Death of a firm can breathe life into others at auction

SJ Corio Co. President Salvatore Corio Jr. has been running liquidation auctions in Rhode Island since 1983, so when he took on the 38 Studios LLC bankruptcy sale, he knew he was in for a big job. With over 2,000 lots on the block, selling everything in one session while maximizing returns for taxpayers would take speed and endurance. Over a nearly uninterrupted 10 hours of bidding, the auction recovered $650,000 for the state as Corio mixed his trademark blend of rapid-fire humor with salesmanship. More than once, he asked for a bid of $75 million, the amount of the 38 Studios loan guarantee.

PBN: How did the 38 Studios auction compare with others you’ve done over the years?
CORIO: After 27 years of doing this, we kind of have it down to a science. Obviously 38 Studios, with the amount of press and exposure, certainly attracted a crowd and a lot of attention. But we do the same thing at every auction. If you came to one of our smaller auctions – and I call them a show, because that’s what they are – it is the same routine, except at 38 Studios in Providence we had 2,100 lots.

PBN: Do you perform any differently at an auction like that, a big stage with a lot of attention,
CORIO: It is really the same. One of the things I always try to do is keep things moving along as fast as possible. With 38 Studios, that was even more important, because I think that was a record for us. In all the years I have been doing this, I don’t think I have ever sold 2,000 lots in one day. But I really didn’t want to have to come back the second day. I knew I had big groups of items out there, like the computers, the monitors … that if there were buyers out there to take those big groups, we could get through it in one day. We started an hour late because of the crowd – there was a line from about 9 a.m. from the front doors to Westminster Street – so I started selling at 11:30 a.m. and finished selling a little after half-past 9 p.m. I took only one 15 minute break around 6 p.m.

PBN: Just 15 minutes off the whole day?
CORIO: Yeah and it was because we had some cars in parking lots that were going to close. But it did give me a chance to step down off the block and get a quick bite and some water before getting back out there. Once I get warmed up … the adrenaline is running. You’ve got lots of people there, the crowd was bidding and I could joke around with them. If you can keep them relaxed and having fun and into the spirit of the auction, you can keep selling. They stayed with me all day.

PBN: Who bought Schilling’s elliptical machine and what was the highest grossing item?
CORIO: The elliptical didn’t sell. It was not supposed to be part of the sale. I think the highest number was for the phone system.

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PBN: Even with so many people turning out on Empire Street, there were even more following along online – how does the online buyer change an auction?
CORIO: What we find is it adds a mystery element to the auction for those that are sitting there, because they don’t know what the online buyers are thinking. You can’t look over at them and see where they’re at. And we had a lot of them. We had 475 registered bidders on-site and 700 registered online.

PBN: Has auctioneering changed as a result of Internet technology over the years or is it the same? Does it complicate things for you at all?
CORIO: No. There is a gentlemen standing next to me and he is monitoring the online bids and he calls out the bids to me just like someone else in the room, but he is representing 700 online buyers. Most of our auctions are still on-site auctions, so mostly it is the same as it has been for hundreds of years.

PBN: You employ a fair amount of humor in your auctions. What role does that play?
CORIO: Like anything else, if you are just listening to a straight auction chant, it is pretty boring to listen to. My theater background and stand-up comedy background lets the crowd relax and have some fun. Laughter is the best medicine. If you have people sitting there and you know it is going to be a long day for them and a long day for me too, if you can entertain them it certainly makes the day go by faster.

PBN: How did you develop your auction-calling style? Do you have influences or is it just your personality?
CORIO: It’s totally unique to me. I consider the block my little stage.

PBN: Do you only do liquidations?
CORIO: Probably 95 percent of the work we do is either an insolvency matter or at least commercial-industrial. We don’t really do estate sales. Arts or antiques are not something I have a whole lot of knowledge about. I have always been selling equipment; it’s just something we know and there is a lot of crossover between industries.

PBN: Can it be depressing selling off the last pieces of failed companies?
CORIO: For what I do day-in, day-out dealing with insolvency, we have to look for the silver lining. For us that is the startup company and the company that is expanding and coming to our auctions and buying equipment. Even though I have been referred to as an industrial undertaker, even though this company is closed, the companies that are there are buying the equipment to enhance their own businesses. •INTERVIEW
Sal Corio
Position: President, SJ Corio Co.
Background: A North Providence native, Corio was a finance major who dreamt of a career in the theater when he experienced his first liquidation auction and discovered a way to combine stagecraft and commerce. After founding SJ Corio to buy and sell equipment from liquidations after graduating from URI, he went auction school in Missouri and held his first auction in 1986.
Education: Bachelor’s in finance from the University of Rhode Island, 1983
First Job: Shoveling snow
Residence: Cranston
Age: 50

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