Today, Grassroots Motorsports announced that Hagerty purchased the rights to the Radwood car show. This is the latest in an increasingly long line of acquisitions Hagerty has made, and this is in the midst of the company deciding to go public. To say it's been a big year for what was once just an insurance company is an understatement.
There's a few things to unpack here: for one, Hagerty is certainly in an acquisition mode and clearly looking at its next-generation of customers. Second, the Radwood show has done an incredible job of assigning real monetary value to what amounts to a car show - albeit a fantastic one - but a car show nonetheless. This tells us that there's perceived value that goes way deeper than what we see on the show field. Third and final, the landscape of vendors and retailers in the automotive marketplace continues to tighten and grow smaller by the day, which is bad news for those of us who like to shop around for the best price or at least feel like there's a need for service providers to compete on price.
A company like Hagerty making numerous acquisitions indicates there is still plenty of value to be found in the enthusiast marketplace. The question is, what does it mean for the truly grassroots aspects of the hobby when even a car show can be put on the acquisition block?