James D. Julia Auction House has Merged with Morphy Auctions

Hrachya H
by Hrachya H

James D. Julia Auction has become a division of another auction house called Morphy Auctions effective of December 14th, 2017. The merger was announced on December 21st by Dan Morphy, the president and founder of Morphy Auction Company.

As claimed in the press release, Morphy auction’s annual sales of $35 million and James D. Julia’s $43 million combined make their joint sales $78 million which in turn makes them one of the largest antique auction houses in North America. These are not only firearm sales but combined prices of a variety of antique item auctions. It would be interesting to know what is the combined percentage of the firearm sales and how does it compare to other auction houses of the industry like the Rock Island Auction Company.

The upcoming James D. Julia Spring 2018 Extraordinary Firearms Auction held in March will take place in the usual location of Fairfield, Maine. All the succeeding auctions and consignments will be arranged at Morphy Auction’s two locations in Denver, Pennsylvania and Las Vegas, Nevada. Such schedule is chosen to ensure a smooth transition process.

You can read the full text of this announcement published on James D. Julia Auction’s website by clicking here.

Whether this move will anyhow affect the firearms industry or not is hard to guess. What do you think the firearm collectors community should expect from this merger?

Hrachya H
Hrachya H

Managing Editor Being a lifelong firearms enthusiast, Hrachya always enjoys studying the history and design of guns and ammunition. Should you need to contact him, feel free to shoot him a message at Hrachya@TheFirearmBlog.com

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  • True Born Son of Liberty True Born Son of Liberty on Dec 26, 2017

    I’d like to hear from Ian about this.

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    • Baron of Livonia Baron of Livonia on Dec 27, 2017

      @oldman I think they will keep all the Pre-Auction publicity they can get. I think those items he pulls and does features on actually help drive interest, which drives bids. He has even admitted reluctance on choosing items he plans on bidding on to keep them in catalog description only. I think the buyer and seller premiums are high, but I am poor so my son has to use his own money to further this hobby. I enjoy his presentations and the historical content and background he provides.

  • Baron of Livonia Baron of Livonia on Dec 27, 2017

    Typo in 2nd paragraph. Murphy, or did it Morph to Murph.

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