First Auburn car auction without Kruse International

AUBURN, Ind. (WANE) - The first Auburn Classic Cars Auction without Kruse International ended Sunday night. Auctions America by R.M. bought the park two moths ago. As ticket sales were tallied earlier in the day, there were mix emotions about how the weekend went.

“We started off a little rough on Thursday,” said Auctions America CEO Ed Cepuran. Ticket totals were only at about 5 thousand for the day.. “Friday was good the weather started to cooperate and we saw an increase in traffic.”

By Saturday, nearly 20 thousand people filled the former Kruse Auction Park. Cepuran admits it’s not the most impressive number the park has ever seen, but he’s thrilled with the number.

“This is an investment year for us. We have to build on this for the future years so the financial aspects were solid we're very, very pleased. But more important is the response from everybody from signers to bidders, to patrons to vendors, everybody had very, very positive things to say,” he said.

First time auction attendee Dennis Reasner made the trip all the way from Albuquerque, New Mexico and said he was nervous about the trip all summer. “I wasn’t even sure there was going to be an auction.” He told NewsChannel 15 he was still pretty impressed with the park.

“They seem to be very organized, but I don't know what to think about the two auctions yet,” said Jack Bowshier. The auction veteran has been coming to the park for more than 20 years. “One over the other, I don't know.”

Bowshier said he's willing to give the Canadian company the benefit of the doubt, especially because of their short time line this year, but he's still worried about the classic car market.“The crowd's been good, the money has been a little soft but that could be the market, you know?”

While the reviews of this year's auction are mixed, the one thing everyone seems to agree on is next year's auction.

“I think it will be a lot better then, it's hard to put something together in two months,” said Bowshier.

“For next year we can only imagine how successful next year will be but we can put behind us all the facility upgrades and just focus on the cars,” said Cepuran.

Gregor Peterson, owner of Classical Events Auction said the event wrapped up with a 1932 Duesenberg Model J Dermham Tourister selling for $1 million, making it the highest price car of the weekend.

A lady also auctioned off her taxidermy before the car auction and she sold everything for $15,000.

Auctions America by R.M. is also planning on having a spring auction in 2011.