to see that we working together can make that load lighter for each of us. But to do that I need your help. Yes God has given me the knowledge necessary for others to improve their life but it is up to us together to share this information that is relevant to solving the problems we face today. I can continue to write each day what is on my mind but if that isn't helping you then what is the purpose.

Telling you how others make money is fine but that doesn't help pay your bills, so hopefully for a few day I want to write blogs that directly can effect your well being. To do that I need to hear from you and see if the program that I laid out in the “31 Steps to Your Millions in Antiques and Collectibles” is working. I wrote that the purpose of the book was to help the average person make money by the knowledge that I would share with them not the amount of money they had to invest.

There is a fun thing about people that make money they all have a drive to be successful. With all the knowledge that I share with you if you truly don't have the drive to succeed then the final conclusion will always be the same, disappointment. I attempt to answer every email plus I have published my phone number so that you can have immediate contact with me. The thing I can't do is answer unsent emails or phones that don't ring. I am appealing to you that have the desire to change your life for the better to use all the tools that the 31 Club provides.

This is the start of a new year and my question is have you entered the Million Dollar Race and what step are you on or aee you still at the starting gate? The true is that for us to be successful we must have a plan and that is what I have attempted to do but I can't force you to follow it. I have found that the best things are usually the simplest and that is what the 31 plans is intended to do, give you a simple plan.

I hear everyday friends of mine say I want to make Money but when I begin discussing ways to do that they try to think of reasons why it won't work. Then I turn the table on them by asking how is your present plan working?

Over the next week I would like to review the plans that we entered into together and hopefully will have questins from you that I can answer along the way. Lets get back to the basics and make money together.


Put a Turbo Charge on your Antique & Collectible Treasure Hunting Skills. Join Daryle Lambert's 31 Club.

Get FREE MENTORING. Learn Inside the Industry Secrets that help you make money buying and selling antiques & collectibles. Then Learn to Grow Your Money Exponentially with Daryle's Strategic Business Plan on How to Make Money Buying and Selling Antiques & Collectibles. Our Members are Newbies to Seasoned Dealers, making more money than they thought possible. Join Daryle Lambert's 31 Club, today.

My 220 page book about how to make money buying and selling antiques & collectibles is FREE with your membership. Join Today!

Check out the new Paintings and new items in our Gallery and Marketplace here.

Daryle Lambert: WOW! It could have been you

I believe it has begun in earnest and that is the appreciation of the Obama memorabilia. I was watching the news on Yahoo and a gentleman was talking about the car that he had purchased for $24,000 and now had it listed on eBay for a price of one million dollars “buy it now”. He listed it at the end of last year and took it down on advice from his accountant but there were 41 bids and a high price of $1,551.000.

The new listing shows a starting price of $100,000 but only from approved bidders. It will be interesting to see what the final bid will be but, whatever it is, in the future that price may prove to be a bargain. It is too late to buy that car but what else should we be looking for that has been a part of President Obama's life?

The hunt for the Obama treasures will be a continuing adventure and this gives you the opportunity to cash in on it. My suggestion to you is to try to find things that were part of his early life, like letters that he wrote as a young man, Boy Scout cards if he was a scout, driver’s licenses, school papers he signed and I am sure you can think of many more. Don't forget his wife and children, because items they possessed will also have value. When they sold Kennedy's items, his son’s rocking horse brought over $100,000, if I remember correctly.



It would be an interesting idea to just concentrate on Obama over the next few years and see if by doing so you could become the “go to” guy or gal for information and items pertaining to President Obama. I have read articles about the biggest dealers in sports memorabilia and they have become extremely wealthy. This will happen with the President’s collectibles also.

I would like to hear from some of you that took my idea of going to Obama's headquarters and collected campaign items that will do nothing but go up in value over the next ten years. If you were fortunate enough to get duplicates, don't sell them all at once.

It still isn't too late to cash in on this special event that will occur next Tuesday.


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Daryle Lambert: Surprises never cease

Thanks to www.americaremembers.com


This story will take you around the bush but I think that you will enjoy it. I love to share with you when I see items that I have never seen before and this story is about one of those items that I will never forget.

I have been on a quest to understand the bible better and this journey has taken me to some very exciting places. Not long ago I shared that I was troubled by some of the conclusions that I had come to in the bible and this friend of mine by the name of Jerry must have begun to worry about me. He would suggest this bible study and then another until I finally said that if I attended the one that he was sharing with me now, would he join me? His answer was “yes.”

So two Sundays ago, after my regular services, I attended an evening Sunday night service with Jerry. Being new in the church we had several people approach us including the pastor, welcoming us to the service. I thoroughly enjoyed my time there but as I was leaving the pastor asked where I lived and what profession I was in. After I told him I wrote a book about antiques, he seemed to be very interested and asked if he could call me. I assured him it would be welcomed and we left it there. In just a few days the phone rang and this gentleman said “ How are you? “Not wanting to act like I didn't recognize him I said “ Fantastic.” “This is the pastor and I was wondering if we could get together?” I said, “Sure, anytime that is convenient with you.” Well I met him still not knowing what he had in mind and wondering if Jerry had talked to him about what I was going through.

When he arrived it was lunch time so I invited him for lunch at a local restaurant and we spent about an hour just talking about his new church and how he had come to Chicago from Nashville to start it. I informed him that I had a meeting in about ten minutes so I needed to return home and he said “fine”. By this time my mind was racing about a mile a minute but as he let me out of the car he said “I want to show you something that I would like for you to help me sell.” Going to the back of the car he opened a gun case and my eyes couldn't believe what I was seeing. There was the most beautiful rifle that I had ever seen. He called it a border rifle. This piece had the most fantastic stock that I had ever laid my eyes on and there were four Indian beaded straps around the stock. On the butt was a metal badge and a leather cover. I had never seen anything like it and, guess what, I only had a matter of seconds to see it because my other appointment was arriving. The pastor said we would get together again and talk about how to sell the rifle but I won't sleep well until we do.

I hope you can tell how much fun and excitement I have by being in this business and sharing the experiences with all the members of the 31 Club. I just wish that more people could find the “31 Steps to Your Millions in Antiques and Collectibles” and have their lives enriched like mine has been by writing it.

Learn to Grow Your Bank Account Trading in Antiques & Collectibles. Register for the 31 Club. Daryle's 220 Page Book, 31 Steps to Your Millions in Antiques & Collectibles is FREE with your Membership.
Plus You Get FREE MENTORING with Daryle.
Join Today!