In an email press release at 9:56 PM EDT tonight the Pebble Beach™ Concours d’Elegance announced that the 2020 event has been cancelled and postponed to 2021 due to Covid-19 concerns.
Their early announcement is welcome recognition that we’re not going to get out of coronavirus/Covid-9 concerns any time soon and acknowledges the concerns of entrants, exhibitors and spectators about rubbing elbows in a densely populated crowd from across the planet.
The fallout of the Pebble Beach™ Concours’ decision will spill out across the car collecting spectrum in coming days and weeks.
The events that have coalesced around the Pebble Beach™ Concours d’Elegance are by now mythic and beyond comprehension in a single week:
- Concours on the Avenue
- Monterey Automobilia Expo
- McCall’s Motorworks Revival
- The Little Car Show at Pacific Grove
- Pebble Beach Motoring Classic
- Prancing Ponies
- the Rolex Monterey Motorsports Pre-Reunion and Reunion at Laguna Seca
- Pebble Beach Retroauto
- Werks Reunion
- Concorso Italiano
- The Quail
- and even Concours d’LeMons,
And that’s not to mention the Worldwide, Bonhams, Mecum, Russo and Steele, RM Sotheby’s and Gooding auctions that last year traded some $252.5 million dollars’ worth of cars in a few Monterey days. That’s a quarter billion in collector cars … which seems paltry in view of the money being thrown at Covid-19 costs.
Will all these events fall under the sway of the Concours’ postponement?
Days to come will answer that question, but this is an epic announcement with far-reaching consequences.
Hi Rick,
This news, while not unexpected, is still gut-wrenching. I live in NJ and have been in this hobby for 40 years. Hershey, Carlisle, Greenwich and other local events have been as regular as trips to the office. But mentally, I’ve completely written off the year 2020 for any kind of car hobby activity, and I’m beginning to have my doubts about early 2021. I hope I’m wrong!
As always, thanks for your reporting. I always enjoy reading your take on auction results.
Gooding & Company “postponed” their auction at Pebble Beach “until 2021”. They had already “postponed” their April London auction. The rest can’t be far behind.