A local antique auction I used to go to had something similar.
They would announce just before starting that the people helping out were dealers, and were allowed to bid on items. It was mostly because without allowing them to bid they wouldn't get any qualified help. (I always figured it was because they asked friends to help since they'd be there anyway. )
Each had a specialty, and would rarely bid on any other sort of item. One was a doll dealer, and usually won. A couple of the others had shops that I'd been to and saw items for sale that they'd won a week earlier.
On the face of it it did seem a bit shady, but I never got the impression that it was anything but what it was announced as.
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