The strategy had been in development for years. Digital selling and buying tools, and all the ancillary parts around them, were to be gradually introduced and optional, so as not to alienate customers who preferred doing business with vehicle auctions the old-fashioned way.
At least, that was the plan before the coronavirus pandemic.
Instead, as COVID-19 spread rapidly though parts of the U.S. in March, auction giants Manheim and ADESA went all digital in a matter of days.
"We had to go completely from brick-and-mortar auctions to 100 percent simulcast auctions at all of our sales — and we had to convert those sales in the space of about seven days," KAR Global CEO Jim Hallett said on Automotive News' Daily Drive podcast in late April.
Both Cox Automotive's Manheim and KAR's ADESA switched to digital-only auctions March 16 — and that continued as of last week.
Last October, well before the coronavirus became a global threat, Hallett bluntly told an industry audience that he hoped to one day see a complete end to vehicles running through auction lanes to make auctions safer.
His comments came after ADESA and Manheim had deployed mobile trading tools and had been testing virtual auctions at several locations.
Auction giants Manheim and ADESA switched to all-digital sales in mid-March as the coronavirus pandemic prompted social distancing protocols across the U.S. It marked an abrupt adoption of technology the companies had been developing for years.
Digital sales had taken hold in the industry in a big way: In 2019, almost half of Manheim's sales and nearly 60 percent of ADESA's transactions were done online.
But going completely digital across about 150 auction sites in the short period of time the company had to shift was "absolutely beyond my imagination," Hallett said.
With the new reality in place, at least for now, auction companies are investing additional money to make the all-digital strategy work better.
For instance, some dealers prefer to see vehicles in person before agreeing to purchase them. So auction providers are working to improve their vehicle imaging and condition reports.
At Manheim, physical auctions will not return within weeks, or even months, if Cox Automotive CEO Sandy Schwartz's comments during Automotive News' "Congress Conversations" series last month are any indication.
"For at least the rest of this year, I certainly hope we don't sell any cars through a lane," he said.
While acknowledging that digital-only sales could be a difficult change for some, Schwartz said they are nonetheless safer and more efficient.
Looking further into the future, Hallett noted that Amazon has a massive physical logistics and distribution chain but is driven by a purely online format.
"That's the way the world's going. And I think as you speak to things like safety and you think about efficiency and you think about the things that you can do with digital, you don't have to have one sale a week. You can have a sale every single day," Hallett said.
"You can have a sale from multiple locations. You can sell from multiple sellers from multiple locations. ...
"The opportunity to really scale your inventory across the entire nation is really unlimited with the use of technology."
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