Tracking Down A Bargain Auctioneers Put On A Show At Fairgrounds Snowmobile Sale

The place boiled over with German sausage, chili and staccato - the latter being the most inescapable.

“I got 22 and I need 23 hunnerd,” the auctioneer fired. “I already got 22 and I need 23. I need 23 hunnerd.”

John Mahon did this with a brimstone conviction. The ‘94 Yamaha snowmobile needed to go. Now. And you would be the one to fix this problem - for just (another) $100.

And so it went Sunday at the annual Snowmobile Auction and Trade Show at the fairgrounds here. Nearly 800 people paid $5 each to see it, whether or not they were interested in buying. If not, there was always that concession-stand sausage.

It was a show. Black-shirted men would wheel in a mirror-bright sled, moor it in front of the sea of folding chairs, then the fast-talkers took over.

“I got 5,000 and I need 51 hunnerd. I’ve got 1,000 miles on the motor since the re-build.”

Mahon and his son, Matthew, took turns at the microphone. When the gray-haired man from Hayden Lake was up, his son turned to the crowd, whirling and pointing and shouting with each new bid. “HEY-ay!”

One went for $600. One went for $6,000. Some came from Yellowstone National Park, former rental sleds the park was selling because of high mileage. Others were consignment offers from people needing a buck or wanting to trade up.

Snow Zone Enterprises was happy to help. The owners of the Spokane company sprinted about the place, pushing sleds and readying paperwork.

“It’s total craziness!” Lynn Sorensen said. “But it’s fun.”

The 35-year-old and her husband Ron have done this for three years; only once a year, and only here. Why?

“We’re nuts,” Sorensen said. “Total blondness.” Her main goal was just to break even this time.

But the crowd was finicky. Not all the 100 or so snow mobiles moved at the auction stage. Some ended up outside in a lot, waiting for rescue by anyone who would haggle directly with the owner.

Four men sized up a Polaris before moving on. “He wants a new machine with at least 10 inches of suspension,” one said. Apparently this didn’t fit the bill.

Larry Erickson and a friend came from Creston, British Columbia, in search of electric bum warmers for snowmobile seats. No kidding. They didn’t find them, but decided the bidding was way, way low.

“I’m surprised at how many machines are out here,” Erickson said.

“And I’m surprised at what people are bidding on,” his friend said.

“A lot lower than what they want for them, eh?” Erickson said.

The friend was pounding out exchange rates and sales taxes on a calculator. He looked up and laughed.

“I figure they’re two-thirds of what the value is,” Erickson said. “…I think people are hanging on to their money to see what the winter does.”

That El Nino thing. Last year, way up high, Erickson could ride even in May. “You gotta ride in the mountains or you don’t ride at all.”

Inside, where the vendors were, Doug Kashuba talked a lot about the mountains. He sells beacons. Kashuba said he was trapped in an avalanche five years ago and his buddies had to find him via beacon before digging him out.

“It was a long five minutes,” he said. He couldn’t even move his fingers. He tried to convince everyone who stopped that $250 for a beacon wasn’t a bad deal.

“Cheap life insurance,” he’d say. “… my wife would kill me if I came back in a box.”

Back up front, past the scent of sausage, the Mahons had really loosened up. The longer they went, the more air they had. The younger one mediated a back-and-forth war between two bidders, then reached $1,100. The denim-clad man in the front row surrendered. He shook his head, put away his bid number and walked out.

“Sssold!”

, DataTimes ILLUSTRATION: 2 color photos