Q auto, the standalone used-car program that Asbury Automotive Group launched in the spring of 2014, is still a work in progress and a learning experience — a “laboratory,” if you will. And one that the group thinks has some promise.

But 2016 is the year Asbury’s management hopes it turns a corner. The company aims for those stores to begin pulling a solid return on investment.  Asbury has three Q auto locations, each of which is in Florida (locations are in Brandon, Fort Myers and Jacksonville, respectively).

“Q auto lost two cents in this quarter. It had been losing somewhere in that one- to two-cent range, so we’re kind of right where we thought we’d be. I would say it continues to be something that we feel very good about,” Asbury chief executive officer Craig Monaghan said during the Q&A portion of Thursday’s earnings conference call.

“It is a laboratory,” he added. “And we shouldn’t kid ourselves. We continue to learn. We’ve been changing some of our marketing efforts with Q. We’ve co-branded one of the stores with the local, regional name. But I think we need some more time.

“I think this is the year for Q,” Monaghan said, “where our internal objective is to get it to the point where those stores are generating an attractive ROI.”

What may help on the ROI front is that there’s not a lot of capital “tied up” in the stores, particularly for the two smaller-format locations, according to Monaghan, who said Q is seeing an “interesting impact” from digital marketing.

One of the three Q auto stores, he said, has had a far stronger performance than the other two. Monaghan said the most challenges have actually come from the larger format store.

“But we think there’s still an opportunity there and it’s something we’re going to continue to pursue,” Monaghan said.

Another interesting nugget on Q auto from Thursday’s call: most of its sales are in the subprime credit tier.