The News from ElephantToenails.com

Deciding Your Collection’s Direction or Theme

So you have decided you want to purchase a toenail and are trying to decide which one to get. This is a common situation and I am frequently contacted for suggestions. There are several factors you must consider at this point before you jump right in.

Buy the Knives You Like

First, I would encourage you to buy what you like. Do you like new shinny ones or the older varieties that are showing their age? Different strokes for different folks- there is no right or wrong. Again it is what you like. The issue of your likes and do other collectors like your likes only really comes into play when you go to sale the collection. Also, you can take comfort in the fact that the toenail pattern is a popular pattern and unless you only buy JUNK toenails or an entire collection of plastic or celluloid handled toenails, folks will want to buy the knives when you do decide to sale.

See The Possibilities- Go To The List

The first place I would go is The List here at ElephantToenails.com. You will find many different makes and variations, plus there are actually different style toenails too. I don’t want to get too deep into all the specifics at this point and will stay somewhat general to begin with here, but when you go to The List you will see the different drop down menus for most of the different variations manufactured, like maker, style, handle material, color, etc.

Then I recommend you think about this- If you were to want to purchase additional toenails as you go, it is important to consider what I am going to call the direction or theme of your collection. Again keep in mind you are going to be buying what you like, so as you look through The List are there any factors that appeal to you the more. It is OK to begin with to have a hodge-podge of unrelated toenails.

Giving a little thought to the direction of a collection is healthy and will save you headaches and money in the long run.

Your budget is going to come into play immediately, and while it will probably grow as you get into toenails more and begin to appreciate other toenails (either make, handle materials, era, etc).

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How do you have your collection inventoried?

You may say, “Inventoried, I don’t have so many I can’t keep up with what I have.” Well, let me tell you two things- First, it will get to the point you simply can’t keep up with all the details about each knife, when you bought it, from whom, the value and price you paid, etc. and second, you need a written record for your insurance and for your loved ones to use when they want to cash them out

There has been a knife inventory software around for several years. I resisted it. Thinking I would just use The List on ET.com as my inventory. Well, I have found a fantastic application/program that is very easily customized.

I spent about 20 minutes and came up with this as a template for mine. It will take several months for me to load it (because I must take new photos and then will need to reload most of them in The List to replace the dark ones up now).

Here it is. I know the categories may be hard to read but I made them and then can add a text field, a currency field, drop down menus, as many pics holders as I want and as many pages as I want. This one is two pages (left side and right side). I can customize the look of it by choosing different color backgrounds, etc.

What is really cool is there are two views of this information. If you notice in the top left are the words “Table and Form.” The view with the green background is the Form view.

The spreadsheet format is the Table view. You can see on the right side are the fields I select to customize the spreadsheet view. The numbers and currency columns will total at the bottom (like Excel or Numbers). I haven’t added mine yet and made this as a sample.

You enter in the info one time and then can see it in the Table View (spreadsheet format) and the Form View.

This is a Filemaker Product offering Database Software. This one I have is called Bento. It is a Mac product, but FileMaker offers products for Windows and Macs.  I wanted Bento when I first saw it in a Mac Magazine a month ago, BUT, it only runs on Mac’s newest OS system (Leopard 10.5) Yesterday I installed the new OS system. I was very anxious about installing the new OS system because you know the old saying- “if it ain’t broke, don’t fix it,” well, mine wasn’t broke and I ran the risk of breaking it.

There were some real horror stories out there about the extreme problems encountered when installing Leopard. I am very happy to report it went off without a hitch so I am up and running full steam. I loaded Bento right away and started playing with it. Now the big task, converting over to it 100%.

I did a search for Knife Collection Software and there are other options, including a discussion at one of the knife forums talking about using Word and Excel. I have had mine in Excel for years but like the look of Bento much better and it serves the same function with the Table View, plus I get the Form View.

This is Part II of our topic of “What is the best approach to use to sell your collection?” In Part I we looked at questions to ask yourself. These questions are pointers to help determine which approach best fits your needs, now I want to look at the pros and cons of the different approaches.

In general, a knife is only worth what someone is willing to pay. We must ask ourselves what factors/set of circumstances can I create to create the ultimate buying environment so that when that “offer” comes in it is the maximum offer I could/can expect.

As both an auctioneer and a knife collector, I have been asked on numerous occasions which is more advantageous to sell through, the auction method, or the one-on-one negotiated sales approach. This question typically then leads to online auction, such as eBay compared to the traditional live auction format.

To look into the answers involved here we examine several aspects; first, we must examine each method’s pros and cons. (more…)

When it is time to sell your knives, what is the best approach? Should we take the knives to the next area show, put them on eBay, sell them to a dealer all at one time, or should we hire a traditional auctioneer to sell them for us?

You may be thinking, “Whoa, Scott, where the heck is this coming from? We are having fun collecting toenails here….we talk about buying, so why are you talking about selling?”

Guys one day we will sell. Heck, you never know, you might decide to start collecting butterflies or election buttons (just kidding) or simply want to reallocate your assets, if you will, or could be faced with a forced sale, or worse, an estate sale, you get my point- bottom-line, we need a plan, OK? I think about this frequently as it relates to my collection, my family and their livelihood, and what if something should happen to me. This article is not about a forced or estate sale, so cheer up, but not to think about it at all would be some form of denial, wouldn’t it?

Frequently I am asked about my auction experience and how the prices realized at auction compare to those obtained through the more traditional one-on-one approach, and more recently, how the online auctions compare, from a seller’s perspective. (more…)