People often ask, how does The Raab Collection differentiate itself in the buying and selling of historical documents? This short answer: at Raab, we buy documents outright; we don’t hold auctions and we almost never take consignments. We don’t ask sellers to wait for the next sale day to see if their document has sold, nor do we extract fees or ask them to wait for payment. When we believe in a document, we make a strong offer to the seller. When they accept and send the document, we pay promptly on receipt, usually the day that the document reaches our hands, generally within 24 hours. What does this mean? We invest in our own material because we believe in it: every piece listed for sale at Raab is owned by Raab.
A recent example: The descendants of Secretary of State Timothy Pickering contacted us and indicated that they had three signed letters of George Washington to their ancestor which had been kept by the family for more than two centuries. They were now considering selling. We made them an offer–higher than other valuations they had received–and they accepted. Nathan met the representative of the family, shook her hand, transferred the money, and walked away with the letters. We later found them homes, but our acquisition was not contingent on that. We bought them because we loved them and believed in them.
Why do we do it this way? Because we value quality over quantity. Our business model is to find individual historical documents and autographs that are interesting and inspiring, not to focus on the volume of the material, but on the importance of the document. We seek out documents we believe in and that we believe our clients will appreciate. Then we invest in the piece ourselves, which means 100% of the material listed for sale on our website is wholly owned by The Raab Collection.
For those wishing to buy from us, they see that we are true custodians of history. We care for the material and demonstrate that with our own funds. For those wishing to sell their historical documents and autographs, our model is beneficial for several reasons, including ease of process, guaranteed sale, and confidentiality. To learn more about it, read “Who Sells Their Historical Documents to Raab, and Where Do We Find Material?” and “Why Sell Your Historical Documents to Raab & How it Works.”
