Practically everyone with a vehicle today has felt the impact of Alan R. Bauer ’74 and his visionary leadership. A philosophy and mathematics double major at Carleton, Bauer earned an MBA in finance and accounting from the University of Chicago before joining the Progressive Corporation, then a small, specialty auto insurer. Throughout the late 1990s and early 2000s, he led the company in developing many industry innovations— Progressive became the world’s first insurance company to have a website and to sell an insurance policy completely online. In 1998, Bauer and his team made it possible for customers to change and manage their policies completely online, and later—though still years before the iPhone’s debut—they developed the insurance industry’s first mobile website. Bauer also inaugurated Progressive’s boat insurance program, which now claims more than one million customers.
Along with his strategic and practical innovations, Bauer’s work resulted in more accessible and affordable insurance. His group helped build Progressive’s standard auto program as well as Progressive’s Comparison Rate Ticker, which uses real-time data to show Progressive’s rates and rates of other leading insurers online. They also played a role in Progressive’s launch of usage-based insurance, using real-time driving behaviors to assess drivers, leading to fairer pricing for consumers. These features, which were granted U.S. and European patents, are now standard for almost all major insurance companies.
In 2011, Bauer was honored as one of the Top 10 Innovators of the Decade by Insurance & Technology magazine.
By the time he left Progressive, the company had become the third largest auto insurer in the United States, and it is now the largest.
Bauer has played an important role at Carleton over the years, joining the Board of Trustees in 2006 and again in 2017. He was inducted into the College’s Founders Court in 2024 in recognition of his exceptional leadership and generosity. He and his wife, Barbara, live in Mill Valley, California.