Large auction houses and marketing: RM abandons the bet and plays across the board
13 March 2020 3 min read 5 images
With Gooding betting everything on one lot, RM chose the opposite strategy; offering a series of top lots with limited estimates (albeit above $1 million) and close to one another.
It therefore auctioned 8 cars with estimates of between $1 million and $2.8 million. And sold 7 out of 8.
The top lot of the auction was red, with a prancing horse on the hood that neighs in Italian. I don’t think I’d surprise you if I say that the prize for the most expensive car of the evening went to a red 2003 Ferrari Enzo (really?) with a black interior. Purchased from the Lingenfelter collection in 2005, it was offered at Amelia with 1,700 miles from new on the clock and Tubi Extreme modified exhausts. When new it was about $800,000 but this won went for $2,782,500. If I had this amount, I wouldn’t let it pass by before it climbs the path that leads towards the numbers commanded by the McLaren F1.
The second highest sale went to an old acquaintance. The Bugatti Type 57 Cabriolet d’Ieteren. It had previously been sold in France in September 2015 for €1,265,000. Being a unique example, with an elegant style that follows that of the Aravis, it is never useful to track previous sale prices. But I don’t think this was the case because the current seller took her around the world between concours d’elegance contests (from Villa d’Este to the very recent Audrain Newport) and then put her on the market, also making a fair profit at $1,655,000. Gianni Agnelli once famously said: “invest in wine, if it goes badly at least you can drink it”; the collector first drank two or three excellent glasses and then sold the bottle and earned on it. Clever!
The third lot is not interesting in itself but because of what happened during the auction. Usually pure competition cars are not my thing, because of the limited use that can be made of them (only on the track) but this story simply had to be told. The Lola T165 CanAm from 1970 presented itself as one of the many lots before the auction. Yes, the first owner had been the car racing manager Carl Haas and it had been driven by Paul Newman. Even if it had a 900 bhp engine and had appeared on Road & Track, it still remained the typical CanAm car, models that attract only a small niche of collectors. Hence the estimate of $200-250,000. Starting at $100,000 two buyers competed doggedly with each other, passing very quickly $250,000, then $300,000, then $400,000 and over $ 500,000! Go! But was it the Paul Newman influence? After 55 raises (perhaps a new record?) one of the two stopped in the pits and the other paid out the princely sum of $665,000. Every now and then the magic of the auction comes out and would exalt even the most boring bureaucrat. Standing ovation!
Not one sale goes by in which RM fails to come out with some dark 80s kitsch “object” with the power to make anyone shiver. This time it was a Mercedes-Benz 560SEC AMG 6.0 Wide-Body. In 1990 the top of the Mercedes-Benz range was represented by the 560SEC with a 5.5-litre 238 bhp engine, but for those who were not satisfied, you could take yours to a place near Affalterbach where, by slightly inflating the 6-litre engine they were able to squeeze 385 bhp out of it (remember that at the time, the Ferrari Testarossa produced 380). Obviously, it was and is an incredible rarity and you know, these things are difficult to evaluate. RM thought $220-260,000 was correct but eventually it changed hands for $390,000. The beauty of the market!
The deal of auction? there were several made here too, but it was necessary to dig deeper than at Bonhams or Gooding. It looked like a normal 1963 Jaguar E-Type S1 3.8 Coupe. The elegant Gunmetal grey with black interior hid its true feline soul. Because this is not a kitten but a jaguar with sharp claws. Powered 4.2-litre engine, five-speed gearbox with tailor-made ratios, dozens of refinements and improvements, this car could leap away before its competitors had the chance to comprehend what they were dealing with. These improvements don’t come cheap, the previous owner spent over $200,000 installing them but a (smart) bidder took it home for roughly half that amount: $106,400.
Despite the excellent result, with over 90% of the lots sold and 89.5% at their estimated value, it failed to match the results from 2019. Last year brought in just over $38 million in sales, this year $34,492,700.
This reminds me of one last thought. RM has managed to bring interesting cars at correct prices, with prices that, however, have a tendency to drop, the Canadian strategists have been unable to compensate this phenomenon with higher offers or, perhaps, they simply preferred not to risk betting on a single lot.
CLASSIC CAR MATCHER