Hi Grey,
You mean his statement is untrue, specifically in regards to any loss
to Heritage?
If so, accepted.
Are you also denying fakes inadvertently passed through Heritage?
I wasn't clear on that bit.
On 2 Oct 2009, at 16:17, Smith, Grey - 1367 wrote:
Richard
JR reads between the lines! His statement is untrue in regards to a
loss to Heritage due to fakes.
On Oct 2, 2009, at 9:24 AM, "Richard Evans" <<mailto:[email protected]
>[email protected]<mailto:[email protected]>> wrote:
JR, I believe you just outed Heritage.
On 2 Oct 2009, at 07:35, James Richard wrote:
Steve,
You are right on all points. In the past, after the outrage
subsided, things went on just as before. This time may be different
for a couple of reasons:
1) A *lot* more money was lost on these high-end fakes. Millions of
dollars by some accounts.
2) The reports coming out clearly show that the restoration and
backing industry needs to formalize practices and standards and
unique identifying serial numbers on backed items -- and to have
some kind of "Underwriter's Seal of Approval" that operations who
observe those practices and standards can display to show they are
supporting industry reform. If they don't join together and do this
they *will* lose money going forward (not to mention possibly ending
up with some liability in lawsuits). So it has now become in their
best interests to spend the relatively small amount of money
necessary to form an industry guild and police themselves. The cost
would not be that large when it was spread among the 20 or so
operations and it would be well spent.
3) Some of the Really Big Players got hurt this time. Heritage and
other auction houses/retailers had to refund a lot of money to
customers who bought fakes from them. Maybe they had insurance to
help with the refunds, maybe they didn't, but it still hurt them
financially and also hurt their reputations and customer confidence.
They should now be willing to back the formation of a guild to
define restoration standards and practices and *identification
marks* of who did the work so it could be quickly checked on.
They should also be willing to encourage genuine experts to examine
their very expensive items and provide "Opinions of Authenticity" to
help restore buyer confidence. Note that I call them "Opinions" of
Authenticity because it is getting harder for even long-time
participants in this field to identify the best of the fakes. After
the John Davis fiasco, I doubt anyone would be willing to sign their
name on 100% Guarantee anymore, but a solid opinion with specifics
delineated would still be better than nothing, which is what we have
on most very expensive items right now.
Grey is entitled to his opinion that there is no real problem in
catching fakes, but history has not borne that out in recent years
and besides, the public perception being what it is now, if Heritage
expects to keep setting those record prices they are simply going to
have to offer the buyers something more substantial in the way of
authentication on high-end items than they have in the past.
Or maybe not. Maybe it will all go back to business-as-usual once
again. In which case we can all look forward to even bigger scandals
in the future -- and declining realized prices for genuine high-end
and middle-tier authentic movie posters.
It is now in *everyone's* best interest to DO SOMETHING real and
practical to help insure nothing of this magnitude happens again.
Just making reassuring statements that the "sky is not falling"
won't cut it. A 19% buyers premium on a $30,000 poster sale is
$5,700 bucks -- they should be willing to spend a few hundred to
properly authenticate it before offering it to the customers they
are asking to trust them.
A money-back guarantee is a great thing. But what good does it do
you if you end up buying a fake and never find out about it? Or
don't find out about it for 10 or 20 years... or until your children
go to sell it after you've passed it on to them in your estate?
-- JR
dsonesheets wrote:
Just a humble Japanese collector/dealer here, but that sounds like
quite a lot of money you're expecting "someone" to fork over, let
alone a publicity campaign for a standards group. Sounds like a
shitload of money.
I have let my voice be known for my absolute revulsion for the guys
like Thomas Loce, who to this day CONTINUE to have their wares up on
eBay, only to cry wolf when they get caught trying to pawn those
Pulp Fiction Lucky Strikes posters with the official "stamp" on the
back. And I only use that example because it's one most people know
of. They then start agreeing with the crowd that the stamp is fake,
after trying soooo hard to disprove actions like Dan Rickard.
Let's take a step back...
Seems like old times, when just three years ago that I suggested the
same thing to the poster community, albeit from the other side of
the restoration business. The email below was sent out to all the
MOPO crowd, and I received ONE letter of encouragement, a single
letter, from the person who wrote the letter I am responding to,
JR. BTW I have bolded #2 in my list, as it bears relevant interest
here.
The bottom line, going forward, is that talk is cheap and actually
devoting time and money to a "campaign" is something that no one
wants to do. PEOPLE ONLY CARE WHEN IT AFFECTS THEIR INCOME. Let me
say that again. People only care when it affects their income.
I expect a lot more fluff over the Dracula issue, and people like
Loce and his accomplices will keep doing what they've been doing and
making tons of money, being the King of Posters he is. What a
joke. I don't expect anyone even stepping up to shout their
opinions of the Drac incident from their soapboxes to really do
anything. When it comes to shelling out for WHAT IS RIGHT, I don't
expect anyone to do anything. Maybe I'll be proven wrong, but that
is something I would love to see.
I expect to see a few emails about this, maybe just one or two. I
am honestly sickened that this community, for all the good they try
to do, has no real love for the ENTIRE poster collecting/selling
community, apart from their own interests (like Universal horror
films, let's say). There are a few, like Ed and Sue, that really
step forward and do something. I tried THREE YEARS AGO to start
something that possibly could have prevented something like the
Dracula incident from ever happening, and no one wanted to help,
apart from JR. I didn't have the time, money or resources it would
have taken for ONE person to do this, so it stopped there.
If there are people who are genuinely interested in devoting even
time to this, I would be happy to assist where I can and even take
lead on as many issues as I can. But I don't expect anything to
really come out of this; maybe JR and I will start our own
business. :)
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