On January 5, 2010 there was an article in USA Today on University of Texas’s football coach Mack Brown. He’s had tremendous success since taking over there 12 years ago. In that article it talks about a young man who spoke to the team prior to their big game against Oklahoma. The young man was 16 year old Corey Borner who was paralyzed from the neck down after he was injured while making a tackle last spring in a scrimmage at Desoto High School.

He told the Longhorns he was going to find a way to walk again, just like they were going to find a way to beat Oklahoma. After trailing at halftime, Texas won 16-13. Borner gave Coach Brown a black wrist band that reads “find a way.”  Brown wears it during all games and states, “You hear our kids say all the time ‘find a way’. Corey’s moving his arms now.  He has some feeling in his legs. We got it pretty good, and if he’s finding a way, we can find a way.”

You have to find a way to improve your bottom line and improve your business for 2010. There is a way. It doesn’t matter if you’re in a big market or a small market. It doesn’t matter if your economy is more depressed than other areas of the country. There is a way. Maybe the pie has gotten smaller, but you have to figure a way to get a bigger piece of the pie.

You won’t find a way by looking at the four walls in your office. You will find a way by seeking information on how to make it happen from those who are making it happen. I can’t think of any business where owners are so willing to share their success stories with others like they do in the automobile business; be it from a phone call, a 20 Group or from dealers at the NADA convention. There is a ton of information available that will help you if you would only seek it.

The most successful dealers in the country are always looking for a way to improve what they are doing. They are never satisfied. So if their motto is always “Let’s Find a Better Way” then why don’t all dealers do the same? It’s simple. They’ve lost their way because they are convinced there is no way…and that’s all I’m gonna say.  Tommy Gibbs

I wasn’t a very good history student. I couldn’t rationalize why I needed to know what had happened a hundred years ago. I could not have cared less. Actually, I hated history.

As an adult I have come to appreciate history and wish I had paid more attention in my history classes as I now find it amazingly interesting.

George Santayana, a Spanish-born philosopher wrote in his book, The Life of Reason, "Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it."

Why are those 11 words so hard for us to get our heads around in the car business? Many in the car business keep repeating the same mistakes and don’t understand why they are always fighting with the same issues. If you are not willing to change, what else can you expect?

The two things I hear dealers complain about the most are the mistakes in their used car inventory and how difficult it is to hire people.

The reason you can’t hire people is because of the type of people you keep going after. You’re trying to hire the same type of people that you did back in the 70s and 80s. If you keep going after people who are motivated by being paid on gross profit, how can you expect anything but who you are getting? Paying on gross profit has very little appeal to generation X and Y.

Your selling system and pay plan is fundamentally the same as it has always been. Get an offer, work the customer, make as much gross as you can and repeat the process. Sales people and managers are programmed that the more gross they hold the more they get paid. Yes, we need lots of gross profit, but the historical approach to achieving it is not working.

By and large the way many dealers manage their used car inventory is the same as it was 20 years ago. Dealers buy cars based on a combination of gut instinct and a little pretending that they are using some software to guide them. Their emotions still control what they buy and what they keep.

I often hear comments like "Why should I get rid of that car when I can’t replace it?" I love it when dealers make that statement to me. Really, really…you want some more of that? If it hasn’t sold in 45 days why would you want to go out and buy some more cars that you haven’t been able to sell?

Many dealers want to stay with the "old way of doing things." They price cars at a certain amount of gross and then want to hold the line on those prices as long as possible. History tells us that you are working with a depreciating asset. If the value is going south on a daily basis how can you think that your pricing shouldn’t follow the same formula? But, because you don’t adjust the pricing fast enough (and you’re not using my Life Cycle Management Program) you wake up one day, take those aged units to the auction and lose your shirt. History keeps on repeating itself and you wonder why?

So back to our little history lesson. If through your history you keep finding yourself struggling with these same problems over and over again what’s it going to take for you to change? Yes, change is hard; it’s never easy to go down a different path. To do so you have to clear out a lot of old debris. It takes time, patience and commitment. The alternative is for you to keep repeating history.

You cannot control the past, but you can control your future and you can make your own history by having the guts and courage to change those things you know you need to do. That’s all I’m gonna say. Tommy Gibbs 

What a great quote by Mark Twain. Ask yourself, are you in denial? Are you in denial about what’s really going on in your dealership? Is it really the economy or is it partly you? Are you not looking in the mirror?

I’m probably one of the luckiest people in the world because I get to travel and spend time with some very successful automobile dealers, and some who are not so successful. One thing that separates them is that successful people don’t lie to themselves. They know they have faults and they seek to fix them. In other words they are not in denial. The not so successful ones are usually in total denial. The denial starts with having all the excuses they can come up with as opposed to taking an honest look at themselves and their organization.

Denial is an unrealistic hope that a problem is not really happening, and will go away by itself. It is an attempt to put distance between ourselves and our experience, and protect ourselves from the threat of danger. In its many forms, denial acts like a pain reliever. If we keep pretending it’s not there then eventually it will go away. Not!

Denial can become your worst enemy. It diverts your attention, and decreases your mental efficiency.  As long as you refuse to accept the truth of your situation, you must, of necessity, refuse to give it your attention. Instead you will pay attention to every possible manner of distraction you can employ to support your denial. You keep reading the paper and watching CNN to reinforce your personal denial.

Successful businesses always get down to people and/or processes. Yes, you know these things to be true on the inside but you lie to yourself and your staff on the outside…you zip right into denial mode. I have an old friend by the name of Marvin Barnes. Marvin had a saying, “You can justify anything you want to justify.” Denial allows you to justify how bad the economy is and that’s why your business is so bad rather than face the fact that you either have the wrong people or wrong processes.

That’s all I’m gonna say, Tommy Gibbs

Let’s pretend that you have a million dollars lying around and wanted to invest it in the stock market. Also, let’s pretend you decide you want to be a day trader and manage your own portfolio.

If you were a day trader how close would you watch the market? How hard would you study the various stocks to determine the ones you wanted to risk all or part of your million dollars on?

The odds are pretty good it would be minute by minute. I’m also thinking you would unload those stocks that appeared to be heading south with no real chance of making you any money.

It would stand to reason you would cut out those stocks that are losers, study the market really hard to find the winners, and invest your money in stocks that gave you the greatest edge toward making a profit.

Being a day trader requires that you have access to multiple real-time news sources and can make split second decisions. News and rumors can provide large amounts of volatility and high emotion creating great opportunities if traded properly.

To be really successful as a day trader probably will get down to how hard you are willing to study the market and to what degree you will exercise strong discipline.

Let’s say you have a stock heading south and all the research says the company’s earnings are not going to get any better. Why would you keep it? The only reason to keep it would be somewhere back there in the deepest, darkest corner of your brain something keeps telling you, "Hang on to it, don’t you remember 10 years ago, you had that one stock that you kept against your better judgment and it bounced back and made you money." You still believe in miracles.

Day trading can be extremely profitable. The downside is that if done incorrectly, it can also be extremely unprofitable. Due to the high volatility of day trading, some people have labeled Day Traders as gamblers or adrenaline junkies.

It’s probably simpler than you might think. If you buy smart, unload the losers as quickly as possible and reinvest that money into stocks that give you the greatest chance of making a return on your money, then the million dollars you started out with can grow substantially.

Since most of you reading this are in the car business you have probably figured out where this is going.

It is not uncommon at all for dealers to have over a million dollars tied up in their used car inventory. If that’s you, then you must take the same approach with your used car inventory as you would take if you were a day trader.

It’s not about losing money at 60 days. It’s all about turning the right inventory (stocks) as fast as possible. Finding a retail buyer early in the "Life Cycle" is what creates a high return on your investment. A low return on your investment automatically occurs when you hold a car for 60 days. 

It’s not called a "60 Day Trader." It’s called a Day Trader for good reason. That’s all I’m gonna say. Tommy Gibbs

What’s the number one thing that separates your dealership or business from your competitors? Silly question, huh? It’s obviously the people. The leadership of an organization sets the tempo of what the expectations are even if they “state” them or not. If you never announce what your expectations are you have actually done so by remaining silent.

I was thinking this morning when going into my local dry cleaners, why do I go there? Other dry cleaners are just as close and I know for a fact that one of them does a better job. The difference is the people who work there. They know me by name and they are friendly. Pretty simple, huh? As I think about other businesses I frequent it’s the same thing. Be it the post office, restaurant, Office Depot…they all offer the same items and/or services. I select which one I will give my business to based on the attitude of the people who work there.

Attitude does not happen by happenstance. It happens because someone has led that attitude. Attitude is not developed by having a meeting and stating what the new policy is on attitude. It’s done by example and continuous training/coaching of the entire team.

Most people would point to Ritz Carlton Hotels as having the best employees and customer service concepts. Do you think that happens just by hiring nice people, paying them well and having a new employee orientation program? You and I both know that cannot be true. First they are in the same talent pool that you are. They want to hire nice, well spoken, talented people. Second, I doubt very seriously that they pay the most money and third we all know that there is no way to maintain the level of service they do by doing an employee orientation and saying “go get ‘em.”

Most businesses do just that. They hire people and say “go get em” and they wonder why they can never achieve the level of success they would like. It’s really about developing a culture within your organization. In order to do that you need to retrain all the members of your team at least once a quarter in order to coach them on what the “Cultural Expectations” are. This needs to be in a formalized session with the Owner/Operator/GM actually doing the presentation. Do not delegate this to your HR department or other management to handle. It has to come from the top because it is so important to your survival and success.

The message should be very clear. Here is who we are and this is the way you will need to conduct yourself if you expect to continue working here. This is not about threatening them but it’s about making sure there is not an ounce of doubt as to what we expect of our team members. Part of the message for those who “get it” is that they need to make those who don’t “get it” very uncomfortable to the point that they leave on their own accord.

Daily life is very much like the military. When I was in the Marine Corps they often referred to “that 10%.” Meaning there are always 10% of the people who just can’t do “it,” whatever “it” might be. Just as in the Marine Corps, you need to run the misfits off. This doesn’t have to be mean or cruel. Just factual and to the point.

Never forget, you can train and re-train all you want, but you must set the example each and every day. You cannot operate under the theory of “do what I say not what I do.” That’s all I’m gonna say. Tommy Gibbs

Let’s talk about cars. Not the kind you drive and sell, but a report you should be doing once a week called a CAR Report. Which stands for "Cars At Risk."

If you will follow this simple little discipline I can guarantee a lot of your problem children will go away. If you’re the dealer or GM I’m thinking it’s a pretty good bet that from time to time you sit down with your used car manager and go over your aged list.

In that discussion you talk about this car and that car and what the plans are to get it sold. Often the used car manager is able to hold you off from demanding that they dump the car or whatever.

They tell you they have a deal pending or they have plans to take it to the auction by the end of the week. You know the drill. It becomes a very nice conversation with no real demands on your part as you don’t want to upset your manager because if you do, you know nothing’s going to get done today.

Stop this insanity and use my CAR process. Once a week you should meet with the used car manager to review the CAR report. It’s a list of ten cars based on whatever formula you might want to use. Just be consistent. It could be your 10 oldest, it could be your 10 most expensive, or it could be the 10 with the lowest vAuto scores. (The form is at the bottom of this article.)

Go over each car on each line. As you do so, ask your used car manager "Do you agree this car is at risk?" There will be some cars on the list that your manager will say something like "No we are ok on this car, etc." But, every time your manager says "Yes I think we are at risk on this car" have them turn the form over on the back. 

The back of the form requires the used car manager to give you one of two plans. Either a plan, (a real plan!) to retail the unit or a plan (a real plan!) to wholesale the unit.

Now, here’s what really makes this process work. Each week when your manager brings in a new CAR report for you to go over, they must also bring in the previous week’s report. You will notice on the right hand side a column that says "Did You Lie?"

In other words Mr. or Ms. Used Car Manager, when we had the meeting last week you said "You had a plan to make this car go away. So you lied to me because it’s still here. You did not follow through and do what you said you were going to do with this car."

This simple weekly process avoids these ongoing conversations about what you are going to do with a car. Yes, it takes discipline to do this every week. I will guarantee you that by taking 15 minutes of your busy schedule to do this every week that your inventory is going to shape up, your volume will get better and your grosses will improve.

Almost everything we do in this business, or any business for that matter, gets down to "the pain of discipline or the pain of regret." You will have one or the other. And the best part is you get to choose. That’s all I’m gonna say. Tommy Gibbs

 (CLICK HERE FOR THE FORM)  

It is not unusual for dealers to struggle with either the lack of volume or the lack of a high average gross profit per car sold. In either case that can lead to a decline in total gross which is how we pay the bills and pay ourselves. There are very few cases when you will achieve both high volume and high average gross profit. It goes against the laws of nature or something like that.

Either way has challenges. If you have decided to be a high average gross dealer then it’s a pretty sure bet you will see decline in your traffic. If you go after volume, which means aggressively pricing your inventory on the Internet, then it’s likely you will see traffic go up and average grosses go down.

It’s also very easy to convince yourself that there are no cars to be bought. I want to remind all of you once again that CarMax, Texas Direct and Drivers Select are still buying lots of cars. (Drivers Select is cool, CLICK HERE to check them out.)

Going after volume means you have to up the ante when it comes to finding replacement cars. There is a lot more to acquiring inventory than just running out and buying more cars for the sake of a larger inventory. It requires a strategic plan of staffing and research or you will find yourself with a lot of aging purchased cars.

Assuming you get a solid plan in place to find more cars is there anything you can do to actually improve gross? Yes. Can you do $3000 a copy on the front? No.

I have some ideas for you:

1. Goal setting. If you are now at $1000 a unit on the front, it’s a real stretch to set a goal of $1500. You would be far better off to bonus the management team for bumping the average up by $50 a unit for this month and then repeat the process the following month. To say to them you want a $500 bump in one month is unrealistic and if you do bump it up the $500 you can bet your volume will take a hit. You can ultimately get to the $1500, but you need to eat the elephant one small bite at a time.

2. Do a better job of training the sales people (and sales managers) to sell the value of your company and the value of the vehicle, and your grosses would be a lot better. The Team needs to learn to say "no" and to convince the customer that you have the best deal going.

3. Provide more information. The more information your sales people have about your inventory and how it’s priced to market the more likely they are to do a better job of convincing the customers you’ve got the best car at the best price. You have to sell the sales staff before you sell the customer.

4. Rethink "Buckets." Many dealers have become sold on buckets. Buckets are a solid discipline process, but you can’t take a position that all cars in the first 20 days are priced a certain way and at day 21 another and so on. There are some that need to be over market and some under market regardless of age. All cars have to be evaluated on their own merits and must be done daily, not in 15 or 20 day windows.

5. Track GAP and ROI. Dealers who are tracking GAP and ROI are seeing a big difference in their average grosses.  If you’ve not bought into this process then maybe it’s something you should take a hard look at. If you need the GAP/ROI spreadsheet, send me an email and I’ll get it right to you. (It’s Free!)

6. Fix your reconditioning timeline. If your most profitable car is a 20-day car (and it really is) how can you allow the service department to bog you down with it spending 7 to 10 days in the shop? This is one of those things that’s fixable, but it has to be done by the dealer. If the dealer wants to fix it then it gets fixed. Speed wins; the lack of speed kills. It’s as simple as that.

7. Re-do your website. How does your website look? Your website is the "New Showroom." Do your pictures tell a good story? Do you have 12 to 20 photos? If that’s all you have then you are not in the game. You need at least 40 and they need to be done in a photo booth. If you don’t have a photo booth you need to make a commitment to get one. Saying you don’t have the space is a poor excuse. You can make it happen if you want to. Kind of like the issue in service. You can fix it. You just need to do it.

8. Install EWR into your "Trade Walk." Have you read my article on EWR and Life Cycle Management? Early Warning Radar Here it is. Even if you’ve read it, read it again.

I’m thinking you can increase your volume and average gross profit, and "That’s all I’m gonna say." Tommy Gibbs

You have opinions, I have opinions, We all have opinions. My opinion today centers around the "Turn Over" or commonly referred to as a "TO," which may be one of the most misunderstood aspects of the car business. For those readers not familiar with the process it’s generally a salesman turning over their customer to a manager to "close the deal."

In theory, managers have better closing skills than the average sales person so managers are often times expected to go in for the close. Bear in mind I said "in theory," which doesn’t always hold true.

Many dealers are still running the business with what they believe to be a tried and proven method of negotiating the deal. Dealers who negotiate the transaction most often employ the concept of a "TO" to management.  If you’ve read much of my material you know I believe the best business model today is that of CarMax and non-negotiation.

Since so many dealers have not yet, and may never move towards the CarMax model I want to address the "TO" concept.  Even if you have moved to the "one price," non-negotiating model, you still may be utilizing a "TO" at some point in the transaction.

There are many things changing in the automobile business these days, but one of the core principles that should not change is a sales person should never let a customer leave without checking with a manager first. That fundamental principle is critical to the success of the business. There is no argument that can be presented that will lean in favor of the sales person having the latitude to decide when to let a customer walk.

The customer belongs to the dealership, not the sales person. Maybe, just maybe the sales person created the lead from friendship, prospecting or whatever, but the dealership has far more invested in the generating of that customer than the sales person will ever have. Thus, management should be allowed to determine when and how the customer goes out the door.

Whenever I hear dealers talk about the type of sales manager they have or want to have one of the things that they seem to want is a "good closer." They want someone who will get off their duff and go in and close the deal.

I’m not sure we are going to agree on all or any part of this, but one of the things God blessed me with is common sense, and to me this is all about common sense and human nature.

I believe the TO can and should take place at any point in the sale, not just during the negotiating process. Managers have to have a keen sense of what’s going on around them. Call it peripheral vision if you may. Far too often they have their head stuck in a computer or better yet stuck in the sand. They just don’t see what’s going on around them.

So, the TO could take place immediately after the sales person greets the customer. No, really I’m not kidding. If you sense there is bad chemistry between the customer and the sales person from jump street then do it right away before the deal gets all screwed up and you never have a chance for the sale. In Tommy’s little world the "TO" could occur from that moment up until the customer is "put out the door." (Getting a little old school talk here.)

So, let’s fast-forward to a "TO" being utilized to "close" the customer. Many dealerships operate on the theory of the sales manager going in to close the customer. Let me say this as nice as I can. As long as you continue to follow that practice you will never develop a strong sales force. You just won’t.

I’m sorry to report that the average sales person is lazy. (Don’t get testy, I said average.) As long as you keep closing their deals for them they will continue to let you do so, and all that does is make them weaker and in your mind makes you stronger. And of course in the dealer’s mind you are a strong sales manager because you close deals.  (Kind of like the Government giving handouts, the more they hand out the stronger the Government. Yikes, I don’t believe I stuck that in here.).

I believe the first "TO" should be handed to another sales person not the sales manager. Of course the manager makes that decision as to who, when and how. The manager decides who they are going to send in on the "TO" and that person is introduced as the Assistant Sales Manager.

If you’re a sales person, doesn’t it stand to reason that if you know you’re going to have to give up a half a deal that you are going to work that much harder to close the customer as opposed to running to the desk asking the manager to do your job for you? The more you do for them the more they want you to do for them. (More political message here.)

Sales people will never get any better at their job as long as you keep doing it for them. Is there still a time and place for the manager to go in on a "TO?" Of course there is, but the first point of attack should be to send another sales person in, not the manager.

If the manager is running around closing all the deals who’s running the desk and managing people and processes? Don’t take this to mean that the manager shouldn’t have good selling skills. They should, because they are always selling something, cars, concepts, ideas, processes, etc. just like I’m doing right now. I’m trying to sell you on my way of thinking. That’s all I’m gonna say.   Tommy Gibbs

That could mean a lot of things couldn’t it? It might mean we are half way through the year or it could mean you go about things in a half-way manner.

That doesn’t necessarily mean it’s you that’s approaching business half way, maybe it’s the organization that you work for. But either way you end up with half the results you could be getting.

We all have things that tend to drive us nuts and one of the things that drives me nuts is "lip service." I see it at all levels of business. I see managers who say they are "all in," and I see dealers who say yes, we do this and that everyday.

Just because you say you’re the Queen of England doesn’t make you the Queen of England. Saying something and doing something are two totally different things.

Regardless of how good you are or how disciplined you are, your processes always want to evaporate. When you have turnover in management they evaporate even faster. It’s not unusual for upper management to have blinders on and don’t want to acknowledge the obvious. To ignore the evaporation factor is like saying I still have checks so I must have money in the bank.

It takes a strong will to get up each day and look in the mirror and be honest with yourself. Most of the days when I look in the mirror I say, "you suck." I really do, because even as much as I apply myself and as hard as I think I might be working, I know I can always do more.

If looking in the mirror and telling yourself that you are "the greatest" works for you then I would suggest you keep doing it. But, really at some point you have to come to the realization that you are leaving a lot of "you" on the table. You have to realize you and your company have so much more potential than you are hitting.

Isn’t it fascinating that when a dealership gets taken over by new ownership that all of a sudden it rocks? Do you really think the new owners are all that much smarter than the previous one? Probably not, but what they were able to do was to view the landscape with a different set of new glasses as opposed to those old fogged up and dirty ones of the previous owner.

If you are like most people in business back in December you probably did one of three things:

1. Made some New Years Resolutions
2. Developed a Forecast for 2011
3. Put together an Action Plan.

Assuming you did one of those three, how about taking your list out and give it a serious review. How’s it shaping up? Was your list made up of "pie in the sky?" Was it based on fact or fiction? How much of your list have you actually accomplished?

Frequently when we have not achieved the results we were looking for we tend to want to blame someone or something for our lack of accomplishments. Always keep in mind that "if it is to be it is up to thee."

So, the Calendar says it’s June and that means we are half way there. The question I have for you is are you half way there or are you half way? That’s all I’m gonna say, Tommy Gibbs

I give a lot of thought to the information I share with dealers. One of the things I do in my workshop is I give dealers a lot of information fully realizing they can’t or won’t do it all.
 
Either my ego or my wisdom tells me that for each item they actually do (WITH CONSISTENCY) that their business will improve by at least 10%. So, if a dealer does 10 things I put on the table (WITH CONSISTENCY) then their business could actually double from their current production.
 
I’m going to share 10 relatively simple things I’ve picked from the many I present in my workshops for you to dwell on and for you to consider doing WITH CONSISTENCY.
 
Let’s pretend you are now selling 100 used cars a month. Doing all 10 suggested processes will get you to 200. If you’re not selling 100 just make the adjustment based on 10% for each process you are willing to commit to on a CONSISTENT basis. Here you go:
 
1. Study The Data– Be a student of the game. Use Auto Count’s Reports each month to confirm what’s selling and what’s not. Use vAuto’s stocking tool to determine the fastest moving units to stock. Combine those reports with Auto Trader’s reports and you will have a competitive edge. Make sure you keep these lists at the tower/desk so when one comes to the door to be appraised you step up and make a deal on a car that you are going to be able to retail in short order. The more units you step up on the more cars you sell at retail. =10 more units
 
2. Press Your Cost Down-This is probably the simplest and most effective thing you can do to improve your business. Know what your average cost per unit is every day and do what you can to reduce it. If you are at $15,000 today, do what you can to get it to $14,500 and so on.  There is no magical number. It’s about keeping the lesser expensive units and making sure the more expensive ones turn fast. =10 more units
 
3. Know Your ROI-Every deal should be tracked for ROI. As you are working a deal you not only need to know how much gross you have, but what the ROI is. Go to FixROI.com and plug in three numbers. Your cost, your gross, and the number of days the unit has been in stock. Bingo, you have your ROI. Shoot for 110 to 120 ROI. By knowing your ROI you will know what’s working and what’s not. =10 more units
 
4. Attack the 10 Most Expensive Units in Stock-Make a list each day of your 10 most expensive units in stock. With one exception make sure they are priced really, really right. The one exception is if you know you always make money on a unit that’s on the list then use some common sense, don’t give it away. Consider putting bonus money on those 10 units regardless of the number of days they have been in stock. Sooner rather than later. Most dealers bonus their sales staff when the units have aged. Do it early, you will be much better off. Lastly, make sure the service manager gets that list each day and if one of those units happens to be in the service department the service manager has to understand they must get it out of the shop in a hurry because it’s one of your 10 most expensive units. You have lots and lots at risk with these units.  =10 more units
 
5. Life Cycle Management-Read this statement then read it again. There is nothing, absolutely nothing you can do that will improve all aspects of your used car business more than understanding my process of "Life Cycle Management." Think Fast, Be Fast-You are working with a depreciating asset. Everything, including decisions on what to keep and not keep has to be done fast. Pull the trigger quickly on units that you are suspicious about. Don’t hang on to them hoping and wishing something good is going to happen. Early losses are far better than late losses. If you are paying attention and recognizing problem units early in the life cycle then you will have a lot less need to take units to the auction and lose money on them at 45 or 60 days. There are certain "Trigger Points" you need to focus on during your daily "Trade Walk." Knowing how to use EWR (Early Warning Radar) pays big dividends. =10 More Units (Probably even more)
 
6. Lot Walk-Nothing new here. If you do a lot walk once a week with all the members of your sales and management team then without a doubt you will sell more units. And, you’re going to see a lot of things you’re not going to like. Do you remember doing "Phone POPS?" You know, it’s the deal where they place mystery phone calls to your sales department then play the results back to you. They are never, never, never very good. Makes you just want to scream. So, initially you will have the same feeling when you do the lot walk. But, the bottom-line on the lot walk is it gets your entire team to know and understand your used car inventory. The more knowledge they have the more they sell. =10 more units
 
7. Daily Inventory Pricing-The market changes every day and so should your pricing. Sometimes you can ask more, sometimes you can ask less. You cannot and will not achieve maximum results by changing prices every 10 to 20 days. Pricing takes intense management. It’s not something you do when you get around to it. You would be far better off if someone priced the car who is not in charge of appraising and buying them. =10 more units
 
8. Analyze Your Wholesale Pieces-Look at the numbers. How many units are you wholesaling each month? Go over each unit. How many of them could you have retailed if you opened your mind a bit either relative to pricing and/or the type of product you’re willing to keep? Are there early wholesale units or late wholesale units? You need to know the difference between the two. If you have lots of units being wholesaled late (at the end of the cycle) the odds are you are either stocking the wrong stuff or pricing them wrong. If you are wholesaling a lot of units early in the cycle it’s probably because someone on your staff doesn’t want to "mess" with certain types of cars. The probability is there may be a problem getting them through service in a timely manner or the used car department feels ripped off by your service department. The good news in in either case it’s a fixable problem. You just have to want to fix it. =10 more units
 
9. Photo Booth-and 40 pictures per car. If there is one thing I would do if I opened a dealership today it would be to do whatever it takes to have a photo booth. If you haven’t accepted the fact that the Internet is your new showroom then you are doomed. You cannot and will not be able to remain competitive until you get with it. It’s the biggest no brainer since the invention of the wheel. =10 more units
 
10. SETS & SUBSETS-simply put, SETS is an easy way to set up a price leader with several other vehicles for the customer to pick from when they show up. SETS & SUBSETS are designed to drive traffic and increase volume. You can do as few as two cars in a SET, but never more than five. It’s not as complicated as it first appears. Don’t over think this. =10 more units
 
110%-Here it is. It’s called Save-a Deal-It’s the basic of all basics. From the first day I got in the business we did a save-a-deal meeting every morning. Back it those days we didn’t call it that. I learned that term back in the 80s from my good friend Mike Casey with JM&A. Call it whatever you want, but it’s an easy way to increase your business another 10%. Simply put, you go through all your pending deals and ups from previous days. You will always find that two heads, three heads, etc. are better than one.
 
Suppose I’m wrong? Maybe you won’t hit 110% increase in sales. Maybe you will only get half that? Not so bad! It takes 21 days to create a new habit. How many of these are you willing to focus on for the next 21 days? Today is day one. Go do it.
 
That’s all I’m going to say. Tommy Gibbs