The Armadillo Consignment Beginning

American Leather Recliners Retail $2,000 ea. Sold for $600.00

One of the questions I am most frequently asked is how I got into the consignment business.

I worked in the claims department of an insurance company for a good share of my 25 years in the industry. I spent the remaining time as a Product and Project Manager, and I’ll tell you how those experiences shaped the Armadillo Consignment brand in my next post.

When you suffer a theft loss and the insurance company pays you for the stolen item, if recovered it then belongs to the insurance company.  These things often turn up in pawn shops or are found in police raids. These items are known in the industry as salvage and your insurer will often attempt to sell that property to offset their losses.  There are at least there problems associated with the insurance strategy:

1. Insurance company employees are strictly forbidden to take advantage of these items.  The rule is meant to preclude any moral hazard. A good safeguard, but it limits the opportunity to easily dispose of salvage.

2. Returns are often damaged and as such the condition makes resale difficult.

3. Insurance companies sell insurance, not recovered bicycles, televisions and jewelry so they don’t have good systems to handle salvage sales.

Knowing this, I decided to open a business to address this need.  And as you might imagine, the story took some interesting twist and turns…

I’ll share them with you in my upcoming posts.

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