<VV> RE: Barrett-Jackson

[Bruce Schug]

I guess I disagree a little with most of you on this subject.

Do you have any awareness of what other auctions bring for other 
valuable items? Did you see the NOS Corsa tach sell on ebay for, what 
was it, $650? Do you realize that pieces of furniture, paintings, and 
other art objects regularly sell for hundreds-of-thousands of dollars 
and into the millions? Is the most ever paid for a painting still 
sixteen-million dollars or is it more now? Have you ever bid on a '59 
Cadillac brochure on ebay and seen it go for over two-hundred dollars - 
not to mention what an Airflow brochure or an old Packard brochure will 
sell for?

If you don't understand the B-J auction, you simply don't understand 
economics - supply and demand folks, supply and demand.

You can go anywhere and buy a good hamburger for, what $2.50? But what 
if there was only one hamburger and another guy wanted it too, and you 
were hungry, and you just got paid, what would you pay for it then - 
$5.00? $10.00? $50.00?

Let's take our hamburger example one step further. Let's say a 
CORSA-judged 99-point air-conditioned, turbo-Corsa convert with wire 
wheels is "worth" at most $20,000 in the eyes of most Corvair 
"experts". Now lets say it goes up for sale on B-J. Two of our Corvair 
"experts" bids it up to 20K, which is all they "know" it is "worth". 
Then another gentleman bids $21K for it - look - it's Reggie Jackson! 
He says he's always wanted a nice Corvair! Now on the podium is another 
recognizable figure - he bumps the bid to $25K; just like that - well 
what would you expect from Jay Leno! So Jay and Reggie bid the Corsa up 
to an astonishing fifty-thousand dollars!; then sixty!, then 
seventy-thousand dollars! (Jay puts his hands in his pockets to be sure 
he has that much on him.) Then a phone bidder raises it to one-hundred 
thousand dollars!!! Leno really likes the car and goes to one-ten; 
Jackson can't stand to be beat and nods at one-twenty! Then the phone 
bidder, who is a very busy man, raises the bid to two-hundred thou! At 
that, Reggie starts thinking about fifty-seven Chevys. Jay frowns, 
knowing he has much more than that in his fifty-five Buick, but decides 
he can have his guys build him one even nicer - maybe with TWO Corvair 
engines - his frown is replaced with a smile as he envisions it. So the 
Corsa goes to the phone bidder for two-hundred thousand dollars!!! But 
how long do you think it takes this man to make that much money - he's 
Bill Gates!

Haven't you ever heard people say, "A car (house, boat, etc.) is only 
worth what someone will pay you for it? That Corvair was not "worth" 
twenty-thousand dollars, it was "worth" two-hundred thousand! Seems 
Bill too, always wanted one - in fact isn't there a Corvair story about 
Bill getting a speeding ticket in a Corvair or something?

I love watching the B-J auction. I love the cars. They appear to be 
some of the most beautiful in the land - true pieces of art - the best 
of the breed - many one-of-a-kind. And I love seeing what they go for. 
There certainly aren't many people who would pay twenty-nine K for a 
nice Rampy, but someone did!

Bruce



Bruce W. Schug
CORSA South Carolina
Greenville, SC
bwschug at charter.net

CORSA member since 1981

'67 Monza. "67AC140"