Core groups define the success of a boutique business. They do not rely on the masses. Example is Pelican Parts, Wayne doesn't own a 959 and 964 because Ford owners come here to buy parts for their Mustangs. He relies upon a core group of well catered to enthusiasts.

Perspective; 60 (+/-) million cars and trucks are sold per year. They made one million air-cooled Porsche's over a 50 + year time frame. It will always be a niche.

I've never been accused of being in the inner circle before. I just know that most economic recoveries start from the top down, and that's what my professional experience suggests in this current economic slowdown. After being flat and tapering for about a year, my business cratered hard in the fall of 2009. As in sales were off more than 50% over previous year same month periods.

Starting about 14 months ago my business started to recover. Racers started to open their pocketbooks and spend money again. Now we're back up to and over our pre-2008 recession sales numbers. Sure, we're only one company and it's anecdotal, but the majority of race shops in America that prep cars for Club and professional racing uses our parts in their cars. We've got a very wide market sampling in our customer base and deal with both the big pro operations and the smallest of the small one or two man mom and pop P-car shops. A lot of the smaller operations tell me they are still struggling and are hand to mouth. The bigger shops and companies report more of a stable business flowing in the doors.

I really think what is being observed by the OP has very little to do with Porsches specifically and has more to do with toys generally. I bet the same sort of slowdown is present in high end speedboats or in snowmobile sales as well. When there's a recession on, people stop spending money on playthings.

I think the absence of cars on the market may be related to people who aren't forced to sell not being willing to sell until they feel the prices have recovered. All the crisis sale cars of two years ago are gone and sold. A lot of these owners aren't connected to the day to day fluctuations in prices and just pull the car off the market for 6 months or a year and don't check back on pricing until they consider selling again.

+1

There are 713 examples of what I am talking about on ebay completed listings of Porsche 2001-1961 just since May 23, 2011.
...and this is just cars. USED parts, wheels, seats, etc...well, just look at what's ending on ebay at any given moment of any given day.

Revenue and sales up on the top .01% cars or racing supplies & equipment have almost nothing to do with the majority of 'the Porsche thing' dying as a whole.

Can't seem to make it any clearer, these sales numbers are down 30 to 50% of what they once were, when I buyer is even present in the first place. This is due in large part to shrinking supply and thus fading interest, not to mention economic conditions, fuel prices, uncertainty in fossil related fuel powered vehicles etc...in answer to the og post, 'that's what happened'.

'I think the absence of cars on the market may be related to people who aren't forced to sell not being willing to sell until they feel the prices have recovered.'


+2 ....I wouldn't sell my house right now either. Still irrelevant to the hay day of air cooled fun by in large part being behind us.

Without home equity spending, weekend toy purchases will be down for a long time. Sure there will be some who can afford a nice Porsche without a cash out refi, but the boom over the previous decade was very much due to equity spending, and that ain't gonna be back for a long time. Those sellers trying to get top dollar today are completely out of touch with the market reality.

Exaggerate much...:rolleyes: top .01%?

People said "it was over" a decade ago when RS values slid from a high of 80-100K back down to 50-60k. Now they are two, three or even 4 times that number. We're in a trough right now. It's directly tied to a slowly recovering economy. Give it 2 or 3 more years and we'll be right back where we were. The excitement and interest in anything air cooled will return.

But I doubt that there will ever be much interest again in B-grade used parts. There's so many good repros on the market today that someone with a presentable air cooled driver is going to use a bunch of repro parts. Only concours caliber used and NOS parts are going to be the stuff that gets chased in the future. Otherwise, most owners will just turn to the aftermarket.

That trend started before the recent economic downturn. Before my current business, I was an employee in one of the larger Porsche air-cooled dismantlers in the country. Not top 10 in size, but probably in the top 20, and we had a yard full of good used air cooled 911s. We also sold new stuff. When a repro tailight reflector sells at retail for a '73 T is $80, a nice used one is $100 and a b-grade used one is $50-60, which one do you think we sold the most of? That's right, the repro. Same thing with door handles, lock kits, headlight lenses, Fuchs wheel crests, etc. etc.

It happened in American muscle cars and it's happening in Porsches now. The top of the market for high quality OEM skyrockets. The reproduction market fills the gap for those who can't afford to "restore" to OEM concours standards, and the bottom drops out of the value of marginal used parts.

This aligns with my experience. The A grade parts are sold on insurance repair tickets at prices that would astonish the typical Pelican shopper. The parts in the marketplace are often B-grade or less. And still, a nice engine lid grille that would have brought maybe $150 2 years ago is $250 or more now, comparing grade-to-grade.

An average '72 T coupe driver today is a high teens/low 20s car -- probably about equal to where it was 2 years ago when the statistics told us the Great Recession was over. Excellence numbers notwithstanding, the market is active, but not all models are desirable. Fashion changes. A Carrera that was in the low teens a year ago is now in the high teens. I'd say +20% straight across the board for the 3.2 cars in a year.

I don't make my living buying & selling cars. I broker 7-10 cars a year as a sideline to pay for my Porsche hobby. I make $500 per completed deal, so I really don't have a dog in this fight. Since this thread started, I got yet another request to find a car and made an offer on a 911S project that was (I thought) market-appropriate, but which was rejected out of hand. Over half the cars I broker are not advertised. They come to me on a referral basis. So maybe part of the market is just not visible.

This has been discussed for the last two years.... Marginal is marginal and outstanding is outstanding. Outstanding is appreciating and marginal is languishing.....

+1

That's illegal in the State of CA without a dealers license, I don't think I would be making statements like that publicly.

It's hardly illegal to put buyers and sellers together.

Your right about that...collecting a fee for it is the illegal part.

Your exhausting Mr. Weenie. I don't have the energy to argue this Ca law with you too, which is even more black and white than the original discussion.

Enjoy what you do, just offering some advice from my profession, auto sales, which I do make a living at ;)

You can routinely print a 8 1/2 x 11 inch 150 dpi image from an on-line Porsche magazine? Do tell...

Mr Renntrade, I'm sorry you're tired. I'm lucky in that I get to spend no more than 3-4 hours a week 'matchmaking' buyers & sellers. I don't have a stake in any car, so whether the buyer changes his mind or not is of no great consequence.

As for illegality, well, I appreciate the tip, but I'm willing to take the risk. Parting out a car in California is illegal, too. So I guess the Highway Patrol could also be combing the 'for sale' section of Pelican to arrest miscreants.

Our big difference is in the perception of the market. I see it as mostly strong with some weak spots. Longhoods are still strong, Carreras have come up in the last year, and Boxsters and 996s probably can't fall much farther. 914-6s are finally bringing strong money. 914 2.0s from 73/74 have been strong for a couple years.

As always, there are multiple forces at work, from the 'back to basics' move you get in any economic pullback to the increasing desire for creature comforts and reduced "fussiness" (a key motive in "backdating" SCs and Carreras). So, from my perspective, the glass is half full.

Me too!

I am talking about stuff like a how-to for a repair. You can find that by a search on this website and print it in 30 seconds, rather than maintaining shelves full of magazines and indices to flip through. If you want to look at pretty pictures accompanying an article from 1987, there's no substitute for holding on to decades of issues of Excellence magazine that 99% of people tossed in the trash after flipping through.

I just picked up this very nice, original owner 72 sunroof coupe. Very original, complete, rust free and 120K miles. Lots of detail pictures. Let me know if any of your buyers might be interested....



http://forums.pelicanparts.com/uploa...1307727273.jpg
http://forums.pelicanparts.com/uploa...1307727286.jpg

'72 911t
 

How much are you looking for? It looks original and the wide steelies are kinda cool...

If it was viper green or another interesting color people would probably be beating your door down to get to it!