Mailbox duo invest in art portal
The duo which sold Birmingham's Mailbox building for £127m earlier this year have made their latest investment in an online trading portal for the art industry.
Property entrepreneurs Mark Billingham and Alan Chatham have backed blutulip.com, which offers art galleries the opportunity to trade, buy stock and sell items to one another to ensure a steady cashflow.
Graham Finch, chief executive of blutulip.com, said: "Excess stock in galleries is a major inhibitor to new collection buy-in as it ties up so much cash for the retailer. Art sales can be influenced greatly by regional variations, meaning that a piece which hasn't sold in the north of England could be desperately sought after in the south.
"However, as the stock has been bought, the publisher will be showing it as ‘sold out’, which may not be necessarily be the case. Blutulip.com allows galleries the opportunity to open their showrooms to the world allowing them to trade, not only within the UK but ultimately globally."
Investors Billingham and Chatham purchased Birmingham’s iconic Mailbox building for £4m in 1998, making a £123m return on its sale earlier this year.
