Legendary Auctions

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Posted By: Elliot

New (old?) auction house. They have purchased the assets of Mastro Auctions and will be carrying on the business.



http://legendaryauctions.com/

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Posted By: Dan Bretta

Interesting. It appears as though the same people are running the show though.

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Posted By: john

Glad to see Doug, Mark and Ron Oser with the new company. I've dealt with Ron Oser since the early days when he was running his own auctions.....hard to find a more honest guy in the business.

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Posted By: leon

Even though Bill Mastro had sold his company I believe he still had daily activity at Mastro Auctions and was still very much in the scenes at shows, events and functions, at least from what I saw around the Nationals I have attended. I don't believe he will be affiliated with the new company in any capacity. It does look as though the other 3 top executives have gone to form the new auction house. I know all of them and I wish them the best. Doug has always been a strong supporter of Net54 and it's appreciated. As a matter of fact Doug has already said he would like to speak again this year at the 8th (I think) National Net54 Dinner. best regards

edited to add that one of these threads at the top is enough

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Posted By: Tim

Just a question so don't shoot the stupid if that's what I am...

Is this a means of providing the same product and service under a new name and escape the speculation of the former company?

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Posted By: Matt

Another question - what does this mean for those who have consigned to or bought from Mastro in the last month?

My Trade/Sale Page

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Posted By: Cat

A movement down from 20% BP to 17.5% is a step in the right direction. That really chapped my a$$ even if it didn't affect how much I bid.

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Posted By: leon

You can rest assured all of those matters will be taken care of in a professional manner. I didn't talk to Doug specifically about it but I am sure everything is fine there. I even asked if he could get my latest winnings out soon and he said no problem. I am quite sure no consignor or winning bidder will lose a penny in the transition. The top 3 folks have been in the hobby a long time and are still in it. regards

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Posted By: Tim Kindler

OK, What is the real story behind all of the possible suspicious stuff that went on with Mastro and the four gentlemen who owned it. I have heard/ read things supposedly where they were being investigated for some kind of wrong doing and that there was suppossedly FEDS on the floor of the National last year investigating them. Before I would ever think badly of them or have a negative feeling about their new company, does anyone really have the facts behind all of these rumors or investigations?

I have bought and sold through Mastro, approximately from 2003 to 2007, but haven't done any business with them since. No particualr reason for this, but nothing has struck my interest. My dealings with them have been positive. I just wish I knew the real story and maybe there IS NO story.

Thanks,
Tim Kindler

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Posted By: leon

All the public, or I, know is that there was/is an investigation going on with Mastro Auctions. I have heard a million rumors about other things but I think that is all we really know for sure. Does anyone else have proof of anything else? regards

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Posted By: Dan Bretta

Well...I have no idea what's going on with Mastro and the feds, but this sale will only help to fuel the rumors.

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Posted By: Tim

Leon-

I know nothing, have proof of nothing, and don't like to speculate on gossip, just thought the move was interesting and probably a smart one given the current cloud hanging over Mastro.

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Posted By: leon

Legendary Auctions Acquires Assets of Mastro Auctions
New Sports and Americana collectibles source to provide enhanced personalized customer service to the hobby
Lansing, IL March 2, 2009 - Legendary Auctions, a newly formed Sports and Americana auction house has announced today it has taken possession of Mastro Auctions assets. Legendary Auctions will preside over a customer base that has been responsible for the sale of over a quarter of a billion in sales of the finest memorabilia since 1996. All current registered bidders in Mastro Auctions will be automatically transferred to Legendary Auctions and the current catalog subscriptions will be honored. The completion of all outstanding Mastro Auctions business will be seamlessly facilitated, processed and completed through Legendary Auctions.

While Legendary Auctions presents an exciting new industry collectibles source for high quality Sports and Americana items, its leadership possesses over 100 years of collecting experience. Well- known and respected hobby veterans, Doug Allen, Mark Theotikos and Ron Oser will head the new auction house at its corporate headquarters in Lansing, IL, as well as its East Coast consignment presence in the Philadelphia area.

Legendary Auctions will hit the ground running and launch its first auction event in April 2009. The sale will include a wide selection of high-end Sports and Americana. According to Doug Allen, CEO of Legendary Auctions, the new firm will focus on mainstream, important Sports and Americana material, and will be built on a foundation of personalized, one-on-one customer service.

"In moving forward, we recognize the need to take stock of what has been so successful in the past," says Allen. "At its core, this has always a relationship driven business. Legendary Auctions will be a customer-centric operation at every level."

Legendary Auctions will ensure that the auction process is pure by guaranteeing that there will be no in-house bidding in their event. "The principals employed by Legendary Auctions will put their own collecting interests aside and concentrate solely on providing opportunities for our customers," said Allen. "There will be no mixing of business and pleasure at Legendary Auctions in terms of our own collecting pursuits. This will really be all about our customers."

Initially, Legendary Auctions plans to conduct five auctions annually. There will be four phone/internet events and one live event during the summer. Bidding in the April 2009 auction will begin on Monday, April 20th and conclude on Wednesday and Thursday April 29th and 30th.

Bill Mastro, who for the past decade has led Mastro Auctions will not be part of Legendary Auctions. The hobby pioneer has acknowledged that for a time he will step away from the hobby. "Circumstances make it clear to me that the business needs to move in a different direction at this time and Legendary Auctions is a positive step that allows everyone to be taken care of, especially our customers who have been so loyal," said Mastro. "I am looking forward to taking some time off for now, and wish Legendary Auctions only the best as they move forward."

Legendary Auctions is still currently accepting high quality consignment material for their April Premier Auction event.

For more information on Legendary Auctions, a schedule of auction events or to consign an item in future auctions, call 708-889-9380 or go to www.legendaryauctions.com.

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Posted By: Fred C

Does anyone know who the principles are for Legedary Auctions?

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Posted By: Fred C

It seems like Doug and crew wanted to divest themselves of the Mastro name and influence. It's going to be business as usual. I'm willing to guess that they're going to continue to offer lots of nice material.

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Posted By: Scott Fandango

very interseting late night press release...


but dont worry, all current transactions will be honored by new company, no worries there...

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Posted By: jay wolt

"It seems like Doug and crew wanted to divest themselves of the Mastro name and influence"

Then why didn't the trio just start their own company fresh?
Why buy out the assets and be affiliated w/ Mastro?

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Posted By: Jeff Lichtman

Jay, why start over fresh when you've got a few million dollars worth of consignments left over for Mastro's April auction?

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Posted By: rand

calling on Jeff.... lets here your perception.

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Posted By: rand

sounds still sticky to me. i think getting consignments will still be a tough road ahead.

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Posted By: jay wolt

"Jay, why start over fresh when you've got a few million dollars worth of consignments left over for Mastro's April auction? "

Jeff, fair enough.
But do the consignors have any legal recourse to get their lots back?
Its no longer Mastro, its now Legendary Auctions and Bill Mastro has
no part of the new company.

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Posted By: Jeff Lichtman

I'm sure they do have some recourse. Consignors did not sign a contract with this new venture no matter how much it smells like Mastro Auctions.

Doug is legendary in the auction business; unfortunately, that is the problem.

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Posted By: Joann

Note that they took over assets and did not just buy the company stock outright. Among other things, this means that the new owners of the assets generally do not take over Mastro liabilities. Usually this is in play for possible future environmental issues, product or employee lawsuits, etc. But along with shedding the name, they've shed liabilities for the most part too.

Not sure it's a factor here. Most buyers want an asset deal rather than a stock deal for a variety of reasons, not just the liability considerations.

J

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Posted By: Anonymous

Liabilities can be held to follow assets if a court finds that the purchaser is merely a continuation of the seller or if a transaction is entered into fraudulently for the purpose of escaping liability for the sellers obligations. I have no idea if either circumstance would apply here, just trying to complete the statement of the law.

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Posted By: Sean C

I checked out their site last night, and it looks like some of the links are still active...

http://www.legendaryauctions.com/rules.aspx

Nice to see that they just copied the Mastro auction rule page over verbatim. Their main page had originally indicated that BP was going to be 17.5, not the 20% listed.

One interesting thing from their email:

"Legendary Auctions will ensure that the auction process is pure by guaranteeing that there will be no in-house bidding in their event. "The principals employed by Legendary Auctions will put their own collecting interests aside and concentrate solely on providing opportunities for our customers," said Allen. "There will be no mixing of business and pleasure at Legendary Auctions in terms of our own collecting pursuits. This will really be all about our customers."

Good for starters. I hope this means that they won't be listing any employee or principals items in the auction as well.

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Posted By: Joann

Hi Peter,

That's exactly why I inserted the word "generally" and said I wasn't sure if it was a factor here. That was leaving wiggle room for this issue. Plus I wanted to be careful not to make any strong statement that suggested there are big or specific potential liabilities even out there for people to be concerned about, b/c I have no clue that there are any.

J

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Posted By: Alan

Will they now reduce the cost ($100 previously) to just attend their live auction at the National ?

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Posted By: Joe D.

""There will be no mixing of business and pleasure at Legendary Auctions in terms of our own collecting pursuits. This will really be all about our customers."


Is that what it was?

just good ole harmless mixin' of business and pleasure?

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Posted By: Rob D.

"Yee-haw! I bid $1,000. Aw hell ... make it $10,000!"

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Posted By: rand

Maybe its me, but this is a mess. i certainly do not know what has happened to Mastro Auctions, but they went from the White House to the Out House. Selling $10,000,000 record auctions to slipping away literally over night.

the economy and trust issues are not going to make this an easy path. i think they should have waited and made this seem more like a brand new venture. this to me is lipstick on a pig.

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Posted By: Michael C

Everyone here is much more knowledgeable about Mastro than me, but since this is an Internet Message Board....everyone can have an opinion


I agree that this seems like putting lipstick on a pig. Seems like a lot of short term thinking going on by those guys.

Some people will still be suspicious about them and think there is something crooked going on. But I have to believe that the new heads of Legendary Auctions don't really care about those few people. They have a bunch of consignments for their next auction in April and are eager to reap the $$ from those sales. Is that short term thinking? Yup.

Long term they will continue lose ground to REA and others, as future consignors see the huge sums and top notch items being sold by other houses. But there is enough of an established base of people who will consign and bid in their auctions to keep them humming. No disrespect meant, but the 20 or so vocal people here, who disdain them won't prevent the people who run the place from making a good living. Mastro was once upon a time at the top of the heap. Now they are headed to be a second tier auction house (at least in sports). But can you still make a good living running a 2nd tier house? Yup.

PR-wise I would say from reading their press release that these guys have heard the complaints about Mastro customer service. It will be interesting to see if they can improve the service so many people complain about.

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Posted By: Alan

I agree with Michael. They have built up such a huge following that we collectors probably won't notice any decline in quality of memorabilia in their auctions. Did they say they are eliminating their "classic" auctions. Perhaps, they will be combining their "premier" auctions with their "classic" auctions. Nevertheless, if the quality in upcoming auctions is not as good as previous auctions, we won't know if it's because of the economy or because of this change. I just hope they still offer free catalogs, though.

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Posted By: Dan Bretta

Is this the "Big news" that Jim C. alluded to a few weeks back?

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Posted By: Jimmy

I am not sure what to think about all this, only time will tell if the change will work for these guys. Maybe the hobby is changing for the better, or this is just a sign of things getting worse. Interesting story and maybe we can all learn something about what really happened. The one thing I do know is this change will gain a lot of attention in the hobby, and more information will soon be available.

Jimmy

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Posted By: James Feagin

It seems like Doug and crew wanted to divest themselves of the Mastro name and influence. It's going to be business as usual. I'm willing to guess that they're going to continue to offer lots of nice material.

I'm pretty sure it was the other way around.

James

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Posted By: Anonymous

Interested to know if anyone is still waiting for their December Mastro consignment check? Hate to post openly about it but they said it was mailed 12 days ago (way past their 45 day commitment) and the past few days they have not been picking up the phone nor responding to voicemails/emails (now I see why). They have an opportunity to make this right of course but with 0 customer service and a convenient change of identity I'm just trying to figure out what kind of fight I am in for.



Update: Just got a call from Mastro (perhaps the awesome power of this board?) and they said they will be cutting a check and mailing out. So while it was not mailed when them claimed 12 days ago it does sound like they are working to resolve outstanding stuff which is all I can ask at this point considering and hope it goes out as they promise.

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Posted By: Jeff Lichtman

"Some people will still be suspicious about them and think there is something crooked going on. But I have to believe that the new heads of Legendary Auctions don't really care about those few people."

Truer words never spoken.

And Tom, maybe you should email the head of Legendary Auctions at his Mastro email address?

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Posted By: George H

Will Legendary Auctions offer free 'restoration and stabilization' jobs like Mastro did for VIP consignors?

http://www.network54.com/Forum/153652/thread/1102513863/WHAT+IS+THE+KEELER+ROOKIE

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Posted By: Aaron M.

This really just continues an amazing chain of events concerning Mastro Auctions and Doug Allen over the last year.

You gotta think this is just an attempt by Doug to layer himself and his cohorts from legal liability that could result from multiple lawsuits against MastroNet if indeed it turns out that shill bidding was going on for years (as their inability to produce bidding records to the FBI would seem to indicate). As others have pointed out though, the manner in which they've done it (which I would assume came under advice from their criminal defense lawyers) seems extraordinarily transparent and probably wouldn't stick.

Personally, I wonder if this means that charges are imminent from the FBI investigation, and this is an attempt to prevent the FBI from seizing their assets (well, their consignor's assets). Knowing that that threat is hanging over them, I just don't know how anyone consigns valuable material to them unless they are truly desperate (i.e., American Memorabilia desperate).

With their sales already way down (suspiciously after the investigation was announced and after Doug announced Mastro would start keeping bidding records), I just don't see how this rather half-ass attempt at a new incarnation is going to survive.

I still vividly recall getting an unsolicited call from Doug Allen about five years ago vehemently denying that the fact that Mastro allowed its employees to bid on Mastro auctions was harmful to bidder trust and could give the appearance that shill bidding was going on. It only took five years and an FBI criminal investigation to change his mind.

You just know that somewhere Rob Lifson is reading this stuff and laughing his butt off.

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Posted By: leon

If nothing else you are certainly predictable.

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Posted By: D. Markel

Now with Bill Mastro out of the hobby spotlight, what is NY Daily News writer Michael O'Keefe going to do with this suddenly aquirred immense amount of free time on his hands?

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Posted By: Dan Bretta

Something tells me that O'Keeffe will be overjoyed to hear this latest news.

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Posted By: Tom Boblitt

is more fuel for O'Keefe's fire, I'd say...........

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Posted By: Fred C

Leon, Barry, et al (those that conduct auctions),

Are you supposed to keep bidding records?

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Posted By: Jeff Lichtman

That O'Keeffe -- he sure hates federally investigated auction houses and their successor companies. Oh and cards, too, he sure hates cards.

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Posted By: barrysloate

Fred - I believe it may be the law to do so, the same way one must keep financial records. Since my auction went to computer a couple of years ago, the records are automatically saved.

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Posted By: Tom Boblitt

We've never seen YOU Lichtman AND O'Keefe at the same time in the same place...........
Things that make you go hmmmmm...............

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Posted By: boxingcardman

I know a number of consignors to past Mastro auctions who are owed considerable money for months now. They are getting no answer on the phone when trying to contact Mastro. Doesn't look confidence inspiring.

If the asset sales deals I've been attacking lately as fraudulent transfers are any indicator, the goal of the transfer is to leave all of the liabilities and obligations with the dead shell and start fresh. Normally that would mean that the purchaser obtains only enumerated assets and leaves the rest behind. Whether the book of future auction consignments is assignable and has been assigned is a good question. You would have to check your Mastro contract to see if they could assign your consignment to another entity. On the older ones I had I did not see anything allowing for or disallowing assignment. Any IL attorneys could better explain those issues.

Given the way all this went down, I would not consign them a 1993 Donruss set...except with a big cash advance.

Sic Gorgiamus Allos Subjectatos Nunc

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Posted By: barrysloate

How on earth could Doug, Ron, and Mark expect to successfully go out on a new venture without taking care of those consignors? That would be financial suicide.

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Posted By: Dan Bretta

Barry, I would hope that everything is going to be taken care of because if they don't then everyone will know that Legendary Auctions is just Mastro with a new name.