Best of Show Automotive Blog

Did you happen to watch the Barrett-Jackson live from Mandalay Bay in Las Vegas this past weekend? Speed Channel had a live broadcast for all three days of the auction, and while the Las Vegas event pales in comparison to the Scottsdale event in January, it’s great entertainment nonetheless.

First off, let me give you my take on the auctions in general. Auctions are a lot of fun. If you love classic cars and you’ve never been to a major classic car auction, plan a weekend and get out to one of the big events. You take 1,000 cars of varying quality, thousands of buyers, many more spectators, add in a little bit Barnum & Bailey and you’ve got yourself quite a spectacle. The people at Barrett-Jackson, however, take it to a different level. Mix in some celebrities, a ton of super nice customs, some feel-good charity cars, every high rolling ham in the car collecting hobby and live television and you’ve got capitalism run amuck!

The no reserve factor at Barrett-Jackson is the final ingredient in the secret sauce that sets this auction apart from all of the rest. You empathize with the guy that spent two years and 3,000 man hours on a car that sells for $55,000.00. You feel good for the guy that spent something like ten years on the custom 67 Nova and walked away with a mind-bending $175,000.00. And every car sells! There’s a lot of raw emotion at these events, even with the Speed Channel commentators. These guys were crying when the 1961 Jaguar “Ol’ Yaller III” only brought $198,000.00. You could hear the tortured anguish in his voice over the unfairness of it all. “Why, a 1969 Camaro custom brought $255,000.00 earlier today”, he wailed. I’ve got some news for the Sports Car Market guys who guest commentate on Speed Channel and are constantly belittling the muscle car market in the pages of their magazine, which they need to rename “British/Italian/German Sports Car Market” …. get used to 1969 Chevrolet Camaro customs bringing more than the obscure British stuff. They are, after all, simply better cars!

Now here’s the all important question …. Is Barrett-Jackson a leading indicator of the health of the collector car hobby? My answer would be an emphatic YES and NO!

Yes, you can spot trends at Barrett and get a sense of what’s going to be hot. For example, a few years ago, the two nicest “big fin” Desotos showed up and everyone was shocked when each car brought north of $200K. Of course, every “big fin” car in the US came out of the woodwork, prices ran up for a while and at Barrett Jackson 2008, there was at least 2008. The classic car market is like every other market … supply eventually will meet or outstrip demand, as Hemi E body owners found out a couple of years back.

The problem with Barrett-Jackson is that it’s an artificial, insulated corner of the hobby. Most of the guys in the hobby don’t and will never buy a car at an auction. And the cars that do sell at Barrett-Jackson are like every other car in our hobby: a unique piece which can only be judged based on it’s own individual merits. In other words, unless you are there, and can carefully inspect the car close-up (the cameras make the worst pig look like a show queen), examine the numbers, check the documents, etc., you can’t use a Barrett-Jackson sale as a barometer on what something is worth. Last year, a 1967 Dodge Coronet R/T sold for $55,000.00. A customer emailed and said … “see, Mopars are on their way down … that used to be an $80,000.00 car”. What Mr. Market Expert did not understand, since he didn’t see the car up close, was that it was an amateurish restoration, with a replacement drive-train, no documents and a color change. In other words, it’s not a car we would have paid $30,000.00 for. So does that mean the market is up or down on 1967 Coronet R/T HEMIS? Doesn’t mean either. It simply means that on that day, someone was willing to pay, rightly or wrongly, $55,000.00 for a non-numbers matching, undocumented car with a mediocre restoration.

What did I see at this weekend’s sale? Two things stood out like a sore thumb. The established trend of great custom builds that you can actually drive outperforming numbers matching cars that you can’t drive is continuing. Thankfully, the days of the “numbers matching Nazis” appears to be at a close. Two, I saw a lot of buyers in their 30’s and 40’s pulling the trigger on large purchases. Normally, it’s the same group of wizened veterans buying 90% of the cars. The generations are changing, and it looks like the guys my age are spending the big money for the best stuff. Very nice to see and, bodes well for the future of the hobby.