Roadra – a digital car auction platform that allows consumers to sell cars directly to dealers – recently announced $5 million in funding to scale its platform further. Launched by brothers Satchel and Bridger Kolde in 2019, Roadra launched its used-car marketplace product late last year to propel its mission to bridge the gap between dealers and sellers. The latest funding round enables Roadra’s expansion and development of new product features, including AI-powered photo and video inspections for existing dealer partners and more.
Built to benefit both consumers and dealers in the car-selling process, Roadra eliminates multiple middlemen, auction houses, and complex platforms while earning consumers thousands of dollars. Dealers can now bid on more than 3,000 consumer vehicles each month.
Year to date, this platform has seen more than $80 million worth of bids placed by dealers, and sales growth is averaging more than 70% month over month. And sellers on Roadra use web-based photo and video technology to create an auction-grade car profile. The user-friendly platform allows everyday users to sell their vehicles in less than 24 hours and potentially receive $1,000+ more than typical instant-offer vendors.
Using web-based photo and video self-inspections submitted by sellers, Roadra provides extremely high-quality vehicle profiles for its dealers to bid on. And the company has launched new features, including “daily car drops” for dealers, promoting the latest and most sought-after private-party additions to the marketplace.
Dealers can also browse used cars effortlessly through a new Tinder-like interface that allows them to evaluate vehicles and make offers quickly. And dealers can engage in Roadra’s gamification features, including a Fortnite-style battle pass with rewards like cash value coins and “mystery boxes” for bidding and purchasing vehicles. By implementing these features, Roadra is providing dealers with a sense of community, which is enhanced by the newly added dealer-chat feature.
Roadra’s long-term company goal is to drive the used-car market forward by helping sellers and dealers seamlessly buy and sell cars and eliminating the challenges dealers encounter when procuring used car inventory.
KEY QUOTES:
“We are at the beginning of a new era in automotive auctions, especially after supply disruptions accelerated dealer adoption of consumer sourcing. With more people choosing to sell to online vendors versus trading in, it’s time to connect dealer buyers directly with online consumers. Using Roadra, consumers can create auction-ready profiles from their phone, and dealers can buy high-quality cars typically unavailable at traditional auctions.”
— Satchel Kolde, CEO and Co-Founder of Roadra
“As consumer sourcing for used car stock becomes more prevalent for professional dealers, it’s essential that they are able to efficiently evaluate and purchase the vehicles they need, and we help them do what they do best. Roadra is a next-generation auction platform allowing cars to completely bypass the expensive logistics of massive incumbent wholesale auctions. Our AI-enabled platform allows us to run a more efficient auction with a fraction of the team and get a better deal for buyers and sellers.”
— Bridger Kolde, President and Co-Founder of Roadra
