If you were Steve Ivy, CEO of Heritage Auction Galleries, you would be smiling, too. Imagine looking forward to his firm?s FUN Signature and Platinum Night Auctions Jan. 3-6, 2007, and the prospect of breaking the auction firm?s $62 million record set at the 2005 Heritage FUN auction.
That?s right, $62 million. That used to be a good year. Now its done during the week of the first major show of the year, which is held in Orlando, Fla.
At the right, Heritage CEO and co-chairman Steve Ivy holds a 1927-D $20 in MS-66 and an Ultra High Relief $20 in Proof-68, two of the featured coins in the upcoming FUN auctions.
?The magnitude and quality of the consignments has set expectations of breaking the 2005 record,? said Ivy, holding two significant lots as he posed for the camera. ?There are also many, many coins fresh to the market.
?The FUN auction is the best coin show of the year for us. It is a well-respected and well-run show. There is a lot of pent-up demand after the slow market in December,? commented Ivy.
Heritage, started by Ivy in 1976, is the world?s largest collectibles auctioneer. Over his three decades of leadership of the firm, he has drawn on deep roots in the numismatic hobby.
Ivy started collecting coins at about age 8 or 9 and received his first coins from a neighbor, he said. He set up his first table at a Fort Worth, Texas, coin show when he was only 12. Ivy then placed his first coin advertisement in a national publication, Numismatic Scrapbook, in 1963 at the age of 14.
At the age of 20, Ivy opened Steve Ivy Rare Coins in downtown Dallas. In 1972 the company was incorporated as Steve Ivy Rare Coins Co., Inc.
In 1983, James Halperin, founder of New England Rare Coin Galleries, was brought in as a partner and the Heritage Capital Corporation was born.
?I don?t have a personal coin collection anymore,? said Ivy, ?but coins remain the center of the Heritage business.?
Heritage auctions now include Americana, books and manuscripts, art, comics and comic art, currency, entertainment memorabilia, jewelry and timepieces, movie posters and sports collectibles. The company recently expanded into jewelry and held its first jewelry sale Dec. 4, 2006.
Ivy attributes much of his success to luck, hard work and surrounding himself with talented people.
Ivy now focuses his attention on the management of the selling efforts of the company in all its markets and the formation of corporate policy for long-term growth, but remains intimately involved in numismatics, including serving on the board of directors for the Professional Numismatic Guild. Ivy is a member of the American Numismatic Association, Florida United Numismatists, and Texas Numismatic Association.
