Dec. 8—TRAVERSE CITY — Hagerty CEO McKeel Hagerty rang the opening bell at the New York Stock Exchange on Monday.

Shares of Hagerty, Inc. common stock and warrants began trading Friday on the New York Stock Exchange under the ticker symbols HGTY and HGTY.WS, respectively.

"It changes the company very little," CEO McKeel Hagerty said of the company's transition from private to public ownership.

"We did this not just to expand the company, but be able to accelerate a number of strategic moves that we were doing and envisioning in the future to create more value for members. It gives us more resources to build on our dreams for the business."

Listing on the NYSE follows Hagerty's business combination with Aldel Financial Inc., a publicly traded special purpose acquisition company (SPAC), as previously reported.

Aldel shareholders approved the business combination during a Dec. 1 special meeting. The SPAC merger with Aldel included a $704 million investment by State Farm and Markel Corporation and a group of institutional and private investors. The combined company will operate under the Hagerty name.

"The only remaining part of Aldel," Hagerty said, "is that the founder/chairman/CEO of Aldel, Robert Kauffman, is on our board now and he has a little bit of ownership."

"It is a company not only primed for growth, but one with a unique culture and visionary leadership team, as well as a record of financial success," Kauffman said in a release.

The transaction values Hagerty at $3.1 billion. Hagerty insures 2 million vehicles, including 11.9 percent of the nation's 10.8 million pre-1981 classic automobiles, according to the release.

"When you go public this way, you're not often actually selling much of the business," said Hagerty. "The original founding family will still own more than 50 percent of the company. I'll still be the CEO. My job is to grow the company as I always did."

"Personally, I'm excited to get the deal phase behind us, because it's been pretty exhausting. I'm excited to just get back to running the business."

Hagerty will continue on the same course it's been on in recent years, he said. It will continue growing its car insurance business and will expand operations in its automotive lifestyle operations.

"What we've been doing the last few years gives you pretty good picture of what the future will look like: Investing in capabilities around the automotive lifestyle part of our business," he said. "Even though 92 percent of our revenue is insurance today, and only eight percent is non-insurance — think events, think media, think some of the other assets that we have — those are the things that really create value for our members."

Hagerty's insurance business is expected to continue growing, too. Hagerty envisions continued international expansion. The company already operates in Canada, the United Kingdom and Germany.

The COVID-19 pandemic has had an effect on Hagerty's customer base.

"One of the things for those tens of millions of people out there who actually like cars is that they actually drove more for pleasure," Hagerty said. "They did more stuff with their cars they wanted to, but didn't before have the time.

"It's been a very good year, couple of years really, for us and our business, as we saw more interest. Especially among younger people wanting to get into this space and thinking, 'You know, if I'm going to work from home, and I'm going to go to the store, I'd sure like to go to the store in a cool car.' That's our world and those are our people."

2021 was the first year more than 50 percent of the company's new business was from people younger than Baby Boomers.

"Millennials — the oldest are now turning 40 — are into cars, contrary to popular belief," said Hagerty. "But they don't want to own the same cars as their parents or grandparents had. They like newer stuff. They like little two-seater convertibles, they like '90s-era BMWs, they like European sports cars or Japanese sports cars. Those are the hot tickets. They're from the '80s or '90s and even the early 2000s."

"I like modern cars, I like old cars, I like cars of all types," Hagerty said of his personal taste in automobiles.

He still treasures his first car, a 1967 Porsche. That car stood in front of the NYSE on Monday, a few says after he drove it on the snow-covered streets of Traverse City.

In 2021, he bought a car 39 years older: a cloth-bodied 1928 Bentley.

"It's a car I always dreamed of having: right hand drive, very difficult to operate and drive," he said.

The Hagerty company last week hired Daniel Ignoto as senior vice president of strategic insurance partnerships, a newly created role.

He will be responsible for crafting growth strategies for Hagerty's largest insurance carrier partnerships and working with those partners. He also will lead Hagerty's Canadian operations.

Ignoto spent the last 17 years at Aviva Canada in progressive leadership roles, including responsibility for the brand's partnership with Hagerty. Most recently he pioneered Aviva's specialty division in personal insurance and oversaw more than $1 billion in written premiums.