How do I start an antiques business?

A primer of book-collecting

What kind of business? Your own shop? Selling them on Ebay? Yard Sales?

First figure out what your ‘business’ is. Secondly, why should I buy from you? What makes you so unique that I should come to you first?

If you can answer all these questions, then maybe you can start your own ‘business’.

Of course, you will have to have a business plan and analysis, or you simply won’t get funded.

Good luck to you.

Book-collecting as a hobby: In a series of letters to everyman

i have owned 3 antique malls so i have a little experience in this area. if you are looking to do it for a living and never been in antiques before, well dont quit your normal job to do it. The antique market right now is very unpredictable and everyone in the business is wondering what is going to happen. If you are looking to do a shop or a mall, DONT ! at least not at this moment wait for the market to stabilize more. otherwise getting into doing ebay, selling at at antiquw shows are not a bad idea. …
i have seen many people try to get into the antique business with no experience and they failed and lost and tremendous amount of money. ( they invested about 1.2 million in a antique mall – brand new building ) the reason it failed they had no idea about antiques.
unless you are thinking of doing a shop or mall, forget the business plan or trying to do loans to get money. money is a factor but the ONLY factor is knowledge of antiques. knowledge of most important is you have know what you are looking at when you do find it and how much it is worth. so learning about antiques is the first step. my advice dont bother focusing your learning on common everyday antiques. Everyone knows them who are in the business and Ebay is so full of that stuff that the prices have dropped so much. find some areas of antiques you are interested in and learn as much as possible. books, online reference etc. search live auctioneers and ebay and see what some of the better stuff and rarer stuff is selling for. it doesnt matter how much money you have if you are at an auction and you pay $10 over what something is worth then it is pretty hard to make money. anyway my point is KNOWLEDGE is key in antiques. I have been in this business for 25 years and i study all the time. i am always trying to learn more about antiques. i see so many new ” ebayers ” going to local auctions where i live and they really think they are going to just buy some stuff and sell it on ebay and make money. yeah, you can buy the junk for a few bucks and then make a profit of about a few bucks, thats about it. normally they leave the auction spending all their money and bought the wrong stuff and paid more than it was worth because they had no knowledge of what items to buy and they ended up bidding against other new ebay sellers who had no knowledge, while the old guy in the corner with knowledge and experience just bought a bowie knife for $20 bucks and will eventually sell it for $12,000 !! while the unexperienced are fighting over 1980s barbie clothes … SO, learn antiques, learn prices, learn what to buy, learn where to sell it.
ebay is a great place to sell IF you are selling items that are a little more rare, unique or at the higher end of antiques. common stuff is way down. yeah if you can find a set of fire-king glasses with advertising for 10 cents each at a garage sale, sure throw them on and you made 50 – 60 dollars .
My favorite way of making $ in the antique business is Antique shows and flea markets. you get thousands of people coming to the show with money in their pockets with the intention of buying antiques. the fact that people can barter in person makes it easy to make $ . And again as long as you are selling something more sought after , you cant have a table full of the same junk the person next to you has.
Also at show you can meet many poeple who are collectors and they will always give you a want list of what they are looking for and eventually have a large list of private buyers just waiting for you to call them with something they collect. Ebay – shows/ markets and private sales to me are the best way to sell. Craigslist is great for larger items because normally it is local people and they will come pick them up.
so there is a few tips ..knowledge is key . you must have more knowledge then the next person to find those unique items that they pass up because they dont know what they are . you can buy ntiques all day long if you have the money so you have to know where to sell it …and last where do you get the antiques?? this is one of the more complicated subjects. antiques are everywhere and they never go away. most of the best stuff you would think has been bought up years ago and it is true but it all comes around again. 1 collector buys it, hoards it for 40 years and then eventually retires or dies and it all goes back on the market thru auctions or estate sales. this is where knowledge comes in because these collectors sometimes really knew their stuff and collected rare stuff 40 years ago and now majority people have no idea what it is because they are too busy learning about the variations of colors in the nose of a beanie baby dog.
so, where to buy it …. estate sales, auctions , garage sales, antique shows / flea markets and the best Private sales.( i hope am not getting too carried away !! )
estate sales – you must be within the 1st few people in line . estate sales use numbers. the earlier you g