response 1 of 28:

Nov 15 04:32 UTC 1999

Before the board meeting last month I printed out a list of all the items
from the last auction (249 of them!)  When sorted by the price they sold
for, I found that 113 items sold for $5 or more, 98 sold for less than $5,
and the rest didn't sell.  The total of all items sold and paid for was
$1800.76, and the total for those items which went for less than $5 was
$203.01. 

My conclusion is that the items which sold for less than $5 were not worth
the trouble of auctioning them off.  So I humbly suggest that we set a $5
minimum on all items, to reduce the auctioneers' work.  I think a good
outlet for the smaller items is to have a Grex garage sale, sometime in
the future.  (This was Mary Remmers' idea, I believe.)

I'd also like to suggest that donors be encouraged not to drop off items
with the auctioneers, but to hold on to them and deliver them (or arrange
for them to be picked up).  Entering item descriptions and delivering
items was a large part of the job of being auctioneer last time around,
and while I didn't always mind, it did take *a lot* of work which would be
better spread around.

Plus, I think one of the best things about the Grex auction is that it
builds connections between people in our community.  If you buy something
someone else offers, you just may get to meet someone new, if it's up to
them to deliver it.

response 3 of 28:

Nov 15 12:13 UTC 1999

Oops!  Looks like i should have put my question about auction cf's and
fw's in this item.  

response 5 of 28:

Nov 15 14:12 UTC 1999

I don't think the garage sale idea was mine - but I like it
if a willing volunteer can be found.  (Only on Grex does one
need to make a distinction between a volunteer and a willing
volunteer. ;-) ).

I also really like the idea of putting each donor in charge of
his/her own postings and the eventual delivery of the item
to the highest bidder and not to the auctioneer.

Thank you Jeff and Sarah for being willing to run this thing.
And to Aruba, for everything.

response 7 of 28:

Nov 16 02:39 UTC 1999

We can still auction single books, but the minimum bid on them will be $5.
(You are correct, though, that a lot of single books were sold - they were
the majority of the 98 items that went for under $5.)

response 9 of 28:

Nov 18 00:35 UTC 1999

        In addition to a $5 minimum, bids should be in whole dollar
ammounts.
        When an items gets to $50 bid, the minimum raise in the bid
should be $5.
        If this was a live-action auction, the auctioneer would scold
one who would raise less than a dollar, and would drive raises on 
higher items to more reasonable amounts.

        You might also consider that the person making the item available
would be making a cash donation from the proceded of the sale of their
item.  It could have better tax deduction effect.

response 11 of 28:

Nov 18 18:43 UTC 1999

Is there any harm done by letting people increase their bids by small amounts?

response 13 of 28:

Nov 18 19:05 UTC 1999

  I think you'll have things selling for substantially lower prices if
  you insist on minimum one dollar bid increments..

response 15 of 28:

Nov 18 23:40 UTC 1999

        I hate seeing bids raised by a penny.

response 17 of 28:

Nov 19 02:05 UTC 1999

Actually, The Price is Right only lets you go up by one dollar (although I'm
not bored enough to watch it often, so I'm not 100% authoritative.)

response 19 of 28:

Nov 19 19:01 UTC 1999

Re #17:
    Which is about the same significant figure as a penny increase for common
grex auction items, more or less.

response 21 of 28:

Nov 19 20:01 UTC 1999

How about if we let donors specify a minimum increase if they want, but leave 
the default minimum at $.01?  Maybe if we have a mix of the two this time
around, then next time we'll have some data on which way generates more
revenue and which generates more headaches.

response 23 of 28:

Nov 19 23:27 UTC 1999

Absolutely.