Cars and the car business have always been my passion. I’ve spent 15 of the past 23 years honing my skills as a Manager, Finance and Insurance Department Director and General Manager. I’ve been a part of transactions with people with incomes close to the poverty line up to people with incomes exceeding the tens of millions annually. I have so many stories that I will share over these blogs that will, I hope, be entertaining especially because the auto business is something the general public thinks anyone can do.
Along those lines, I was privileged enough to work for Hank Aaron at his BMW/MINI Dealership in South Atlanta. I started as the New Car Manager but Hank and his partners realized my previous experience as a GM will make me a good candidate to run his total store some 9 months later. What we accomplished was amazing as the store quadrupled its net profitability in my first year their over its previous year. But I am getting ahead of myself.
When I first interviewed with Mr. Aaron or Henry as his close knit friends refer to him, I was awestruck. Here was a living legend, someone I read about as a kid, one of those people that will go down in history as a great person. I sat with him and asked him the secret to his baseball success. He told me the story of how, during a game, he would watch and study the pitchers he was facing. He would learn their tendencies and focus on what pitches were coming. I told him a professional player does that. “No!” he said. Some of his teammates would be looking at the girls in the stands, talk about what and where they were going after the game and any number of things outside of the game. These things went on in the dugout during the game. He said his secret to his success was he was always learning as a player about his competition.
I took that conversation to heart. As many know, the car business is always changing. More information becomes available to the buying public which makes people much better informed than ever. Let’s go back to my comments about the general public thinking they can do the car business. Mr. Aaron and his partners had the dealership group for a couple of years before I got there. Before I had access to the statements I never thought they had so little experience in the business. They had experiences and success in other businesses but not the car business. I brought the seasoning needed to make some tough decisions, change some policies and process that made that significant difference in the profitability of the store. The best part Mr. Aaron came to the dealership 5 days a week from 8:30am to 5:00pm and he and I visited regularly. I spent many of those meetings teaching Mr. Aaron what I knew. I suggested operational changes for him to receive the ROI he and his partners were looking for. I took that initial meeting with him telling me how he became a great homerun hitter by always being a student of his craft. In return, I became a student of my craft, refined my skills as a leader, not just a manager but a leader of 130 people whom I still remember fondly.
Because my store had such significant increase in volume and profitability, it became a great dealership that had upside to any potential buyers. And Mr. Aaron and his partners had perfect timing…they sold the store along with their Honda and Hyundai franchises for a reported $75M. After the assets and expenses I believe they received $40M-$45M. What a tremendous windfall. It seemed so easy but took so much work on my part to get it there.
I look now at the auto business. I have enjoyed it so much and look forward to what the future of the industry brings. I look at my craft and still think about Mr. Aarons comments…keep studying, keep reviewing and keep looking for the way to groove your swing. It worked for him.
No comments:
Post a Comment