Before I get into the nitty gritty of autograph collecting and dealing I desire to give you some background on why anybody might listen to my advice. For a variety of many years, I was a wholesaler / retailer of true "in person" autographs to a variety of large retail outlets. I offered for sale countless numbers of collectables autographs in this way varying from Cary Grant to Brad Pitt. My sources happen to be very reliable and all in the material I sold was fully authenitcated. I did not promote any "autographs" that had been obtained as a result of the mail. Due to the fact I was a wholesaler, I did not attract or appear for publicity. I had a steady market and I was content with that. The following remarks will not be favorite with various autograph retailers but they stand for the real story which is rarely expressed within the business. I believe this is necessary that the dark side of your company is exposed. It can be unfortunate that the questionable practices of numerous sellers damages the crediblity of your hobby and the honest dealers.

The reason why no one really should sell collectables autographs that have been obtained by using the mail is that I believe a substantial percentage of those that are sold as true are clearly secretarial. You can find a amount of retailers who have teams of workers who send letters to hundreds of celebrities. They use a amount of several PO Boxes and bascially pose as true collectors. They receive a a large number of responses - ranging from signed index cards to signed photos and then promote these as reputable collectables autographs. Now, you genuinely dont require being a brain surgeon to work out that celebrities obtain a big variety of requests for their signature. The additional famous the celebrity the a great deal more requests. I spoke to Chris O'Donnell recently and he told me that he had no way of keeping up with the demand.

Think belonging to the mail Tom Cruise would obtain. Can you realistically imagine that these celebrities sign everything which may be asked of them? You would have to be incredibly naiive to think that that may be the case. Its additional likely that a lot with the responses are secretarial or autopen or published signatures - basically signed by someone other than the star in a manner that looks legitimate.

So how can you determine if they are real or not?

Of course it's always true that some personalities honestly sign some material by means of the mail. The difficulty is the fact that should you did not see the star sign the item there's no way you is usually 100% specific that the signature is legal. Staff of many stars become very skilled at signing autographs. This is where the retailers come in. Different retailers are quite happy to supply a Certificate of Authenticity for  "collectables autograph" that has been obtained by way of the mail. They argue that they have many years of experience in authentication and that they can tell a real autograph from a secretarial version. Thats how they make money. The fact is that in most cases it truly is impossible being selected that an autograph is honest unless it was obtained "in person". It can be, even so, rather effortless to deliver a C of a A and pass a questionable signature off as legal. The truth is always that any dealer who obtains signatures via the mail will want to NEVER deliver a C of a A.


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