Many of the auctions are using legacy software and don’t understand the importance of customer service.
FORT WORTH, TX, August 12, 2025 /24-7PressRelease/ — My name is Ron Sturgeon, and my experience with auto auctions dates from the 1980s when I was buying lots and lots of salvage cars and moving forward into the late 1990s when Copart digitized its auctions.
One day, Copart announced it had laid off all its auctioneers nationwide, hundreds of them, and rolled out a new video platform with pictures for buyers to see the cars up for auction. Additionally, it stopped letting people in auctions on auction day, although a person could still preview a car on a non-auction day.
At the time, this sounded absolutely insane, and all the buyers said it would never work. Today, 25 years later, we all know Copart were the smartest folks in town. They are the 600-pound gorilla in auto salvage auctions. Their biggest competitor, Insurance Auto Auctions, a public company, did bring in video, but almost a decade later.
The issue is the age of buyers and the sea change that is occurring in those demographics of collectors. Unfortunately, the buyers, for instance, of model A’s and model T’s have gone away, and the car values have plummeted. Moving forward, this trend is going to continue in both the regular auction world as well as the collector auction world.
These newer buyers have different expectations about how they buy cars and their use of the computer, as well as having a higher expectation for customer service.
Although the major auction companies like RM Sotheby’s and Bonhams have also always sold some cars online, they don’t focus on their online platform. Having spoken with some of the older collectors and even auction principles also, they are modernizing their platforms, but they are doing it at an amazingly slow pace. And they are more or less dismissive about the need for such tools.
They insist that buyers will always want to go to a live auction, and do not believe they will move to an online-only platform. I do agree that there will always be a place for live auctions, and, perhaps, for some of the super expensive cars, that will continue to some extent.
The first to enter of the space in a digital way, with proper resources, was Bring a Trailer, also known as BAT. The cofounder of BAT, which started in 2007, Randy Nonnenberg, was just an entrepreneur with the love for cars and computers. Laughingly, people have said that he was the Copart of the collector car auction, industry, bringing innovation while nobody else was trying.
Today, there are a host of fairly large auction companies, almost all are ignoring the online segment. Is it because the owners are old and in denial about the demographics of the hobby? Perhaps, it’s because they don’t want to spend the capital to field a world-class site? A website needed to compete in this market likely would cost at least $2-5 million, if done properly, and that can be a tough sell.
There are a number of latecomers, including Cars and Bids, and even Supercar Blondie is having a go at it, but selling a dozen cars a month is unlikely to move anyone’s needle, especially the investors. The famous Antiques Road Show brothers, Leigh and Leslie Keno, even had a go at it with Fine Automobile Auctions, but after a few auctions, they aren’t making much noise.
I’ve discussed the challenges with some of the companies, and it’s not clear to me why, but everyone has a wait-and-see attitude. Another newcomer is Broad Arrow Auctions, who are backed by Haggerty Insurance. They likely have the capital to do this digital job properly, but they also seem to be sitting on their hands.
I believe many of the “big boys” just don’t think the super expensive cars are going to make a splash online. I believe they are dead wrong, and while they watch, BAT is proving that those cars can sell, such as the recent sale of a beautiful Mercedes 540k, which sold for more than $2m, getting over 1,200 comments. The car seems to have brought all the money.
Here’s the rub though, I’ve always told my consulting clients that when the transaction costs get high enough, buyers and seller look for alternatives. Here comes BAT! That 540k would have incurred about $350,000 to $400,000 in fees with any of the big boys, and would have required the seller to truck the car somewhere and wait for the right auction. BAT collected about $10,000 from the buyer, and almost nothing from the seller. That should raise some eyebrows. BAT is smart like a fox I believe, and in 5 years when they’ve dramatically increased the number of sales and the price point, someone is going to be crying in their beer. As I write this, BAT is selling about 150 cars daily, approaching 200. In five years, that $2-million-dollar sale will undoubtably have higher fees.
The big boys will say they offer the services to justify the fees, and they do have great services. But I believe this market is ripe for disruption. If someone doesn’t get very serious very fast, BAT will have the only shooter marble.
I would propose that it’s a Catch-22. Do we do it now, or do we wait? I believe the time for serious competitors to enter the marketplace has already passed. Several of the large auction companies who do have a very large following still do not have a serious online platform.
Some of the companies, like GAA Auctions, have a little or no customer service and their website is poorly conceived and hard to use. Another regional competitor with a large presence is Worldwide Auctions. They have their corporate auction site, but their bidding platform is a completely different piece of software the two are not well connected almost impossible to navigate and my personal experience is the customer service is nonexistent. I had someone there tell me they were really sorry no one had called me back after a number of unanswered emails, but that they were working on it.
Who will take on BAT? That’s the big question. BAT was recently bought by the Hearst Auto Group, joining their family of automotive holdings, including Auto Week, Car and Driver and Road and Track, in a transaction rumored to be many tens of millions of dollars. It’s a big commitment, and they have the money to back up their ambitious plans to own the collector car auction market.
As a big BAT auction user, having bought over 150 cars on the site, I do love the way it works. The only complaint I’ve heard is that it’s almost impossible to reach anyone unless you’re a big buyer or a big seller. I searched the site as I prepared this information, and could not find a place to email anyone with a concern.
After I sold my salvage yard to Ford Motor Co, I started a new salvage auction at the request of insurers in DFW, who were anxious to see relief in fees from what arguably was a duopoly with the 2 big public companies. Just as we started getting traction, guess what happened? Copart bought my auction.
I buy cars from almost all the major auction companies, and many of the buyers have no idea where the industry is headed, and are in complete denial about whether or not it can work completely online. They will slowly come around and adapt, and the hobby will survive and grow as it always has because America loves cars.
About the DFW Car and Toy Museum
The museum was founded by Ron Sturgeon in the 1980’s collecting automobile toys and automobiles. Until recently, it was in Haltom City, TX, and its website dfw elite toy museum.com was the go-to source for toy and car lovers worldwide. After an exhaustive search, the museum found a new location in Fort Worth at 2550 McMillan Parkway, Fort Worth, TX 76137. Sturgeon started his automotive business in Haltom city 50 years ago working on VW bugs, and the museum has more than 35 Volkswagens. Although he wanted to stay in Haltom city, he was unable to reach agreement with city officials on several locations. He found that required parking or zoning changes were too onerous. The new facility has 150,000 square feet and, with free admission, promises an entertaining visit. They offer secure climate-controlled car storage also. The museum is also dog friendly and encourages pictures. Hours of operation are Tuesday-Saturday, 9:00 am-6:00 pm, visit the museum’s website at dfw car and toy museum.com. The museum is also available to host events. It has a catering prep kitchen and large event room with bar and 20-person conference table in the board room.
—
For the original version of this press release, please visit 24-7PressRelease.com here
