eBay offloads its offline assets

Dot-gone...

eBay has sold its offline auction subsidiary to an US auction house. The dot-com has decided to sell its bricks-and-mortar auction house Butterfields to US arts specialist Bonhams. eBay acquired Butterfields back in 1999 in a bid to enter the offline auction market but said the purchase of Butterfields had only help them to set up an online arts auction division and that the division's main focus has always been offline. Bonhams was established in 1793 in the US and deals in art, antiques and classic motor cars. Butterfields was originally established in San Francisco in 1865 as a seller of arts and antiques.