For many dealerships there are two kinds of trades:

• Cars we’re going to keep (sell on our retail used car lot)
• Cars we are going to wholesale (sell at our auction.)

Someone, usually the used car manager or the inventory merchandising manager, will have a pre-inspection done on the car. If the work required to sell the car on the retail lot exceeds a certain threshold they make the call to put the car in the wholesale row.

Traditionally we process wholesale vs retail differently. In some cases never process the wholesale car digitally at all. In other words, we simply send the car to auction without processing the car in our inventory software, booking the vehicle or presenting the car online to wholesalers.

It is estimated that 7% of dealers are holding their own private wholesale bid sale

What if you merchandise wholesale cars as expertly as you do your retail cars, then offer them to your local and national wholesalers and independent dealers online. Do you think you could sell a bunch of those cars before you have to take them to auction? Of course, and because you don’t pay fees or transportation you avoid expenses and above all make more on profit.

That’s what 100’s of dealers around the country are doing right now. Holding an online bid sale to see if they can sell their wholesale cars without having to move them. Reports show that they make more profit and retain the sellers fees resulting in higher wholesale profit over all.

Software like Auction Simplified, make the process easier by helping dealers with auction software that allows buyers to bid online. Another advantage of online auction is that you increase the number of buyers, because they can go online from anywhere in the country. Adding a condition report will increase the distance in which buyers will buy because it help with their bidding confidence.