News

CJM PURCHASES FINE ARTS AND ANTIQUES BUSINESS

              Northern Lincolnshire’s leading antiques and fine art auction house is changing hands.

              Brown & Co, who have owned the business for the past six years, have agreed to sell it to Scunthorpe-based auctioneers CJM Asset Management.

              The transfer will occur at the end of October when the Brown & Co auction room in Old Courts Road in Brigg will close down and a major new auction centre is opened in Scunthorpe.

              Announcing the deal Brown & Co’s senior Brigg partner Philip Dunn said: “The lease on the saleroom premises was due for renewal, which prompted a review of the auction business.”

              “We have had  six very successful years . . . auctions have broken all previous records . . . but the bottom line is that we do not see antiques and fine art auctioneering as a core activity for the firm and hence the decision to sell the business on.”

              “Auctioneering is a core activity for CJM and so we are delighted to be passing the operation on to safe hands. We will clearly be working together in the coming weeks to ensure a seamless transfer of activity and indeed beyond that.”

              “We have a specialist collectors toy sale at Brigg next Saturday (8th) and then our final antiques auction the following Saturday (15th) but the weekly Thursday morning valuation sessions at Brigg will be continuing to the end of October and we will be accepting entries that will go into the first CJM auction in December.”

              CJM Asset Management, one of the leading industrial auctioneers in the country, is to create a new auction centre at Ginetta House on Dunlop Way, the former site of the Ginetta sports car factory,  which at almost 20,000 square feet is almost twice the size of the old Brigg Auction Rooms or CJM’s current auction centre on Brigg Road.

              CJM director Paul Cooper . . .  a fully trained and qualified antiques and fine art auctioneer . . . is to head up the new antiques and fine art auction division that will be branded CJM Auctioneers.

              Paul said: “We are very pleased to have bought the business, which will broaden the range of auctioneering and valuation services that we are able to offer to our corporate and professional clients as well of course to the general public in the region.”

              “Over the past five years Brown & Co have considerably strengthened the business.  Average lot values were almost trebled and the auctions have seen some very high value antiques going under the hammer. We want to develop the quality of sales even further.”

              “CJM operates on an international basis, which we believe will give us an edge in attracting interesting and high quality antiques to be sold in the area. Our aim is that this will be one the most exciting and successful regional antiques and fine art centres in the country.”

              Speaking about the move to the new premises on Dunlop Way, Paul added: “We’ll have 18,900 square feet of modern office and saleroom space, with tons of on site parking. That enables us to move our current industrial auctioneering centre on Brigg Road on to the site and our headquarters offices, which are currently at Duchess House, Queensway Court, as well as providing a very fine new home for the antiques and fine art saleroom.”

              “I appreciate that Brigg will be sorry to see the closure of the old auction rooms but the town-centre site just was not a viable proposition for the auction centre that we have in mind. The new place is just six miles away and for people travelling to the rooms from Grimsby or Hull or Lincoln it will be much easier to reach.”

              “The plan is to hold the first antiques auction at Dunlop Way on Saturday December 3rd.”