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Automotive Lifestyle
AUTOS: RM Reportedly Buying Kruse Auction
Upscale Canadian auction house expected to announced purchase of iconic Indiana auction in press comference.
Company founder and owner Dean Kruse is a familiar sight on the auctioneer's podium of his collector-car auctions. (Photo: Kruse International)
No one at RM Auctions would confirm or deny the rumor that’s been running rampant through the collector-car world for the past week, that RM has reached an agreement to buy troubled Kruse International of Auburn, Indiana.
A terse message was sent out by RM today that it would hold a news conference Thursday morning for an “Important announcement for collector car community and the state of Indiana,” which seemed to lend credence to the story.
Rob Myers, chairman and founder of the Canada-based auction, is expected to announce that RM would buy Kruse’s assets and the rights to hold the famous annual Auburn collector-car auction that Russell Kruse started up in 1971.
RM has held the news tightly since it reportedly fashioned the deal last week, although auction insiders have been discussing the possibility since the rumor broke.
Kruse auction owner Dean Kruse apparently has not been so reticent about the rumored sale, according to a reporter for a local Indiana newspaper, who wrote in an email, “Dean Kruse has been saying all week that he's about to announce the sale of the auction park, so that would be the logical explanation.”
Kruse could not be immediately reached for comment.
Auction veteran Don Williams, who owns the Blackhawk Collection in Danville, Calif., said he had heard the information from several sources, although no confirmation. He said he considers the Auburn auction to be a Midwest institution, and whoever takes it over would need to respect its traditions to ensure success.
“Whoever does it, if they do it in the style that it was, it will work,” Williams said. Referring to RM’s reserved British style of auctions, he added, “If they tried to do an English-style auction as they do in Phoenix, it won’t work in Indiana.”
Williams is a long-time acquaintance of Dean Kruse, Russell’s son and current owner of the auction, and said he has been to every Auburn auction save one since 1973. “It’s bigger, more festive and more friendly than any auction you have in the U.S.,” he said.
Kruse International has fallen on hard times during the past couple of years, accused by collector-car consigners and vendors of not paying them and conducting recent auctions that were shadows of their past sales.
In May, Indiana yanked Kruse’s auction license and banned Dean Kruse from taking part in any auctions for two years, plus restitution to about 70 consigners who sold their cars at Kruse auctions but were never paid.
A terse message was sent out by RM today that it would hold a news conference Thursday morning for an “Important announcement for collector car community and the state of Indiana,” which seemed to lend credence to the story.
Rob Myers, chairman and founder of the Canada-based auction, is expected to announce that RM would buy Kruse’s assets and the rights to hold the famous annual Auburn collector-car auction that Russell Kruse started up in 1971.
RM has held the news tightly since it reportedly fashioned the deal last week, although auction insiders have been discussing the possibility since the rumor broke.
Kruse auction owner Dean Kruse apparently has not been so reticent about the rumored sale, according to a reporter for a local Indiana newspaper, who wrote in an email, “Dean Kruse has been saying all week that he's about to announce the sale of the auction park, so that would be the logical explanation.”
Kruse could not be immediately reached for comment.
Auction veteran Don Williams, who owns the Blackhawk Collection in Danville, Calif., said he had heard the information from several sources, although no confirmation. He said he considers the Auburn auction to be a Midwest institution, and whoever takes it over would need to respect its traditions to ensure success.
“Whoever does it, if they do it in the style that it was, it will work,” Williams said. Referring to RM’s reserved British style of auctions, he added, “If they tried to do an English-style auction as they do in Phoenix, it won’t work in Indiana.”
Williams is a long-time acquaintance of Dean Kruse, Russell’s son and current owner of the auction, and said he has been to every Auburn auction save one since 1973. “It’s bigger, more festive and more friendly than any auction you have in the U.S.,” he said.
Kruse International has fallen on hard times during the past couple of years, accused by collector-car consigners and vendors of not paying them and conducting recent auctions that were shadows of their past sales.
In May, Indiana yanked Kruse’s auction license and banned Dean Kruse from taking part in any auctions for two years, plus restitution to about 70 consigners who sold their cars at Kruse auctions but were never paid.
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