Skinner, Inc. Launches New Website Featuring Enhanced Online Bidding

BOSTON, May 20, 2013 /PRNewswire/ -- Skinner, Inc. announced the launch of its newly designed website: www.skinnerinc.com. Skinner was one of the first auction houses to provide internet services, introducing interactive features and online bidding in the early 2000s. This site redesign introduces a completely new and modern look-and-feel, as well as enhanced features for an outstanding user experience, including:

• Simple, easy-to-understand navigation
• Larger, more beautiful imagery, including a new grid view for browsing auctions
• Detailed information on the dozens of specialty collecting areas covered by Skinner
• Powerful search – presenting lots in upcoming and past sales in one view
• My Skinner – a personalized suite of online services for the registered user
• A major upgrade to SkinnerLive! – Skinner's own live online bidding platform

The site navigation is considerably simpler than most auction websites, with the auction schedule providing direct access to auction highlights, online catalogs, live online bidding, and auction results. From the auction schedule, users can drill down into auctions, lot listings, and lot details with bidding options accessible every step of the way.

For visitors who would like to learn more about Skinner's areas of expertise, specialty area pages provide detailed information and sale highlights from dozens of categories in which Skinner specializes – from folk art to fine wine. Users will also enjoy powerful new searching capabilities which show results from both upcoming and past auctions in one view, making it easier to buy, consign or research specific objects.

The new "My Skinner" section of the site offers registered users personalized services to enhance the experience of buying and selling at auction with Skinner, including lot tracking and consolidated views of absentee bids and purchases. 

SkinnerLive! Online Bidding

The totally new SkinnerLive! online bidding platform offers an exciting and very user-friendly online bidding experience that is a step above alternatives. The new SkinnerLive! provides:

• Faster bidding
• Direct access to Skinner specialists
• Crystal-clear audio
• Complete catalog & condition information

In addition, the new SkinnerLive! allows visitors to watch and hear live auctions without registering or logging in. Since the service launched in February, tens of thousands of users have "tuned in" to watch the action.

Trefler & Sons Restoration Services, having recently watched an auction on SkinnerLive! observed on Facebook: "This could get addictive...listening to LIVE bidding at Skinner Auctions online, and having the ability to log in and bid online? Wonders will never cease."

According to Karen Keane, CEO of Skinner, Inc., "In just two years, between May of 2010 and May of 2012, our web traffic tripled and the number of visitors just keeps increasing. While our roots are squarely in New England, our clientele is global. The redesign provides buyers and sellers more extensive up-to-date information as well as an outstanding new way to bid through SkinnerLive!"

Customer feedback has been extremely positive. Charles Horey of Boston, Massachusetts, said, "I just wanted to say that I love the new website…One of my areas of interest is Galle vases…before I had to scroll through the back 20th century auctions searching for vases that have sold. Now I can just do a search and find all that have sold (including the two that I acquired). So much easier...and a great educational tool. Thanks!"

About Skinner
Skinner auctions draw international interest from buyers and consignors alike, with material regularly achieving record prices. The company's auction and appraisal services focus on fine art, jewelry, furniture, and decorative arts from around the globe, as well as wine, fine musical instruments, rare books, clocks, Judaica, and more. Monthly Skinner Discovery auctions feature a breadth of estate material. Widely regarded as one of the most trusted names in the business, Skinner appraisers have appeared on the PBS-TV series, Antiques Roadshow, since the show's inception. Skinner has galleries in Boston and Marlborough, Massachusetts with an international audience of bidders participating in person, by phone, and online through the SkinnerLive! online bidding platform. For more information and to read our blog, visit the website at www.skinnerinc.com, find us on Facebook at https://www.facebook.com/skinnerauctions, or follow us on Twitter @Skinnerinc.

SOURCE Skinner, Inc.