Greater Quad-City Auto Auction (GQCAA) has teamed with the General Services Administration (GSA) to hold the first public, client-specific Internet auctions in May and June 2003.

According to GQCAA owner and general manager Larry Anderson, the GSA approached him asking if the auction could develop a system specific to GSA. “GSA was essentially asking us to develop something that was tailor-made for their public sales,” said Anderson. “They hadn’t been able to find anything in the marketplace that suited their needs.”

Anderson explained that many hours of research were devoted to seeking software that would meet the GSA’s requirements. “From the beginning, we were told by software experts that what we wanted didn’t exist, and that our best solution was to use one of the products already on the market.”

From presentation of the idea to implementation at the first sale took 45 days. That first GSA Internet auction was a success, with 35 percent of the offered vehicles selling online. The second auction ran for seven days, from June 11 through June 18, and showed even greater results, with a 58 percent Internet sale rate.