CARY, N.C. -

This story appears in Auto Remarketing's upcoming Leading Dealer Groups issue. A sneak preview is available here to Cherokee Media Group Premium subscribers. 

When Asbury Automotive Group announced the launch of Clicklane in December, one of the tool's used-car applications was that the end-to-end digital car-buying platform could help the retailer expand its pre-owned operations to markets where it doesn’t already have a brick-and-mortar presence.

In a follow-up interview with Auto Remarketing in December, Asbury executives explained how that pre-owned play could happen.

First, the basics.

Clicklane, which Asbury said is an “evolution” of its PushStart tool, is a communications technology ecosystem that the retailer worked with Gubagoo to build, and it gives consumers “one platform for the entire life cycle of vehicle ownership,” as chief executive officer and president David Hult said in a news release at time of launch.

“Clicklane is the latest evolution in our omni-channel strategy that we began more than four years ago,” Hult said.

“The future of the automotive retail industry relies on innovation and our ability to meet consumers where they are — online,” Hult said. “With Clicklane, we have created one platform for the entire life cycle of vehicle ownership and found the solution to what has been a fragmented process.

“Others may have pioneered the online car-buying experience, but we believe that we have perfected it.”

Clicklane was piloted at one of Asbury’s dealerships in Florida. The retailer then brought it to several of its dealerships across the country, and aims to roll it out to all of its dealerships by the end of the first quarter.

Then next step would be for Clicklane to move into new markets where Asbury doesn’t have brick-and-mortar stores. The retailer would use the platform to sell used cars in those markets.

Asbury previously had a Q auto standalone used-car store program, but that was focused on brick-and-mortar locations, which is where the Clicklane would diverge.

“When we started Q auto, we got it profitable. But when we looked at it, and Carvana coming into the space and it becoming a digital world, the brick-and-mortar didn’t make sense to us,” Hult said during a Q&A portion of an online video presentation in December. “The engagement point was online, and our ability to offer a transparent experience in a full end-to-end solution was going to be the differentiator, that we believe.”

He added: “Years ago, we decided Q auto was profitable. There’s a large expense in doing this. What’s the benefit of the brick-and-mortar expense, when this is going to be an online transaction?”

Once it rolls Clicklane out to all of its stores, gets it working right and then begins taking it to markets where Asbury doesn’t have brick-and-mortar locations, what will the used-car process look like in those markets?

As far as branding consumers will see, that’s to be determined.

“When we enter a new market where we don't have brick-and-mortar, we don't know yet if we're going to use Clicklane or a different name. We will use Clicklane for the tool itself, but I don't know that we'll market the used car that way in a market,” Hult said in a follow-up interview in early December.

In terms of the types of markets Clicklane will expand to, Asbury will concentrate on densely populated areas to create efficiencies when it comes to delivery.

“We want to be really fast and efficient. And efficient means we can't be everything to all people. So, we need some scale. So, we'll focus on Phoenix and Las Vegas and maybe LA … certain markets that have dense population,” he said. “But we probably won't spend a lot of time on South Dakota, North Dakota or Montana, because it's very expensive to get the cars there and there's not a big pool to fish in, if you will.”

In describing the focused expansion, Hult gives the example of Las Vegas. The retailer would take a rifle approach, concentrating on the city itself, versus taking a shotgun approach and looking at all of Nevada.

“We’ll put a circle, a digital circle, around Vegas. We'll determine how we want to market,” Hult said. “We'll establish … a cheap parcel of land outside of the city limits to house vehicles. More of a hub and spoke concept. And we'll market the tool online.”

Hult added: “If you think about it now. If you're that consumer in Raleigh and you go online to buy a used car from Carvana, what does it look like? You go on their website, you pick out a car, you purchase the vehicle, you sign the paperwork and they ship it to you.

“And we're going to go with that same simple concept. The one differentiator we'll do in that example of Vegas, just to gain credibility in the marketplace, we will make it quite clear whether we use the Clicklane name or another name to market used cars in that market, it'll be very much disclosed that it's part of Asbury Automotive Group, a Fortune 500 company.”

That is designed to give the consumer confidence in the company, which would be new to the market and theoretically new to the consumer.  

There’s also the consideration on housing the inventory in those new markets. Hult gave this example.

“If we’re going to target Salt Lake City metro, Phoenix metro and Vegas metro, we'll have one chunk of land set up in a location that will be a distribution center for used cars,” he said. “So, we'll pre-stock and buy the inventory based upon what the analytics tell us about what's selling in those markets. When someone in those three cities buys a car, that car is coming from that one location going to those three different cities."

Many of the national, online used-car platforms like Carvana and Vroom have added reconditioning centers and established wholesale operations. Hult confirmed Asbury anticipates doing the same in regards to Clicklane expanding in pre-owned to new markets.

Asbury’s partnership with CarOffer

In other tech and used-car related news involving Asbury, teams from CarOffer and Asbury Automotive Group have collaborated to build a group trade platform that allows dealers within the same group to buy, sell and trade vehicles between one another, thereby tailoring inventory distribution to the specific needs of individual stores within the group.

CarOffer’s Group Trade platform gives dealers the ability to utilize the CarOffer Matrix platform and do so from a multi-store vantage point.

Asbury, which brought the idea of this platform to CarOffer seven months ago and worked with the company to develop it, will be among the first groups to enroll its dealerships in the platform.

“At Asbury, we’re committed to evolving the auto retail experience using the most innovative and performance-driven solutions available,” Hult said in a January news release.

“The CarOffer Group Trade platform streamlines vehicle sourcing and brings much-needed simplicity and optimization to the inventory process,” Hult said. “It allows our dealerships to keep inventory flowing seamlessly without raising their hand to bid on a vehicle or taking focus away from servicing our guests.”

The platform is designed to facilitate automated, real-time, in-group offers at the time of appraisal on all group inventory, CarOffer said. Groups can manage offers centrally or on a store level. Additionally, CarOffer will streamline logistics and inter-group bills of sale.

Beyond the dealership group aspect, if stores that are not in the same dealership group wish to utilize the platform for private trading among themselves – dealers in the same 20 Groups, for example – the Group Trade platform can be customized for that purpose.

In the release, CarOffer founder and CEO Bruce Thompson said: “We believe our new Group Trade platform is a break-through for the industry.

“We took the power of the Buying Matrix and dialed it in at the group level so that groups could maximize their buying power and optimize vehicle demand among store locations. It creates opportunities for profitability and scalability that have never been seen before, and we are thrilled that Asbury is leveraging this tool across their stores.”