A forklift that was sold at the Edmonton auction.

Ritchie Bros' three-day unreserved auction at its Edmonton, Alberta, permanent auction site, attracted the most bidders ever registered at any auction the company has held in the past 51 years.

More than 8,500 unique on-site and online bidders from 24 countries participated in the CAD93 million (USD79.6 million) unreserved auction of trucks, equipment and real estate on April 28-30. It was Canada's largest equipment auction.

Corporate communications manager Kim Schulz told Forkliftaction.com News that nearly 60 forklifts, worth "hundreds of thousands of dollars", were sold at Edmonton.

"We had buyers of forklifts from the United Arab Emirates, Saudi Arabia, Canada and the US [but] the majority of forklifts did stay in Canada," Schulz says.

Examples of forklifts sold included a 2003 Hyster H210HD for CAD37,000 (USD31,649), a Caterpillar R80 for CAD29,000 (USD24,806) and a JCB 506C for CAD42,500 (USD36,354).

The auction set several Ritchie Bros records, including the most equipment buyers at a Canadian auction (more than 2,000), the most equipment sold online at a Canadian auction (more than CAD20 million/USD17 million), the most registered online bidders at a Canadian auction (more than 2,250 unique bidders) and the most online buyers at a Canadian auction (more than 450 unique buyers).

Ritchie Bros says the auction is the largest the company has ever held outside Florida, US, where it typically holds large five- to-six day auctions each February.

Jake Lawson, Ritchie Bros regional manager, says: "There is a lot of optimism in the industry as there is still global demand for construction and transportation equipment. Thousands of owners and fleet managers continued to pursue quality used equipment at our auction.. People are still working and equipment is needed here and all over the world."

The bidders' 24 countries included Australia, Spain, all Canadian provinces and territories, and 45 US states.