British Car Auctions has launched the first-ever dedicated sales programme for MINI. The new ‘MINI Select’ (a term already used by MINI UK for one of their finance packages?!) Sale at the Nottingham auction centre has quickly become established as “the place” to be for MINI buyers and sellers alike. Around 80 MINIs are regularly entered for the event, which is held on the fourth Wednesday of every month.

The most recent sale saw 63 MINIs sold for an 80% conversion that generated a turnover in excess of £450,000. With around 100 trade and non-trade buyers attending the event, bidding was brisk underlined by the fact that 35 different buyers made purchases on the day.

MINIs were entered from a number of sources including BMW Group, LeasePlan, Lex, Lombard and numerous main agents, with 39 different sellers represented on the day.

BCA Nottingham General Manager Robin Wilde commented

We have created an ideal platform for remarketing Mini product from all sources and can deliver the buying power that means sellers can maximize their sales values. Sometimes, putting all your eggs in one basket is the right course of action and the values we are achieving for Mini certainly bear this out.

Of course, we still think that if you want a really good deal, often from a genuine MINI enthusiast, the best place to buy and sell MINIs is the MINI2 Classifieds. But if you’re after a quick and convenient option the BCA MINI auction may be for you.

The success of MINI Cherished, the authorised used MINI scheme in the UK, does appear to have a knock-on effect making it quite difficult for owners to sell their MINIs privately, we’re not sure if this new “job lot” auction style for MINIs is a good or bad thing for the used MINI markets and residuals on the whole, which do appear to be showing some signs of faltering lately, if feedback from owners on the MINI2 forums are any gauge.