What We Do
Dan Matthews and Joey Whiteside formed The Authentication Company LLC after both had discussed the idea of marking and identifying advertising antiques as a means for ensuring their originality & authenticity.
TAC (pronounced “tack”) guarantees all items marked with their security holograms & serial numbers to be original items and not reproductions. Items that are found to be authentic received a specific TAC # for a specific item. No items will have the same TAC #.
Antiques we can mark as original
Original period correct items from a certain era in time which include Signs, Globes, Cans, metal thermometers, Displays, and other miscellaneous advertising items.
How to verify a TAC Number
All items with a TAC hologram and serial number are located in our database. Simply type the number into the search bar and you’ll see a picture of the item. You can search by TAC # as well as keyword. For example typing Mobil into the search bar will display results with the word Mobil in the title.
Items TAC does not grade include:
Completely repainted/restored single sided signs, reproductions, signs that are “Age Unknown” which are signs which cannot be verified as being legitimately old/original. We do not grade clocks where faces can be interchanged with reproductions and do not authenticate glass-faced thermometers (such as PAM Type, jumbo dials, etc).
The TAC Process:
A TAC employee will review your item to determine if it is authentic. Items deemed as authentic will received a TAC # which is generally placed on the front edge of an item (TAC’s discretion is used when placing the tags on items). TAC will also give the item a rating on a 1 to 10 scale which is good only for the day of the authentication. TAC uses the Matthews Grading System which can be viewed here.
TAC will also give customers a general market price estimate of the item at the time of authentication. For clients with larger collections TAC may also provide a detailed database list of their items with TAC numbers, Ratings, Price Estimates, Etc. For many collectors this is a great way to have your collection in an easily accessible file format or a printed document.
BECOME A MEMBER OF TAC | GET AN ITEM AUTHENTICATED
