As Keith troubled me a moment ago for an invoice form, it occurred to me that so far this year, we’ve made quite a number of small sales. Mind you, we are glad of anything that brings in a bit of the ready, but what has eluded us are the serious purchases from collectors and interior designers.
This phenomenon is apparent to Keith, as well. He is the one with the keys to the chequebook, so he is reminded more frequently than I about our plethora of receivables for antique pieces for what he calls ‘little money.’ This starts to sound like whingeing, because for each small sale we make, the client has looked at something, sometimes many things, for a lot more money. We look on this with optimism, as it, in our opinion, portends demand that due to the uncertain economic environment, presently manifests itself as a small purchase but promises a larger purchase, once the economy has achieved if not significant recovery then at least straight and level flight.
Interestingly, while the average invoice size has been small, the larger invoices have been to interior designers who seem now to be back in the marketplace. My twenty or so devoted readers will know this is unusual for us, with our private collectors our typical mainstay. Our largest sale so far attributable to the Los Angeles Antiques Show was to an interior designer, and one of our best design clients, sadly silent in the last few months, is now making noises like he has some business for us in the offing. May his tribe increase.
The numbers of individual sales and the apparent return to health of the interior design trade might bode well for the immediate future in the antiques and fine art business, but I wouldn’t go so far to say that it is otherwise portentous. Lately, for every sale we make, there have been two or three near misses- sales that somehow have gone awry, or invoices wherein the buyer has actually reneged. Forget the H1N1 flu virus- there has existed since late last year a pandemic of cold feet amongst buyers. While it may be on the wane, new cases crop up at Chappell & McCullar daily. For the moment, we must content ourselves with the ‘little money’.