NAFA’s first annual CIAS breakfast delivered good food and conversation.
NAFA Ontario’s first annual CIAS breakfast, held at the Metro Convention Centre on February 22nd, created an opportunity for guests to network with each other, and hear thoughts from industry experts, Blair Earle from Impact Auto and Peter Snoyer from ADESA.
About 65 industry professionals were attending the event, as each presenter discussed and answered questions about the “Emerging Trends” in Remarketing. Earle covered topics such as:
- auction use advantages and auction over the internet;
- managing service and expectations;
- managing distracted driving and legalized cannabis;
- rebranding–alongside depreciation;
- marketing and its growth online;
- impacts on resale values in the future;
- theft vehicles and the effects of Fentanyl; and
- electric cars.
Earle says the electric vehicles, especially, contribute to real growth in the business based on the increased development and expansion of electric cars. “There’s a lot of controversial numbers when it comes to electric cars. The number is anywhere between 0.25% and 0.5% of the total volume of adoption in North America. We know the EV future is coming, but the big question is when.”
Similarly, Snoyer’s presentation focused on the future of auctions, specifically about how the auction business is heading into the digital age. These topics included:
- Physical auction footprint;
- Upstream private label sales;
- VirtuaLanes;
- Auction app sales; and
- Economic trends, like vehicle values and resale price over ten years.
Snoyer comments on the auction business’ online presence, stating:
“There are the physical people that are at the auction and then there are the people that are online–they are watching the auction and they’re able to bid online. How that’s impacted our business in Canada over the past 10-15 years on the commercial account side and leasing companies and finance companies, is that, on average, 45% of the vehicles bought at auction are bought by someone online. Of the 55% that are bought by in-lane buyers, 80% of those cars have an online bidder and back bidder. When you factor all that in, the online is actually impacting close to 80% of everyone’s businesses. And it’s at the point now where if our system goes down, the sale stops. they wait till it goes back up because it greatly impacts the resale value of vehicles when you lose that kind of audience.”
This change from physically attending auctions to online viewing inspired the concept of VirtuaLane, a live in-lane auction experience where cars also don’t physically make an appearance. Another example of this change is the app TradeRev, where people can trade and buy vehicles on their cell phones.
“There’s a demographic of people that want instant gratification. They want quicker, faster, and safe with as much transparency. And that’s been the evolution of the digital era that will make huge gains over the next few years. What took 20 years to do will now take two or three years to do, and it will continue to change,” says Snoyer.
The rest of the day was spent with the group visiting the OEM displays and participating in the Passport Event, where if they visited all the booths, they would win prizes.
Take a look at the pictorial below to see who attended.
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