MILAN, Mich. — Rollo A. Juckette, auctioneer of Dundee, Mich. and Neuhart Auctioneering of Milan, Mich. are attempting to combine skills to create a modern, upscale, technologically efficient business that will serve their buyers and sellers with the merging of their companies.

Both work from home offices and go together to check out potential auctions. They are pleased with the opportunity to work together.

“The auction industry is a tough business to become established in, so when you have an opportunity to work with someone like Rollo you take it,” said Brad Neuhart of Neuhart Auctioneering. “He has obviously done something right to be successful in this business for all these years.”

According to neuhartauctioneering.com, the company has gathered information from people who have had auctions and made a commitment to change whatever needs to be changed to satisfy their customers. Their goal is for the seller to have a positive experience from the initial consultation to the final sweeping.

“We are not in this business to just make a dollar and then move on to the next auction ... Our clients basically become our extended family,” Neuhart said.

According to Juckette, Neuhart had approached him a few years ago about combining their knowledge and resources, but it didn’t seem like the right time. Now that everything and everyone is going to web-based businesses, the timing seems perfect, Juckette said, to combine their nearly 60 years of experience.

Juckette lost his father when he was 15 years old, and his neighbor was in the auction business. He began helping the neighbor by holding up items for sale and moving furniture around. Juckette realized he had found his mentor.

But the neighbor told him he “had to get at least two years of college in before he hired him to help any more”, so Juckette went to college. He completed his two years, but while he was in auctioneer school, his mentor died.

So Juckette began knocking on doors to build his own business and began with a few estate sales where some of his original buyers and sellers who remembered him from past auctions. Then Juckette picked up car auctions and began conducting about five of these per week.

He is now down to around three per week, but continues to do them as his regular job. With 30 years of car auctions behind him, Juckette is used to putting together estate and farm auctions on weekends – and even lining up some evening auctions.

“All my business is at the house or farm of the person we are selling for. We do some real estate auctions, but I really enjoy selling farm equipment,” said Juckette. “And I’ve always remembered what my grandfather told me when I was real young – ‘You put your money in a savings account and take it out, it is twice as hard to put it back in.’”

So Juckette never went in debt with his business. For the first 15 years as an auctioneer, he didn’t even purchase a public address system.

“As we made money, we bought what we needed, and I still work hard to keep my overhead low”, said Juckette.

Neuhart and Juckette joined forces because Neuhart is skilled in the modern, digital auction environment; which both feel has become necessary. A new website became an essential tool, and emails have almost replaced the mass mailing that Juckette always had maintained in the past. Now the hard copy mail releases have been cut almost in half with the auction attendees requesting emails instead.

So when Neuhart and Juckette were separating the people out who wanted emails, they also began separating out which items the customer is interested in purchasing. “Now we can email them with items and auctions that they are particularly interested in,” Juckette said. “About half of our buyers come to all our sales just to see if there might be something there they are interested in and also just to visit with their friends. Auctions are a social event too.”

Neuhart is a full-time firefighter and paramedic during the week, and this background came in handy at an auction in June. The owner of merchandise became over-heated, got red-faced and passed out. Neuhart went to work on the gentleman and began treating his heat exhaustion while they waited for the ambulance to arrive.

Now Juckette is counting on Neuhart’s experience with computers and the technology this involves to help treat their combined auction company and put them ahead of other companies. The two are very familiar with how the other one operates as Neuhart began his auctioneering under Juckette 16 years ago. They have now been conducting auctions together for a little more than a year.

“Working with Brad has opened up some great new online opportunities,” Juckette said. “In addition, I appreciate sharing auction responsibilities with someone I can trust.”

For more information about the company, call Juckette at 734-529-2388 or visit www.neuhartuactioneering.com