At one time, if you needed a Triumph car part or even a whole car, apparently Triumphs Only in Stockton, California had the market cornered. The seller says they were in business for 40 years and the amount of cars and parts stored both indoors and outdoors looks almost endless. The inventory (but not the property it all sits on) is available here on eBay with a Buy It Now price of $299,999.
Here’s what the seller tells us. In a 40-year period, they collected cars, parts and almost anything else related to Triumph automobiles. They started up in San Jose and moved to Stockton at some point. If you wanted to go into the Triumph junk yard business today, you’d have most everything you’d need from the get-go. Except maybe a place to do it because the property this empire all resides on is also for sale, we assume by another party. As a business, they were said to perform every service from something minor all the way up to full a restoration. We’re told that people all over the world would order parts from them.
If the cars themselves are what catches your eye, we’re told about 60 vehicles in various states of survival are there. These include at least one each of the following Triumphs: TRA2000, TR2, TR3, TR3A, TR3B, TR4A, 4A IRS, TR5, TR6, TR7, TR8, TR10, Spitfire MKI, Spitfire MK2, Spitfire MK3, Spitfire MK4, Spitfire 1500, Stag, GT6, GT6+ and GT6 MK3.
But if its parts you want, the seller says there is 9,000 square feet of inside inventory consisting of new parts, NOS parts, NLA parts, used parts, rebuildable cores and even rare wheels. Outside, there are four 40’ containers also filled with parts. Then there’s all the racking, tools, lifts, shop equipment and it goes on and on. Should you need help in making an unknown number of trips hauling everything away, you’d also get a 2002 Chevrolet 4×4 Suburban 2500 with one car trailer and one utility trailer.
The seller puts a retail price tag on all of this between $600-850,000. The ad says the asking price for everything is $450,000, but the seller apparently forgot to edit that when changing the eBay Buy It Now price to just under $300,000. There is no mention of parting anything out; apparently this is an all-or-nothing proposition.
It’s quite possible this collection/business has been up for sale for a very long time – or it changed hands and is for sale yet again. We found a listing online from 2010 that has this collection for sale using some of the same photos used now. 10 years ago, the listing said 100 cars instead of the 60 now, so perhaps some of it has already been sold off or the seller lost count of everything.
If you Google Triumphs Only, the business is said to be permanently closed. And if you check Yelp , there were reviews of the business as recently as 2013. What this tells me is that this collection of cars and parts has probably been sitting around a lot longer than is indicated. And, BTW, if you check their web site, www.triumphsonly.com, the domain is for sale. So if you love old Triumphs and have 300 grand lying around, perhaps all this could be yours!
Subscribing to see what readers have to say about this one…..
If someone were to buy all this stuff, the sheer task of moving it all would be mind-boggling, to say nothing of sorting through it to see what you had. And if you were to buy it all with the intent of reviving a Triumph parts business (why else?), it would obviously be helpful if the buyer knew the Triumph cars like the back of his own hand.
It sounds like job for a strong and financially well-off 30-year-old Triumph expert with lots of friends! Where you gonna find one of those?
This collection reminds me of AMS Obsolete, a Mopar parts business outside of Atlanta. Only AMS is probably 10 times the size of this Triumph business. AMS has about 600 cars sitting on their property in rural (I mean rural) Georgia, with multiple huge buildings stacked to the rafters with Mopar parts from the 1920s through the 80s. It’s hard to believe it when you see it. Used, new, NOS, NLA, everything Mopar, it’s staggering. It’s hard to imagine liquidating such a place once the owner is ready to pass it on, or passes on.
The line up pc of triumphs is quite old because I own the green TR4AIRS in the middle. I purchased it over 7 years ago.
Here’s a shot from the grounds of AMS when I stopped there last summer.
And another….
Looks like the rare T code Barracuda.
Ran when parked…
Tree speed
Are there enough old Triumphs on the road to support a Triumph parts business? Sad to say it, as a former GT6+ owner, I see the enthusiasm for Triumphs to be waning. The younger generations just aren’t as interested.
Of all the things to dedicate a business to, why a marginal and mediocre British manufacturer?
Diamond in the rough, fixer upper
Is this what they mean when a car is advertised with “three on the tree”
Is this what they mean when a car is advertised with “three on the tree”
My father-in-law had a beautiful dark blue Triumph Stag that he bought new and loved for many years. These pics bring back a lot of memories….
I would hope that a business like Moss Motors “might” have an interest, it depends a lot on the selling price. What awaits is a huge inventory job with many parts having to be cleaned up a lot. My guess is some party will buy it but start parting with many of the worst shape cars. Might even end up with an English company coming over and shipping much of the inventory back “home”.
I doubt Moss is interested in the Triumph stuff, it’s probably 95% duplicate inventory items that Moss already has more than they can realistically sell over the next 20 years.
Not only have I sold a large inventory of vintage parts [a NAPA store that closed in 1971], but also one for a specific upscale marque – Packard. What I’ve discovered is that when selling a large inventory of parts, especially if you don’t have a very up-to-date item-by-item inventory, you’ll be lucky to get ten cents on the dollar. Had a friend with probably close to $250,000 in Studebaker parts & accessories, he finally sold them all for [if I recall] $15,000 about 15 years ago.
And even if you’ve got a damn good inventory of rare items, sometimes there is very little interest. For example, I’m trying to find a home for an Evinrude Outboard Motor parts inventory, from minor parts to complete “power units”, and I’ve found little interest in it, even when the dealership closed in 1980.
Such a discount has always been true. When I was in high school (1971) a friend and I bought out the local Chrysler dealer’s stock of Simca parts and two cars for only $1500! And yes, the cars ran and drove!
Still have any Simca parts?
Add in a LOL here that got cut by the site….
No, I don’t need any. ;-)
The only Simca parts I have left are some emblems and badges that are mounted on my work bench!
Yes, I am at the point where I will never do anything else with all the NOS and some impossible to find 1954 Pontiac parts and accessories. I feel like I missed the boat, if there ever was one, for the last year of the straight eight, although I love the cars from childhood. Once you know everything about a particular vehicle, like they ALL rust HERE…how do you pass that on if no one cares. I guess the world only needs that one air conditioned Star Chief convertible that will never move under its own power again after a wonderful restoration…check back in the POCI Smoke Signals archives. As we age out of not only the car hobby, motorcycling and collecting what means something to us, if we are lucky, it passes into memory and then that fades out. This discussion is going on daily in all the interest groups. Add COVID-19 and it’s not the best of times. For right now though, still here.
4501 Safari…sure makes one think, doesn’t it? *sigh*
I can only imagine the cost to move everything and the space to put it. Hopefully it will find ownership in the right hands.
The only way to make this economically feasible is to start by buying the entire hoard at a very low cost, low enough so the parts can be offered below what the competition sells items for.
Plus, it’s important to have a large property to put it on, and in a location where zoning will NOT be an issue. Those who have made a success in the vintage parts business typically own [not renting] a low-cost big building out in the country.
Also consider buying or leasing your own rollback truck, an older one in decent condition. And you’re gonna need a lot of cheap labor to move anything. It’s important to find young guys [or girls] who have a genuine interest in old cars, because they will be more likely to take care of the stuff during the move.
And before moving anything, make sure it is inventoried [with item description and/or part number, and quantity] as much as possible, and on unpacking, it’s important to know where it’s been placed. [If you can’t find it, you certainly can’t sell it!]
It will be a shame if this “collection doesn’t end in the hands of a party who has the interests of Triumph Motor history in mind.
Update to this, price now reduced to $125000 as of yesterday according to their FB posting