Another world (view of the Barrett-Jackson big event)
If you commute back and forth between the Scottsdale auctions, you are immersed in two completely different worlds, although the intention behind the different events is actually the same.
While Barrett-Jackson is primarily a public festival at which a large number of modern cars are auctioned off, Bonhams or RM Sotheby's are about selling carefully selected cars in a cultivated and distinguished setting - without drinks, hamburgers and curly fries. What all the events have in common is that there is no shortage of celebrities, with baseball legend Reggie Jackson and stand-up comedian Adam Ferrara appearing at Barrett-Jackson on Thursday, for example.
This year's Barrett-Jackson auction will attempt to sell 400 cars a day at the huge WestWorld site in Scottsdale from January 20 to 26, 2025. Only around 15% of these are non-American.
In typical American fashion, prices are driven upwards by the auctioneer in an almost incomprehensible vibrato and interested parties are motivated to bid with drinks and encouragement from the numerous employees.
What is astonishing this year is the almost complete absence of pre-war cars. Instead, there is a large number of newer luxury cars from Bentley, Rolls Royce, Lamborghini and Maybach among the Europeans. Where else can you find a well-maintained 2004 Maybach 57 with less than 100,000km on the clock for 24,000 US dollars!
The Ghostbuster sets the daily record on Thursday. However, the 1959 Cadillac Miller & Meteor "Ghostbusters Ectomobile" is a re-creation and not the original movie car, but is still worth USD 297,000 to one collector.
A De Lorean DMC12 from 1983 as a "back-to-the-future" recreation also sold well, fetching USD 132,000.
In any case, many expensive vehicles are "custom cars", all with engines with 400 or more horsepower. So they are no longer original vehicles. Of course, the young vehicles, of which there are many, many, are much more true to the original.
The Americans also have to cut back on popular cars. The four Hummer H2s on offer on Thursday are priced between USD 14,000 and USD 23,000, but a few original US classics still score high, including many so-called restomod Americans.
At Barrett-Jackson, it is good to see that more and more classic cars from the USA are being offered in beautifully restored condition with modern, high-performance engines from Ford or Chevrolet. In fact, significantly more than half of all cars sold at auction would have no chance of being registered in this country due to a lack of originality.
So it is all the nicer to find an original Mini, a beautiful Porsche 964 or an (almost original) Alfa Romeo Duetto Spider, which is also paid for with a decent price.
And if USD 154,000 is paid for a 1964 Amphicar 770, then there must be a lot of love for multimodal transportation.
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