Triceratops skeleton ‘Trey’ to hit the auction block as dinosaur market soars

After decades on display at a Wyoming museum, a rare triceratops skeleton known as “Trey” is headed to auction amid a booming market for prehistoric fossils. The 66-million-year-old specimen will be available for bidding from March 17 to 31 on Joopiter, an online auction platform founded by musician Pharrell Williams, with an estimated value between $4.5 million and $5.5 million.

The 17-foot-long herbivore was discovered near Lusk, Wyoming, in 1993 by Lee Campbell and the late Allen Graffham, a commercial paleontologist noted for numerous significant discoveries. Trey became a centerpiece attraction when the Wyoming Dinosaur Center in Thermopolis opened its doors in 1995 and remained on loan there until 2023.

Following a private sale, the fossil is currently in Singapore, where it is available for private viewings through March. Paleontologist Andre LuJan, who worked with Joopiter to prepare the specimen for auction, emphasized Trey’s cultural significance.

“This fossil has a cultural aspect that many auction fossils simply don’t have,” LuJan said. “It’s connected to people and has undoubtedly inspired young visitors to pursue careers in paleontology.”

The market for dinosaur fossils has experienced extraordinary growth in recent years, transforming what was once primarily the domain of academic institutions into a lucrative investment opportunity. In 2024, a stegosaurus skeleton named “Apex” sold for a record-breaking $44.6 million, surpassing the previous high mark of $31.8 million paid for “Stan,” a Tyrannosaurus rex, in 2020.

The market’s strength was further demonstrated last July when a rare juvenile dinosaur skeleton at Sotheby’s exceeded its pre-auction estimate of $4-6 million, ultimately fetching over $30 million after a competitive bidding process.

Caitlin Donovan, Joopiter’s global head of sales, attributes this surge in interest to a broader shift in collecting patterns, with buyers moving away from traditional categories like fine art toward objects with stronger “cultural resonance.”

“Dinosaurs have always captivated our imagination, and people are now starting to see the value in investing in these as assets,” explained LuJan, highlighting the growing recognition of fossils as both cultural artifacts and financial investments.

However, the escalating prices have raised concerns within the scientific community. As private collectors and investors drive values to unprecedented heights, public institutions find themselves increasingly unable to compete.

“Museums are getting totally priced out of an exploding market,” said Kristi Curry Rogers, a paleontologist at Macalester College in Minnesota, who is not involved with Trey’s sale. She warned about the potential scientific consequences of specimens disappearing into private collections.

“If a fossil goes into a private collection without guaranteed access forever, that data is essentially lost to science,” Curry Rogers explained, underscoring the research value these specimens hold beyond their commercial appeal.

LuJan countered these concerns by noting that Trey has always been privately owned, and expressed hope that the fossil would ultimately find its way to a museum. He pointed to “Apex” as an example of a positive outcome – the stegosaurus is now displayed at New York’s American Museum of Natural History through a long-term loan agreement that also permits scientific study.

“We’ve experienced a paradigm shift in what owning dinosaurs means to society,” LuJan said. “People are naturally gravitating toward benevolent arrangements where they loan specimens to museums long-term or donate them to newly established institutions.”

As Trey heads to auction, the sale represents another chapter in the evolving relationship between private fossil ownership and public scientific access – a tension that continues to shape paleontological research in an era of skyrocketing fossil prices.