Tuesday, August 03, 2010

Yesterday Scott Coots of Rochester, New York commented on his observations on this past weekend’s auction at Early’s. Scott asked for others interpretation of the market.

Frank Ford responds as follows

I received the Early catalogue and did notice the small number of Steuben items. I think the whole art glass market is low / soft.

I mentioned earlier I consigned a rare Steuben Turquoise Aurene vase to Julia’s auction last month. He sold one from the same line in 2007 for $14,000. Mine sold for $4000. Quite a difference. And someone informed me that Early had one a few years ago that sold for $16,000.

So I would say the word is not “soft” it’s downright flat.

Rande Bly of Birmingham has some considerable thoughts

Very interesting Scott! I think a market trend discussion is pertinent to all of us. What I have noticed is the market is down for the moment but not on everything. This has provided two things. The opportunity to buy of course but the other thing I see is what is interesting to me. I see a balancing of the market prices and a view of the future. What I mean by this is prices were set on certain types of glass or color and held their ratios to other pieces evenly due to their history. They have been increasing appropriately over the last ten years proportionately to each other. With the new market a separation is taking place. Perhaps this models the new values and new ratios we will see in the future. For example for many years we felt Light Blue Jade to be quite rare. With the Internet more and more pieces began to show up. More of them than we really thought were out there. The increased ratio of the Blue Jade pieces had no effect on their customary price. History held the strong arm and the pieces were still bringing the customary $400-$600. With the new market I suddenly saw a few bring $250. These pieces may never return to their old ratio of value. The same was true with the matching Amethyst or Plumb Jade Bowl. Yet if either of these pieces were to be acid cutback I would expect to see no to little change from their customary value. A piece of Celeste Blue in a common shape is down $50-$75 but Celeste Blue in a rare and desired shape shows little or no change. I have put a lot of attention to rare color in the last two years. I am very pleased to see with colors like Wisteria, Smoke, Moonlight, Blue Gray, or Russian Amber if anything we have seen a slight increase even with a down market. What we are seeing here is a market balancing and what I believe to be a peek at the future where prices will hold new ratios when the market recovers. I can see nothing but opportunity. If your collection is missing Light Blue Jade buy the $250 bowl. If you have the chance to obtain one of the rare colors do it now because when the market recovers we could be seeing a price of $850 on Moonlight, Orchid or Russian Amber in a good shape number. Go for some of the rare shapes, and low shape numbers. Buy some of the 6030’s that were running $250 that are now $110-$90. They will never be cheaper. Pay a little more and pick up a Mirror Black, Ivory, or Ivrene one. Go for the rare. It is a great time to get a piece of Decorated Turquoise Jade, Alexandrite, or Lace Glass. Round out your collections with colors and types you do not have (they are probably the rare ones anyway). Stay diversified with not all your eggs in one basket. When it finally comes time to sell you will not single handily flood the market and drive your own prices down like we saw happen when one of the largest collection of 6030’s in the US was released. Have faith. Good art never dies. The market can only go two ways. If it goes up and you were buying while it was down your collection will be more complete. If it goes down I believe it will return on its own virtue. Frederick Carder’s glass is the best in the world. It would take a complete global crash to crash the market on Steuben. Hey if the whole Steuben market went to hell in a hand basket at least we will be going in a Gold Aurene one with Raspberry Pruents!

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