REA increasing their BP and making other changes

[Exhibitman]

Scott, besides the fact that the antecedents for having a BP are totally irrelevant to today's business, I do not buy any explanation for the commission-BP structure other than it makes the auctioneer more money. If I 'win' a card at REA now, I pay REA the hammer price plus 23%. 123% of the hammer price is the true price of the card. On a $1,000 bid the auction house receives $1,230 from the winning bidder. How the proceeds are chopped up does not change that math. When a middleman (and auctioneers are middlemen between buyer and seller) has two choices of how to do things, a simple one and a more complex one, there is no reason to use the complicated one, other than in the belief that it makes more money for the middleman to do it that way. I've had many negotiations with auctioneers big and small, and they all use the bifurcated structure because they all 'sell' a low or zero commission knowing that the buyer's premium is still going to them.

I am not begrudging an auctioneer the right to make a living, I am expressing a preference for simply admitting that the commission and buyer's premium are one and the same, and dropping the pretense.