The collectibles industry attracts the purest of sports and entertainment fans. Building a collection of historical mementos brings out nostalgia and a deep love for this exciting craft. But just as collecting brings together the most passionate enthusiasts, it also provides appeal to the most unscrupulous of dealers. We’ve heard time and again of stories about fake items selling for hundreds of thousands. On the other side, it costs an arm and a leg to get a single piece of memorabilia authenticated by an expert who has the ultimate word. For Harlan Werner, the art of collecting should serve the very people who built this industry – the customers. And by building The Memorabilia Network, Werner has provided sports, entertainment, and music memorabilia collectors a platform they could trust.

Created to be the premier platform for authenticating, grading, buying, and selling collectible items, The Memorabilia Network was built by Harlan Werner after his disappointing experience with dealers and authenticators. Having 40 years of experience as a seller, show promoter, and collector himself, Werner spent a lot of time with athletes and entertainers, and had exposure to big collections of precious memorabilia. He has worked with such legendary athletes as Jim Brown, Roy Campanella, Don Drysdale and Mike Tyson, and represented Muhammad Ali and his family for more than 20 years. Werner remembers a time when stories of provenance held water when trying to sell important items, but today, you could pay thousands of dollars just to hear an expert say, “Yeah, it’s the real deal,” but with what authority? Their opinion. This is what passionate collectors and honest sellers have to deal with. The industry has become cut-throat and less about the joy of collecting.

In building The Memorabilia Network, Werner provides a high-quality service you would expect from an upscale auction house, mixed with the authenticity from the people who have spent most of their lives collecting. On this platform, collectors won’t only be able to have their items properly authenticated, they can tell their stories.

Having poured his heart and soul into sharing important memorabilia with others, Werner built a team of people who shared the same passion. He now works with people of authority in the collectibles industry, entertainment, and business, including the COO, Dan Nelles; Director of Appraisals, Mike Gutierrez, who is also the on-air appraiser for the prominent Antiques Roadshow; Hollywood Department Head, David Elkouby; and Office Manager, Maria Parker. On The Memorabilia Network’s Board of Directors are titans and experts of their respective industries.

Today, Werner currently represents such icons as Koufax, Joe Namath, John Riggins, Fernando Valenzuela and Clayton Kershaw, and has worked recently with such Hollywood celebrities as Sylvester Stallone, Gene Hackman, Susan Sarandon and Kevin Costner. With a vast experience in collection management, Werner brings the same upscale service to each and every collector that comes in.

The Memorabilia Network’s white-glove service includes in-house auction services, where, as a full-service auction company, they will be able to conduct their own sale of your collections. They employ a world class marketing team that will effectively market our auctions to global collectors. The team doesn’t use boilerplate templates to create a catalog either – they produce a fully-illustrated high-end catalog that is unique to your collection. The Memorabilia Network team also offers appraisals for single items, larger collections, or full estates. And if you’re wary of vague authentication standards, The Memorabilia Network follows current USPAP standards with all appraisal projects.

Possibly the most important of all the company’s endeavors is in providing a platform where a collector’s voice is heard through their telling of stories. For this, The Memorabilia Network has ventured into studio-quality film projects where interviews are done with the collectors themselves to show the true value of the memorabilia.

If you’d like to see the team at work, attend their upcoming Heroes, Icons, and Legends Auction on October 24, 2022. You’ll be able to bid on extremely valuable pieces, such as Muhammad Ali’s portrait and portfolio sets, Mickey Mantle memorabilia, and much more. Learn more by visiting The Memorabilia Network website.

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