Are you heading to or at the NADA Convention? I hope so. If you’re not going I’m wondering why? Why would you not go? Short on staff? I guess that’s a maybe. You went last year? Ugh, I guess that might be a maybe also. Can’t afford the expense? Another maybe goes up on the board. Those excuses and most others are not great reasons for not going.
Some of you live in a little box and wonder why things never change for you. If you’re like most dealers you spend the largest majority of your time in your dealership pushing yourself and encouraging your staff to do the things we all know are important.
The problem with being in the store every day is you end up in a "mental box." Your brain needs a shot of WD 40 once in a while to loosen things up and make the wheels turn faster. It’s winter, it’s cold and if you’re not careful your brain will freeze up and not thaw until sometime in August.
It’s easy to say "the Convention is always the same, so why bother?" Not true. The only reason the Convention is the same is because you’re the same.
If you’ve gone to the Convention in the past to rub shoulders with the factory guys and attend the parties then I guess it would be the same for you. You get out of something what you put into it. If you go to the Convention and are determined to take real ideas back to your dealership and make things happen the odds will be in your favor of doing so.
It’s hard for your vision to change when you sit there and stare at those same walls and same people day after day. It’s a cancer that eats away at your soul. That’s why you need to go. You need inspiration. You need to see the possibilities. You need to go and learn something.
So, if you’ve not already made plans to go, it might be too late and that’s a shame. If you do go, you can stop by the vAuto booth #1558 and get a free copy of my "Little Used Car Book, Volume 3." My little book is not a cure all for your used car business but it’s guaranteed to give you some ideas and wisdom to help your bottom line.
Finally, I’d like to encourage you to attend your state or local association meeting and by all means consider joining a Twenty Group. You cannot expand your knowledge and your business by sitting in your office daydreaming about the possibilities. That’s all I’m gonna say. Tommy Gibbs