eBay Selling Tips from the Vault

Here’s another great article (if I do say so myself) from the vault!

‘Surprise, Surprise!’

by Lynn Dralle, The Queen of Auctions

I took about 200 items to the Live Boot Camp in La Quinta this past weekend (or was it already two weekends ago?)…Yikes, time flies! The lessons we learned from those 200 items were invaluable.

I want to share a few of those with you here now.

1. Something that sold for less than it should have

From our research, it turned out that a very famous artist made this art glass vase. On his website, this vase was priced at $135.00. I thought it should sell for about 1⁄2 of that or around $65.00. It didn’t sell for any where near that price.

Click here.

I think it was because I started it at $24.99, instead of my usual $9.99. I had paid $15.00 for it at a Bellingham Charity sale and was protecting my investment.

Instead of helping my investment turn into a lot more money, I think I hurt it by pricing it too high out of the gate.

Lesson Learned: Sometimes you have to take a deep breath and start an item at $9.99 that has the potential to sell for a lot! On the other hand, if there isn’t a lot of demand, you may need to price it at the amount you wish to receive.

This Robert Held art glass vase seemed to me that there would be quite a lot of demand. There were over 700 of his items listed on PriceMiner. I thought a bidding war should have broken out, but instead the vase garnered just a few bids. In retrospect, I should have started it at $9.99.

2. Something that sold for more that I imagined

I paid $5.00 for an interesting pottery vase at the same Bellingham Charity Sale. The entire Live Boot Camp class helped me figure out what the signature said.

The signature was Pine Ridge Lodge Sioux E Irving. The history of this pottery company is fascinating.

The Sioux Indian reservation was founded in southwestern South Dakota in 1890. The Sioux were a nomadic tribe that followed the bison herds and did not do much with ceramics or pottery. These items were too heavy to carry.  They were much more interested in lightweight baskets and the only pottery they made was for utilitarian purposes.

In 1930, a boarding school was set up on the reservation, to teach the Native American children English. Legend has it that in 1937, Bruce Doyle was hired to teach the children ceramics. Doyle is credited for making molds to be used in the high school and for inventing glazes that worked with the local clays.

From 1937 to 1940 were the most productive years at the high school. The pottery (both thrown and molded pieces) supported all the crafts at the boarding high school. Doyle left in 1940 and the high school production ceased.

However, three of his students, sisters of Sioux decent, continued Pine Ridge potteries after the high school program ended. Ella Irving (known as Ella Woody during the late ’30s and Ella Cox during the 1940s) got a loan to purchase a log cabin building in downtown Pine Ridge and kept the pottery running.

Local clay was dug and local glazes were used. Ella and the company continued using the incised mark “Pine Ridge Sioux” sometimes including the word “Indian”, under a pine tree on a ridge. Ella and her sister Olive (also known as “Ollie”) Cottier threw pots on the wheel, while the third sister, Bernice Talbot did the work of casting, glazing and decorating the pottery.

My piece had the incised pine tree on a ridge, “Pine Ridge Sioux”, and was NOT signed with E Woody or E Cox, but with “E Irving”. The signature was very hard to read but my awesome live boot campers helped me!

Here is a photo of the signature. Interestingly enough, not one bidder asked to see a photo of the signature. By the way, it was nearly impossible to take the photo and I am sorry it doesn’t show up very well.

Pine Ridge produced a lot of wares over the years and most of it was geometric cream-colored slip decoration executed in sgraffito (the glaze was applied then scratched away in decorative patterns which would reveal the color of the clay underneath). The clay was often red and covered with a clear glaze.

My piece was certainly the geometric slip decoration in the sgraffito medium–very Pine Ridge! How cool is that?

The pottery used red clay from the Pine Ridge reservation and a white clay from the Black Hills.

Some additional marks:

*Some of Ella Irving’s pieces were marked “Woody” (her married name) and “E. Cox” (from her 2nd marriage).  —In the articles I read there was no reference to the E Irving signature on my vase–interesting!

*Pieces from 1930-1942 were marked “Oglala Lakota Sioux”, signed by Bruce Doyle.  Other pieces from that same time frame were signed “Nora Fire Thunder”.

*”Ramona Wounded Knee” was the signature used by Olive Cottier (Ella’s sister).

*”OCHS” signature stands for Oglala Community High School, the name of the boarding school.

There is some debate over the actual years of this timeline. Some say that the Irving sisters ran the pottery out of the high school until 1943. Others say that Ella did not get a loan for the log cabin building until 1955. Whatever the timeline, the bottom line is this; Pine Ridge pottery is quite collectible! The Pine Ridge Pottery went out of business in the 1980s when Ella’s shop and pottery were vandalized in downtown Pine Ridge.

In 1999, when she was 93 years old, Ella Irving was awarded the 10th annual South Dakota Living Indian Treasure Award in recognition of her contributions to Native American art forms. Her pottery can be found around the world, including in the Smithsonian Institute.

Sounds a lot like Mideke (the treasured potter from Bellingham) and another interesting tidbit is that my dad was born in Yankton, South Dakota, which is only about five hours from Pine Ridge. Small world!

By the way, I feel honored to touch a piece of pottery from this amazing company–run by three strong women–back in the 1940s to 1980s. Especially a piece made by Ella herself.

Now, I understand why it is selling for so much! Also, as I looked at the vase closer I could see that it was thrown by hand on a potter’s wheel and not made in a mold. I can see the lines of the clay where Ella molded the vase. Wow! This is why I love selling on eBay and learning so much every day and touching little pieces of history.

But back to the research and lessons learned at Live Boot Camp. When I did my research on PriceMiner, the vase should have been worth anywhere from $15.00 to $60.00. And there were only 3 listed by the Native American Artist E Irving.

Since I didn’t have much invested in it and I didn’t think it was going to sell for a whole lot, I started the auction at $9.99. At the time of my writing this, it has 16 watchers and has gone far over that $60.00 amount.

Please check it out here to learn more.

Lesson Learned: Starting this piece at $9.99 got it more page views (88), bidders and bids than my Robert Held piece of art glass. The Robert Held piece only had 62 page views and 2 bids.

Of course, I realize that I am comparing apples to oranges, but it is really quite interesting.

Remember the majolica hen story from the 4th 100 Best book? When I started it at $49.99, it got no bids and when I dropped it to a $24.99 starting bid, it sold for over $200. There is something to be said for letting the auction play it self out.

3.     Something that sold for just what is should have.

You know I love coffee mugs (and it is not because I drink coffee, because I don’t) and you all should love coffee mugs also. We love coffee mugs because they sell!

I took about 15 different coffee mugs to Live Boot Camp. Here is one that sold for exactly what it should have. In fact, a little bit more than it should have.

D’oh!

You have got to love Homer Simpson! Check out the auction here.

Lesson Learned: Always buy interesting coffee mugs when you see them. Check out this one that sold out of my eBay store while I was writing this article.

Check out Betty’s mug here.

Who would have ever thought that a “Betty” Sea World mug would sell? Well, we do call Mo and Indy my dad’s pet name of “Betty”.

4.     I had to include the sale of our mascot…now didn’t I?

Finally, as you probably know, we pick a strange item to be the mascot at each and every one of our Live Boot Camps. This year’s mascot sold right away and I was very pleased with the selling price. I think I only paid 50 cents to $1 for it and it magically started working right in front of the Live Boot Camp class. (Probably because it was fluorescent and had to warm up!).

Lesson Learned: Always buy beer signs!

Check him out here.

I hope that you have learned something from this article. I sure did when I got to research the Pine Ridge Pottery! Notice that I didn’t need to do ANY of that in-depth research and it still sold for a pretty penny. Research is fun, but very time consuming, and that time could be used to be listing and making money on eBay!