Champ auctioneer Jill Doherty is ready for her first bid of the night.

“OK, we’re going to start with lot No. 1, an acrylic painting,” says Doherty, 57, of Bay Shore. Clad in a black cocktail dress, appropriate for this charity fundraising auction, Doherty stands at the front of a large room at Land’s End catering hall in Sayville. Members of the well-dressed crowd hold bid “paddles” (actually, numbered sheets of paper) for the brief bidding war that’s about to begin.

The crowd shows interest in the landscape painting, when Doherty says, “I’ve got 300, but looking for 400.” She’s following bidders with help from her daughter, Erin Doherty, 27, of Islip, her bid assistant for the event. Almost as quickly as it starts, it’s over. “Sold at $300,” Doherty says, definitively. By night’s end, 23 works of art will be auctioned, benefiting a Huntington-based charity.

Ancient historyAuctioneering is among the world’s oldest professions, experts say, dating to the selling of brides in ancient Babylon, and it’s an older person’s game. “By and large, the majority of professional auctioneers are older men who have been in the business 20 years or more,” says Chris Longly, spokesman for the National Auctioneers Association in Overland Park, Kan., which has roughly 4,000 professional members.

Auctioneers handle a wide variety of items, anything from stamps and coins to Internet URLs and huge tracts of real estate. They are in a profession that anyone can learn but only a relative few master enough to make a good living. Their business is an enduring, multibillion-dollar part of the U.S. economy. If you’ve bought a used car, for instance, it was probably sold at a wholesale auction, Longly says. And once you learn the trade, you never have to retire, even as a younger generation steps up to the podium — often to fill the shoes of a parent.

Doherty, who’s been coaxing higher prices from bidders for more than 25 years, is one of the nation’s recognized masters. In 2002, she won the National Auctioneers Association International Auctioneer Champion Women’s Division title. Competitors are judged on poise, hand motions, eye contact, even the way you say the word “sold,” Doherty said.

She doesn’t wield a gavel, but she does specialize in the repetitive rapid-fire patter — known in auctioneer parlance as “the chant” — associated with the trade.

Entertainment value“The chant is the entertainment of it,” says Doherty, who learned the trade in a 10-day class in Missouri. “If it’s not a pleasing chant, they [bidders] might leave.” She’s sold everything from a new bidet to a pair of Shaquille O’Neal‘s sneakers (also probably new).

The auctioneer’s style varies from laid back to fast and furious, to the stiffer British approach seen at Sotheby’s.

Phil Weiss, 54, of Oceanside, is nationally known as an appraiser on the PBS series “Antiques Road Show.” He also runs auctions behind a desk at his Oceanside warehouse. On a recent Sunday morning, keeping track of bids from the Internet, call-ins and an audience of mostly men clad in flannel shirts and jeans, Weiss calmly sold thousands of dollars in stamps and coins, including scarce Morgan silver dollars.

Weiss got into the business because his father ran a rare book shop in Manhattan, and he was intrigued by the idea of collecting unusual things. “I took a hobby of stamp collecting and rare books and turned it into an avocation,” he says. Over the years, he’s auctioned off “some weird stuff.”

“I always laugh when we auction off human hair,” says Weiss, who’s handled clippings from George Washington and Abe Lincoln. “You are getting 100 or 200 dollars for a piece of hair the size of your thumbnail.”

Auctioneering can be lucrative for those who master the craft. “We are commission sales people, and we can sell an awful lot really fast,” says Doherty, who made her name in storage facility and house auctions. Commissions typically hover around 10 percent of the sale price, sometimes less if the asset is more valuable.

And you can keep the money coming in for decades, with retirement neither mandatory nor necessary. Some auctioneers continue into their 90s.

“You can do it for as long as your voice lasts,” says David R. Maltz, 56, who lives and owns an auction house in the same community. His specialty is auto auctions.

Versatility needed But pumping an audience for the highest bids isn’t the easiest way to make a living, and the chant is only part of the job. Longly says a good deal of the work takes place behind the scenes, and auctioneers have to know marketing and advertising.

Maltz says that a day spent on his auction pedestal, which can involve selling as many as 250 cars, can be grueling, so he doesn’t smoke or drink, and he tries to stay in shape. He’s auctioned off some pretty unusual items over the years — including the entire contents of a funeral parlor, caskets and all — often grossing millions of dollars.

Doherty, whose father was a commercial auctioneer selling restaurant equipment in New York City, is passing the gavel to her daughter, who specializes in charity benefits. She and Erin are the nation’s “only mother-and-daughter auction team,” according to Doherty.

Sometimes, when Erin runs a benefit auction, she hires her mother to help track bidders. Doherty says: “You get to this age, and you are on the other side of the hill, and you say, ‘This is a good thing when the kids step up.’ ”

What everyone should know about having more successful fundraisers;

Proven tips, tools and tactics to raise more money at your next charity event!!

Professional Event Consultant and Benefit Auctioneer from New York City are conducting a one time only  seminar in St. Thomas, USVI.  Learn everything from finding the perfect venue to inviting the perfect guest.  This seminar is designed to help you create the most successful fundraiser you can have.  We will focus on 7 highlighted tips that successful top tier benefits are using today and the hottest trends in the fund raising world.

Join us to learn how to increase your revenue and your FUN!

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Seen at this event was one woman that was very prepared for the raffle.  New glasses are on the market that lets the user wear the glasses with the magnification and also turn on and off a light that adds to the ease of reading.  These glasses are very handy during a benefit especially when there is “mood” lighting.   As the auctioneer it ads a special touch of humor to look out at an audience with headlamps on!

"Now you won't miss your winning number"

Speaking of raffles, it was a common practice at this event that people didn’t want to put their tickets in individual baskets.  In fact in some cases guest would only buy the raffle tickets if someone else put them in the baskets for them.  We are beginning to see a trend of guests not wanted to take the time to do the “raffle shuffle”.  They do their donation and buy the tickets but it becomes a burden to put the tickets in the bags.  Overheard at the tables are people saying things like “I never win anyway” and “I don’t care what it is, it’s all for fun anyway.”   These common comments make me question all of the time and energy groups put into their raffles and how can we make them more fun.  Maybe going back to the huge gold rolling drum and tickets are matched with prizes.  The specialty raffles are still huge draws and get lots of attention but maybe cocktail hour needs to be embraced more for its social time, after all it can be a lot of work to try to balance a cute hand bag, a cocktail, a ribbon of tickets, and rip up the rest of them.  On the note of tickets the sheet raffles are way more efficient!!!

having just one number makes it faster and easier to find the winner!!!

Congratulations to the Islip Rotary for putting on such a great event and making sure all of your guest left happy.

Erin Doherty-Ward Competing in 2010 IAC on the big screen

After the Auction Conference we returned to New York to another amazing experience.  We had an auction for Francios Pienaar’s Make a Difference first annual New York golf outing. We were in the Liberty Island golf course in New York. In a beautiful room with a great crowd we stood below the Statue of Liberty and raised money for the MAD Bunch.  Working as a mother daughter auction team we alternated items we sold and the other one was on the floor working with the vibrant audience.

Erin Doherty Ward and Francios Pienaar at MAD Golf outing

Being a one of a kinda mother daughter benefit auction team has more thrills than anyone can imagine.  Working with my mother and mentor has made our auction company so fun to be a part of.  I am so excited to see  what is next for the Star Benefit Auction team.  Our current goal is to help organizations go to the next level in their events. At the same time as increasing revenue we want to increase the fun. We think that working together will be double the excitement and double the  fun.

New York Mother Daughter Benefit Auction Team

Welcome to Star Benefit Auctions Blog.  We are just getting set up but we can’t wait to share with you.  Please be patient as we fill in about who we are and how we can help you.