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The Book:
Kelley Blue Book
Used Car Guide:
Consumer Edition, January-June
2004
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Editorial
Reviews on Kelley Blue Book
(Kelley Blue Book Used Car
Guide. Consumer Edition, Vol 12, January-June, 2004) |
| An essential resource
for anyone looking to buy, sell, or trade in a used car, this portable
volume provides the general public with information that was originally
restricted to the automotive industry: original list prices, vehicle
identification numbers (VINs), and trade-in, private-party, and
retail values for vehicles, according to condition. First published
in 1926 to help auto dealers, financial institutions, and others
in the trade, the Kelley Blue Book has been available to consumers
since 1993. This edition covers model years 1989 to 2003. Also included
are values for additional options and equipment, a table of acceptable
mileage ranges by year, and tips on buying a used car.
Blue Book Consumer
Edition January-June 2004 - For only $9.95! Includes
values for used cars, trucks and vans covering model years 1988
to 2002. The Consumer Edition includes three values:
- Retail
- Private Party
- Trade In
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2001 marked the 75th anniversary of the
original Used Car Guide — which was first published back in 1926!
Read the story of how it all happened.
In 1918, a young man named Les Kelley parked three Model T Fords in an
open lot, put $450 in the till and started the Kelley Kar Company. It
was to become the largest dealership in the world and, along the way,
spawn a need for placing values on used cars, known as "Blue Book
values."
Les Kelley was the son of a preacher from Arkansas. He made his way to
California in 1914 at the age of 17. He had no money and no job, but he
owned an old car. It was in fine shape because he had a knack for mechanics
and had overhauled it himself. All of his friends admired his car and
frequently tried to buy it. After much persuasion he finally did sell
it to one of them. With the money he received from this deal Les bought
another old Ford. After giving this car a thorough overhauling, he traded
it off, taking in two used cars and a little money on the deal. He reconditioned
these cars and sold them. With the money he bought other used automobiles
and found himself making enough money to pay his way through college.
Then, in 1918, like many young men at the end of World War I, Les Kelley
sought to establish himself in the business world. He leased part of a
lot from another car dealer in Los Angeles and started the Kelley Kar
Company with three cars for sale. His brother, Buster, at age 13, joined
Les as a lot boy, changing tires and washing cars. By the age of 18 Buster
ran the repair shop, with a dozen mechanics, and Les managed sales. Les
and Buster did so well that they had to move to progressively larger sites.
In the early 1920s, to help acquire new inventory, Les Kelley distributed
to other dealers and to banks a list of automobiles he wished to buy and
the prices he was willing to pay for them. The automotive community began
to trust his judgment so much as an accurate reflection of current values,
they started to request the list for their own use. When someone asked
a dealer what his used car might be worth, the dealer usually took a look
at Mr. Kelley's list, conveniently tucked under his desk blotter. It didn't
take long for Les Kelley to realize that he could provide an ongoing service
to dealers and bankers alike.
1926 was an interesting year for individual achievement. A 19-year-old
American named Gertrude Ederle swam the English Channel; "Our Trudy"
was the first woman to conquer the Channel, and her time was almost two
hours faster than the men's record. Babe Ruth led the Yankees into the
World Series (although he made the final out in game seven, when he was
caught stealing). Edsel Ford had risen to President of Ford Motor Company,
soon to announce the Model A.
And in Los Angeles, Les Kelley decided to expand the list of automobile
values he had been producing since 1918 and published the first Blue Book
of Motor Car Values. He showed factory list price and cash value on thousands
of vehicles, from Cadillacs to Duesenbergs, from Pierce-Arrows to Hupmobiles.
A 1926 Packard sedan limousine, with balloon tires, might fetch as much
as $3,825. But a 1921 Nash touring car, even with a clock, was only worth
$50. Les named the publication "Blue Book" after the Social
Register, because it meant that you would find valuable information inside.
(Emily Post had also just published her first book of etiquette, which
was to later be named, Etiquette: The Blue Book of Social Usage). And
Les Kelley was to make Kelley Blue Book synonymous with the authoritative
source for used car values. To this day, across the country, people ask
the question, "What's the Blue Book on my car?" At the dealership
Les was selling "Selected Blue Seal Automobiles," so he carried
the blue and gold ribbon medallion onto the cover of the Blue Book, where
it remains today.
Kelley Kar Company was always known for innovative approaches to selling
cars. In the early 1920s all automobiles were painted black (the joke
went that Henry Ford would say you could buy any color Model T you wanted,
as long as it was black). The truth is, the only reason that all cars
were black was because that paint dried faster. Back then it took about
a month to paint a car, because every coat on every part had to be air
dried. Due to its unique chemical make-up, black paint dried faster than
other colors. As it was, Ford had to devote about 20 acres of covered
storage just for cars waiting to dry. One day, when Buster Kelley (shown
here) was managing the body shop, an employee was about to repaint a car.
He suggested they repaint it pink! Buster questioned the logic of this
at first, but the painter agreed to repaint it black again for free if
it didn't sell. So they painted it pink, put it in the showroom, and it
sold immediately. So they painted another one pink, and it sold. Finally
they painted every car in the body shop pink! Sales soared. (Incidentally,
DuPont came up with a lacquer that, in any color, dried in two hours,
instead of a month, and the industry changed overnight).
Both the dealership and the publication continued to flourish. Buster
Kelley eventually worked his way up to General Manager of the dealership
and Publisher of the Blue Book. Kelley Kar Company had moved to the corner
of Figueroa Street and Pico in Los Angeles and took up nearly an entire
block. The repair/body shop at another location on Pico employed over
a hundred people. For many years the dealership operated solely as a used
car operation, which was to become the largest in the world. In those
days new car dealerships didn't sell used cars, so the Kelleys bought
vehicles that new car dealers were taking in trade, as well as directly
from the public. Sometimes the line of cars waiting to be appraised would
wind around the block all day. During the Depression there were times
when they bought the entire inventory of dealers who went out of business.
The 1930s and '40s were a different world from the car business today.
Often, as a part of the sale, Buster had to spend Saturday or Sunday teaching
the buyers (sometimes both husband and wife) how to drive! The Kelleys
opened their own insurance company and auto club and sold the whole package
with the automobile.
World War II brought with it a shortage of cars. Used car prices got
so high the government decided to put a ceiling on prices and used the
Blue Book as the ceiling for both wholesale and retail. Subscribing to
the book became a must for dealers. At the dealership the Kelleys continued
to innovate. They bought cars in the East and shipped as many as 1,000
a month to Los Angeles in freight cars. A person about to be drafted could
sell his car to Kelley Kar Company and then continue to drive it right
up until he left for the war. When the war was over, they offered the
"G.I. Credit Plan," no money down and up to 5 years to pay.
Buster's son, Bob, started in the business much like his father had,
as a lot boy. He pushed a tank around and put 32 pounds of air in every
tire (and made 50¢ a day). After college he joined the company full
time as a buyer and then in sales. Les Kelley bought a small Ford franchise
during the war and afterward the Kelley Kar Company operated as both a
used and new car dealership. Full-page newspaper ads invited crowds into
the Kelley showroom. And Buster became perhaps the nation's first dealer
to use a new medium—television! Commercials ran as long as 15 minutes,
where Buster would walk around the showroom pointing out specials that
offered a guarantee: return the car within 30 days and you could trade
it for any other car at the same or higher price. Plenty of show business
people bought cars from Kelley. The picture above shows Randolph Scott
taking delivery of his new Ford from Les Kelley. More success followed.
By the 1950s they had become the largest Ford dealer in addition to being
the largest used car dealership in the world.
By the late 1950s Les Kelley, then in his sixties, decided to cash in
on some of that success. He made a decision to sell the dealerships rather
than move them again (this time would have meant a move out of downtown
L.A.). By 1962 the Kelleys were completely out of the car business and
devoting full time to the Blue Book, with Buster as Publisher and Bob
(shown below) as Assistant Publisher. The company moved to Long Beach
and later to Orange County. Les continued to be active in the business
until his death in 1990, at the age of 93.
For the next thirty years the Blue Book was to thrive as a "trade"
publication, meaning it was only sold to businesses involved in the automotive
industry, such as dealers, financial institutions and insurance companies.
These customers used the bimonthly book to determine everything from loan
values to suggested retail prices. Kelley Blue Book continued to innovate,
becoming the first publication to show the effect of high or low mileage
on a car's value.
As a natural evolution, the company began publishing other value guides.
A New Car Price Manual was added in 1966, and the company became the industry's
leading provider of pricing services. Auto dealers sometimes carried recreational
vehicles or took them as trade-ins, so they needed information on these
too. Kelley Blue Book developed RV guides that place values on everything
from travel trailers to campers to ATVs to snowmobiles. A separate Motorcycle
Guide was published, and a Manufactured Housing Guide.
As the quality of cars improved, people began to drive them longer, and
the average age of a vehicle on the road today has been estimated to be
about nine years. The Blue Book covered seven years, so it made sense
to produce a sister publication, the Older Car Guide that provided values
another 14 years back. Then came the Early Model Guide, which today provides
values all the way back to 1950!
The Kelley family tradition reached a third generation in 1978, when
Bob's son, Mike, joined the company. Mike's background in computers made
him a natural to usher in the computer age for vehicle values. In essence,
ever since Les Kelley's first newsletter, the company has really been
in the information business. The delivery method of that information keeps
evolving, from a letter to books to PC-based software to the Internet!
Mike Kelley became General Manager in 1981 and helped develop systems
for dealers to get trade-in values on-line. That led to PC software for
new car pricing and software for creating retail window stickers for used
cars that features the "Blue Book Suggested Retail" price. Last
year over 2 million cars were sold with a sticker from Blue Book.
In 1993 Kelley Blue Book made its initial venture into the consumer marketplace,
by publishing a Consumer Edition of the Blue Book. It features 15 years
of used car values on over 10,000 models of cars, trucks and vans and
is available in bookstores, auto supply stores and other locations.
In 1995, Kelley Blue Book saw a further opportunity to facilitate transactions
between consumers and retailers by offering new and used car pricing on
kbb.com and by sending visitors to companies who could help in the transaction.
In support of the tagline, guiding the car buyer, kbb.com gave consumers
choices of ways to buy and sell cars, get financing, insurance, etc. Today,
we have helped create a new breed of informed consumer, who not only receives
pricing from Kelley Blue Book, but guidance in what kind of vehicle to
buy, through decision guides, side-by-side comparisons, car reviews and
other tools, tips and advice.
For the year 2000, kbb.com was the number one automotive site in the
nation (Jupiter Media Metrix). Over 5 million unique visitors generate
some 30 million pricing reports per month. Perhaps more importantly, it
is by far the most visited site by people who actually bought cars. According
to J.D. Power and Associates' Autoshopper.com studies, 53% of Internet
new car buyers and 55% of used car buyers came to kbb.com. Kelley Blue
Book continues to be the most recognized and respected brand in automotive
awareness studies. By being the "champion of the transaction,"
Kelley Blue Book continues to serve both the automotive buyer and the
industry that builds and sells the vehicles.
Kelley Blue Book, is the number one Automotive Information site on the
web (Nielsen NetRatings). Over 4.5 million unique visitors generate 27
million plus pricing reports on average per month. Of equal importance,
it is by far the most visited site by in-market car buyers. For the 5th
year in a row, J. D. Power and Associates' 2002 New and Used Autoshopper.com
studies find to be the most frequently visited Automotive website. According
to J. D. Power and Associates' New and Used Autoshopper.com studies in
November 2002, 44% of Auto Internet Users, which is a 5% increase over
last year's studies. Kelley Blue Book continues to be the most recognized
and trusted brand in automotive awareness studies and its role as "champion
of the transaction" serves both the auto buyer and the automotive
industry. Advertising opportunities include a variety of ad models with
in depth targeting including premium sponsorships and rich media.
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