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The answer to the above question? That’s simple: We truly don’t have a selling fee because that is not the auction industry’s true role in the consignor-auction-buyer dynamic. 

Our true role is to market used vehicles into the buying niches that absorb that type of product, but “selling it” is the consignors role based on make, model, miles, announcements and price.

Hold that thought and ponder the dynamics in that statement: Auctions are a PARTNERSHIP between themselves and their consignors. And the cost per car is a marketing fee which truly should be charged on every single unit, because it is the consignor’s decision to sell or not sell, based on aspects only they can fully control. 

If the market is flooded with “cookie-cutter” RACs, that increases — not decreases — the marketing work needed by each auction to sell, store and process each unit in-lane and online. 

I can hear everyone now saying, “That’s a success fee.” 

Then why have the success fees been going down versus inflation for the past 20 years? Is it because salaries have, regulation costs have, technology costs have gone down or inflation has? 

Maybe it’s because the auctions, especially the chains, use price instead of service as the logic in marketing their services. So, the consignors, as great business people, use that logic effectively. 

Why worry if you’re a consignor, about using varied auctions to market your products more widely and effectively when you can use “one size fits all” and hope for the best as long as the costs are low?

I will continue to push the partnership concept in all my relationships with my consignors and the concept that we are the marketing arm for their companies, and more importantly, that the utilization of technologically enhanced brick-and-mortar auctions are the total package and not just a segment of the remarketing needs of their companies, reflected in static websites or Internet-only platforms.

The last issue I would ask you to ponder today is, if the sales aspect is not on the consignor side, why would an auction ever charge a “no sale” fee?

Because they realize there is a cost of marketing for every unit, whether a consignor chooses to sell it or not, but they don’t apply the concept universally. They choose to selectively give away their product as opposed to creating industry-wide value for it at all times. 

A per-car marketing fee and a per-car buyer fee, is a FAIR and equitable auction cost model that values the important impact that multi-faceted auctions bring to the remarketing industry.

Editor’s Note: Jim DesRochers is vice president at Dealers Auto Auction of the Southwest. As with any contributed content, the opinions expressed in this and other editorial columns are solely that of the author’s and do not necessarily reflect those of Auto Remarketing or its parent company.