Cheek amid commerce at H&J auction
A large and jovial crowd bought out a mammoth auction of fixtures and fittings from the closed H&J Smith department store in Invercargill on Saturday.
The firm, which has called time on the department store side of its operations, was determined to avoid sending material to landfill, and within a little more than five hours it was mission accomplished.
A cluster of clothing racks was the scant remainder from the sale of 150 lots comprising 2000 items.
The historic auction had a fitting start with a moment unlikely to be repeated, as 86-year-old Bill Todd, a 70-year veteran of the auction business, thanked the vendors from the 123-year old business.
The auctioneering duties fell to his associate Lynzy Francis who, by day’s end, was left to reflect: “There are some real characters in this community.”
One voice from the audience pointed out one of the many mannequins on sale looked like Francis.
Given the general fit-and-toned look of the figures, he could have been inclined to take this well, until another voice clarified it was one of the female ones at the back.
The build up for the auction had featured strong encouragements for people to consider how they might repurpose the offerings.
If that was too challenging, Francis had another suggestion. “Anniversary coming up?
‘’This’ll do for it.
‘‘You’ll never be reminded again.’’
The banter was part of the joy of a live auction, Francis said.
When people from a community came together to meet face-to-face, the result was often a good-spirited occasion and something many now looked forward to.
“There’s one thing missing from our lives these days – conversation.’’
The gravitational pull of one of the largest auctions Todd’s had handled was such that the crowd included a conspicuous percentage of people who were new to the auction system.
This did create a few complications, but these were figured out.
H&J Smith commercial manager Morris Gilbertson said it was great that people had had the opportunity not only to use or repurpose items, and also to have some memorabilia from the iconic store.
A second auction, scheduled for May, would comprise of “back-of-house’’ items, ranging from desks, chairs and ladders to office equipment, and would possibly be of more interest to the general public.
And if some of the items sold on Saturday ended up for resale online?
The company was fine with others making a dollar out of transactions that kept the store’s items out of landfill, Gilbertson said.