$59M in Iron Rolls Off Ritchie Brothers Chicago Lot

Thu June 23, 2005
Crane Equipment Guide

Ritchie Bros. Auctioneers wrapped up its largest Chicago-area auction (its third largest North American auction) on June 1 to 3 in Morris, IL, with gross auction sales exceeding $59 million.

Approximately 3,000 people from 35 countries and all 50 U.S. states registered to bid during the three-day unreserved auction at the company’s 91-acre permanent auction site southwest of Chicago.

The sale included a complete dispersal of one of the largest concrete paving companies in the United States, as well as trucks and equipment from another 315 sellers. The auction items consisted of more than 100 truck tractors, 73 hydraulic excavators, 62 crawler tractors, 21 agricultural tractors and 15 concrete plants among the 3,588 available lots.

Rich Evans, regional manager of Western Great Lakes of Ritchie Bros., said the strong prices achieved throughout the sale were a result of the wide cross-section of global bidders.

“Since the opening of this auction site over six years ago, we have continued to build momentum. Over the past few days, we welcomed customers from the concrete, aggregate, construction, paving, transportation, and agricultural industries from around the world,” he said. “The diversity of the crowd demonstrates our ability to reach interested bidders, no matter where they are located; and the solid prices achieved at the auction show that the used equipment market continues to be strong.

“Our employees did a fantastic job for our customers. Organizing a sale of this magnitude takes a lot of hard work and our team stepped up to the plate and made it happen,” Evans added.

Twenty-five industrial auctions in eight countries, and 19 agricultural auctions, are scheduled on the Ritchie Bros. auction calendar for the rest of June.

Ritchie Bros. is one of the world’s largest auctioneers of industrial equipment, operating through over 110 locations in more than 25 countries around the world.

The company sells, through unreserved public auctions, a broad range of used and unused industrial equipment including equipment utilized in the construction, transportation, material handling, mining, forestry, petroleum, marine, real estate and agricultural industries.

For more information, visit www.rbauction.com.