1. Bid sheets - we have runners who circle the winning bid in red, pull the bid sheet off the table, and also write the winning bid # and amount on a second sheet that stays on the table. That way, we have an individual sheet for each item which comes in handy when we sort things out in the cash out area (I think you were suggesting logging the winning bids on a list and taking that list to cash out. Read futher for why I like individual bid sheets better).

2. We don't use runners to deliver items, unless they won a very valuable item which we have pulled off the table (ex: jewelry). If your items are clearly labeled (we stick an item# label on every item), there should be no confusion over who gets what. At cash out, we give our bidders the bottom half of their winning bid sheets to act as claim tickets. If you want,your runners could just float, helping people find their items.

3. We've done a raffle like your chinese auction. We sell an admission ticket for our auction, so that ticket # becomes the bidder's # for silent auction. We used pre-printed carnival tickets for the raffle. People are supposed to write their names/phone on the stub before they put it in the ticket box for the item. I think we sold a strip of 20 tickets for $5.

Like JHB suggested, we have our runners stake out the hot items and monitor the sheet as the bidding is closed. We give our runners red pens. THey circle the last VALID bid and pull the sheet.

One very important suggestion: close your silent auction items in waves, not all at once. People come to an auction expecting to spend X dollars. If they get outbid on all their bidsheets, they leave spending $0 and feeling bad the organization didn't get any of their money. We close our silent items in 3 waves, about 20 minutes apart. That way, if a bidder gets closed out of an item in the first wave, they'll go increase their bids on items in wave 2 or 3. All items are open at the same time, but close at differenct times. This also builds excitement and increases your bids because people have another chance to bid higher. We balance the waves, with some desireable items in the first wave for bargain hunters, and some smaller items in the last wave for people who want to buy something, but don't have a lot to spend. We use three different color bid sheets - one for each wave, and group the wave items togetehr in the room.

Cash-Out - Always a challenge! Here's our best approach: as soon as the runner pulls the bid sheets, she goes and sorts them by bid # into a set of "in" trays on the cashier table. The cashiers who are sitting on the other side of the table pull the sheets out of the trays and sorts them by bid # (or name if you're using bidder names). This continues until all the bid sheets have been pulled. At that time, the cashiers staple together all the bid sheets for one bidder and totals the amount due on the top sheet. The set is refiled until the bidder comes to cash out. Our bid sheets are designed so the bottom is a claim check/confirmation of what they paid/receipt. The cashier cuts off all the bottoms, staples those together and gives them to the bidder. The top half, still stapled together is saved for post-auction analysis.

We also give each cashier a Cashier's Log form where s/he lists every cash out transaction by bidder (NOT by item #).

Have at least 4 cashiers. Provide good lighting, calculators, staplers, scissors, pencils, file box, cash box.

I've used this system 3-4 times and each time we find another way to improve. Cash out is definately the challenge of an auction evening.

Good luck!

1) Layout - Our church auction was a similar setup with everything in one huge room. The registation/checkout station was set off to the side (the most unused area of the building). The PA system was on the opposite side, so attention was focused there for announcements, entertainment, and the live aution.

The middle of the room (so about 80% of the space) was divided into an area for the auction tables and an area of tables/chairs for people to sit down, eat, visit.

When the auction was over, volunteers quickly gathered up the sheets and took them over to the check out area. A few remained in the auction area to keep an eye on things. Other activities continued while those in the checkout area finalized the winners.

2) Runners - yes, absolutely.

3) Tickets - not sure what you are asking here. We print our own tickets using a business card template (10 per sheet). Instead of numbers,they have space for name/phone number. People buy the blank tickets and put them in the jar for the prize they want to try for. (If that's what you mean.)

4) Agressive bidders-you just need volunteers breathing down their necks. If they bid after close, void the bid. Try humor, but just be firm if necessary. Some groups turn a hotly contested silent auction item into an impromptu real auction and let the two bidders fight it out while someone calls out the high bid and asks if the other wants to go higher. (note - if you do this, make sure it's included in your rules.)

Good luck.

I am running our May auction this year and it is greatly expanded from previous years. We will have silent auction items with bid sheets and are also pulling out about 10-20 items to be won "chinese auction" style with tickets and a drawing. Our goal in doing this is to try and attract more parents to participate as some don't when they feel the bidding is getting out of their comfort zone. We will also have door prizes this year to encourage more participation. Here's what our plan is and here are some questions:

1) We can't have parents exit our multi-purpose room (where the auction takes place) upon close-out as it's evening (dark outside) and there's not enough room elsewhere in the hallways for them to go. They have to stay and mingle. With that said, we were thinking of handling close-out as follows (please any alternate ideas or suggestions welcome!!!)--having volunteers responsible for 1-2 tables each, and when bidding ceases they highlight the winning bid, transfer this info on to a record sheet, and leave the bid sheet with the highlighted winner on the table so that parents can see who has won. The record sheet would come back to the close-out/check-out tables and serve as our record when people pay.

2) Is it beneficial to have "runners" who retrieve the items for people who are paying? Or should we have people pick up the items themselves? What are the pros/cons?

3) What do you price tickets at? I've located several online vendors that sell the chinese auction tickets (25 tickets, one door prize stub, one "Keep this" stub). We figured we could use the chinese auction ticket number as an identification for the parent in the silent bidding as well (on the bid sheets they could use this number). (We'd make up some other special numbering for those not purchasing chinese auction tickets.) You don't sell individual tickets, do you--just sheets, right? We were thinking only of selling the sheets alone--too messy getting into individual tickets I think. We want to engage as many as possible in this part of the auction so we don't want to price the sheets too high...help? advice? tips?

. What do you do if when the bidding closes you have a person that does not put the pencil down--or if there's a battle and you can't tell who was right/wrong? How do you handle?

. Any of you that have experience handling auctions--I'm open to ideas/comments/tips. Our auction is May 6th. I have all the donations squared away (for the most part) but it's the operating of the auction I'm now trying to figure out. Last year we had long lines and not the greatest system for check-out--I'd love to hear what others do. Thanks!!!