Without Tonya and Thomas Rhein, our auction catalogues would not be what they are today. For more than 20 years, the two have been jetting back and forth between the USA and Europe to produce catalogues for the Heinrich Köhler auction house and its sister companies — H.R. Harmer in the United States and Corinphila in the Netherlands and Switzerland.
They handle every single lot at least once. That amounts to around 30,000 lots per year, for which they first create scans of the front and back for both the print and online catalogues. Added to this are thousands of scans of certificates. They then combine these images with the descriptions provided by the philatelists.
Thomas begins by assembling images and text into a rough pre-layout. Tonya then takes over to apply the finishing touches: adding background images, adjusting spacing, and refining the details. The result is aesthetic auction catalogues that are unmatched in the world of philately.
Their home is in St. Joseph, Missouri — the historic starting point of the Pony Express. There, in their free time, they lovingly renovate their house.