As many of you know, Julia’s has been growing rapidly for the past several years. Based on annual sales, we are now one of the top ten Antique Auctioneers in North America. When Jim, and his dad Arthur, started this business almost 50 years ago it was built on a foundation of fairness and honesty.
Jim looked at the auction industry with “fresh eyes” and learned from one of the best businesses in Maine: L.L. Bean. Bean’s had a warranty unlike any of their competitors. In 1990, Julia’s introduced its 45 day guarantee. We don’t know of any other auctioneer that offers a guarantee that comes close to ours. Almost all of them are “Caveat Emptor” – Buyer Beware!
The guarantee is the first thing you read when you read our Conditions of Sale. We want all bidders to understand this important resource when making their decision. It is a guarantee to protect the buyer against major discrepancies that would have a major effect upon value. It covers authenticity, it protects against fakes, reproductions or major fabrications. It does not guarantee against minor issues that have less than a major effect on value. Also, the only thing we guarantee is what is in print in the catalog and what is announced from the block at the time of the sale. If you are interested in bidding in any of our auctions, please take the time to read the guarantee.
We have a fabulous team of specialists that are responsible for the descriptions that appear in our catalog. We look to bring in specialists who have expertise in a certain area, as well as a strong awareness of auction values. We saw a Help Wanted ad for a catalog description writer for one of our competitors; “Candidates need not be firearms experts.” It isn’t this way at Julia’s.
Every specialist is vetted by each department, and is interviewed by Jim Julia before they can join our team. In 2015, we have continued to add more new members to this team of specialists. Tom Power (Antique Firearms), Josh Loewensteiner (Sporting Firearms), Anthony Wu (Asian), Debbie Tarsitano (Paperweights), Cristina Romig (Fine Jewelry), Joshua Chamberlain (Asian – Porcelain and Jade) and Allyson Lee (Fine Art) have all joined our team in the past year, which expands our overall list to over 40 specialists.
As Jim says at the start of all of our auctions, we put a lot of time and effort in this process. However, no one is perfect. If you every see a mistake in any of our catalog descriptions, please let us know and we will investigate it. If we agree, we will modify the description, announce it at the auction, and notify all of our absentee bidders of the additional information.