In just the last year, Classic Collision has vaulted from being the fifth-largest provider to the second-largest by locations in the Denver market, according to Focus Advisors, which represented Colorado Auto Body in its recent sale and most of Classic Collision’s Denver-area acquisitions.
Now with 15 shops in the Denver and Fort Collins areas, Classic is only second to Caliber in terms of its footprint in this high-growth and attractive MSA.
“Classic’s rapid rise in Denver will be one of the highlights in our forthcoming Year In Review article. Denver is already a highly consolidated market with very few MSO acquisition opportunities, so watching this happen over just the last 12 months was remarkable," said Focus Advisors Associate Madeleine Rich.
“Classic saw the opportunity to acquire significant share in a top 10 U.S. market, then marshalled their resources to get it. There was no shortage of buyers interested in these attractive MSOs, but Classic came out on top. They were successful exits for each one of our three MSO clients, who today remain happy they chose to go with Classic,” said Chris Lane, partner at Focus Advisors.
Focus Advisors’ clients in the Denver market included Bill Lipsitz, owner of the five-shop Colorado Auto Body; Chris Brown, owner of the three-shop MSO consisting of Vintage Autoworks, Body’s by Brown and Northern Colorado Auto Reconditioning Services; and Lynette and Gunnar Greenemeier of the two-shop Highlands MSO.
All three of these clients were part of Classic’s acquisition spree of 11 shops just in the last year. Since Classic Collision first entered the Denver market in January 2022, they’ve acquired a total of 15 stores, buying shops in Lakewood (one shop), Littleton (three), northwest Denver (one), south Denver (two), Thornton (one), Commerce City (one), Castle Rock (two), Greeley (one), Englewood (one) and Aurora (two).
While Caliber still significantly exceeds any of the other consolidators in terms of its Denver footprint, Classic now ranks second, equaling or exceeding the number of shops of the next three largest consolidators in Denver: Gerber, Crash Champions and Kaizen.
