Greater Toronto Area dealerships and other service providers in the automotive industry have been honored with the Consumer Choice Award (CCA), an honor spanning three decades designed to go to businesses consumers rate highly.
Toronto consumers were asked about their opinions, perceptions and expectations of service providers based on their experiences during visits last year.
CCA said it gathers responses of thousands of consumers and businesses across the GTA and its surrounding areas.
“All winners have gone through a rigorous selection process conducted by a third party research firm to ensure only the most outstanding service providers are the winners within their respective industry,” CCA said in a news release.
The award also recognizes the quality service delivered by providers of the business solutions, construction, health and home and lifestyle industries.
“This is the only organization in North America to recognize business excellence by conducting third party market research of both the consumer & business community with statistical accuracy. The research method determines all the service providers, ultimately selects the top ranked companies and establishes the winner within each industry,” CCA added.
For more information about the awards methodology visit the CCA website.
Below is a list of the Consumer Choice Award winners in the Automotive and Transportation industry category.
Bell Auto Inc.
Bob Bannerman Chrysler Dodge Jeep
Birchmount Collision Inc.
Concord Trailer Rental
Don Valley North Toyota Scion
Hitch City
Lease Busters Inc.
Lexus of Oakville
Macgyver Autobody & Collision
Monster Plowing Company
Oil Changers
Ontario Truck Training Academy
Sunwing Airlines
The Brimell Group
Thorncrest Sherway Inc.
The Tire Butler
Town + Country BMW
ALG has named the winners of its 9th annual Canadian Residual Value Awards, where the Subaru and Land Rover were awarded honors for top Mainstream Brand and Premium Brand, respectively. ALG also named 27 vehicle segment winners.
Recipients were chosen from 2017 model-year vehicles that have are forecasted to offer superior value in their segments.
Mainstream-brand winners are those expected to retain the highest percentage of MSRP after four years, and premium-brand winners are those project to retain the most after three years.
“Residual values are a key indicator of the overall market success and health of a vehicle and brand,” Jim Nguyen, president of ALG said in a news release. “And with vehicle leasing on the rise, resale values have never been more important to both consumers and automakers.”
Subaru received the top mainstream brand award for the second year in a row.
The brand earned a total of four segment awards which include the Subaru Outback in the Midsize Utility – 2 Row segment.
“Consistent product execution and practical sales strategies have resulted in back-to-back Residual Value Award wins for Subaru among Mainstream Brands,” ALG said.
This is Land Rover’s third consecutive win. The top premium manufacturer, according to ALG, has been in high demand in both the new and used markets.
“Strong transaction prices on the new side enhances resale performance as consumers queue up for the sleek and modern new designs with the luxurious image that comes with it,” said ALG.
Additionally, among mainstream brands, Toyota earned six segment awards and Honda earned segment awards for four of its models.
Below is the full list of the 2017 Canadian RVA winners:
RVA Overall
Mainstream Brand: Subaru
Premium Brand: Land Rover
RVA Mainstream Segment
City Car: Nissan Micra
Subcompact Car: Honda Fit
Compact Car: Subaru Impreza
Midsize Car: Honda Accord
Fullsize Car: Nissan Maxima
Sports Car: Subaru WRX
Alt-Fuel Vehicle: Toyota Prius V
Minivan: Honda Odyssey
Subcompact Utility Vehicle: Subaru Crosstrek
Compact Utility Vehicle: Honda CR-V
Midsize Utility Vehicle – 2 Row: Subaru Outback
Midsize Utility Vehicle – 3 Row: Toyota Highlander
Fullsize Utility Vehicle: Toyota Sequoia
Off-Road Utility Vehicle: Toyota 4Runner
Midsize Pickup: Toyota Tacoma
Fullsize Pickup: Toyota Tundra
Midsize Commercial Van: Ford Transit Connect
Fullsize Commercial Van: Mercedes-Benz Sprinter
From dealers and entrepreneurs, to auction executives and auto lending professionals — and everywhere in between — the Canadian auto industry is full of young men and women who have achieved massive success at an early age.
That’s why for the third consecutive year, Auto Remarketing Canada is honoring “Remarketing’s Under 40.”
And we are now accepting nominations for this year’s awards.
If you know a deserving colleague in the remarketing space who deserves this recognition, simply fill out Remarketing’s Under 40 nomination form.
Potential honorees could include but are not limited to the following fields of the Canadian auto business that impact the remarketing segment: auto auctions, dealers, lenders, technology providers, vendors, trade associations, automakers, governmental agencies, and more.
The nomination period for the awards program opens today and will close Wednesday Feb. 22.
Nominations can be made here.
To be considered for the award, nominees must be under the age of 40 at time of nomination and currently work in the Canadian automotive business.
Those selected to receive the award will be recognized during a ceremony at the upcoming Auto Remarketing Canada Conference, in Toronto at the Westin Harbour Castle, scheduled for April 3-4.
Recipients will also be recognized in the March/April print edition of the Auto Remarketing Canada magazine, which is the on-site issue for the conference.
AR Canada’s editorial and conference teams will be following up with recipients regarding the print publication material and conference details.
On Tuesday, Mercedes-Benz Canada announced the recipients of its 2017 Star Dealer designation, the top ten performing dealers from its national dealer group.
The title recognizes the Mercedes-Benz dealerships who have excelled in the areas of new and pre-owned sales, service and parts during the year of 2016.
"Every dealership in our organization has worked extremely hard to help Mercedes-Benz Canada achieve our overall outstanding results in 2016, including being top luxury manufacturer for the third year in a row. There were however ten dealerships in particular that truly distinguished themselves and as such, we are delighted to award them the 2017 Star Dealer designation," Mercedes-Benz Canada president and chief executive officer Brian Fulton said in a news release.
"I congratulate them, but more importantly wish to thank them for their role in being the Best of the Best. Not surprisingly, this year we put a more elaborate focus on the Customer Satisfaction component and I am delighted to say that these ten dealers most definitely rose to the challenge."
The annual program was first incepted in 1999.
The award-winning 2017 dealers (from East to West) are as follows:
Peter Santos – Mercedes-Benz Peterborough (Peterborough, Ontario)
Van Malkhassian – Mercedes-Benz Midtown (Toronto) and Mercedes-Benz Markham (Markham, Ontario)
Thomas Hiscox – Mercedes-Benz Thornhill (Thornhill, Ontario)
Ken Szekely – Mercedes-Benz Burlington (Burlington, Ontario)
Sylvester Chuang – Mercedes-Benz Oakville (Oakville, Ontario)
Brian Lowes – Mercedes-Benz Winnipeg (Winnipeg)
Perry Itzcovitch and Steven Itzcovitch – Mercedes-Benz Downtown Calgary (Calgary)
Ajay Dilawri – Mercedes-Benz Langley (Langley, British Columbia)
George Taubenfligel – Mercedes-Benz Surrey (Surrey, British Columbia)
Toyota, Mazda and Ford were the top mainstream brands while BMW and Volvo took top luxury brand honors in Vincentric's fifth annual Best Value in Canada awards.
Honda also fared well, with four vehicles winning Vincentric awards.
At the manufacturer level, Toyota Motor Corp. led the way with eight winning vehicles, two of which came from its Lexus luxury brand. Ford’s F-Series pickups dominated the full-size pickup categories, taking home all three awards, while Mazda showed strength in the compact and subcompact segments.
“The data analyzed to determine our awards showed the broad range of high-value vehicles in the Canadian market,” Vincentric president David Wurster said in a news release. “When manufacturers measure and manage a vehicle’s total cost of ownership, they are able to consistently deliver high value to consumers.”
Using a statistical model and eight ownership cost factors, Vincentric identifies the winners by measuring which vehicles had lower-than-expected ownership costs given their market segment and price. Ownership costs measured were depreciation, fees and taxes, financing, fuel, insurance, maintenance, opportunity cost and repairs. Each vehicle was evaluated in all 10 provinces plus the Northwest Territories using a range of annual kilometer intervals and insurance profiles.
Additional information about the awards is available here.
This week, TRADER Corp. revealed the winner of its 2015 Driven to Perform Contest, which debuted for the first time early last year and aimed to recognize the top performing dealer in Canada.
The company selected the honoree based on key performance metrics using the vAuto inventory management solution, including turn rate, average days in inventory, cost to market and price to market.
Receiving the award was Craig Dunn Motor City from Portage LaPrairie, Manitoba.
“We are excited to announce Craig Dunn Motor City as the winner of the 2015 Driven to Perform Contest,” said Robert Rath, vice president of business development at TRADER.
“When we compared their performance prior to using vAuto to where they are today, it’s really quite impressive to see the growth transition and efficiencies the product has created,” Rath continued.
The store, part of the Murray Group of dealerships, has been a vAuto subscriber for more than years and is located 100 kilometers outside of Winnipeg.
“I was surprised by the results (of vAuto). It’s absolutely the only reason I can remain competitive outside of major metro (Winnipeg), especially in today’s economy where there may be less consumer demand,” said Tyler Dunn, sales manager of Craig Dunn Motor City.
TRADER explained the dealership recognized their biggest challenge prior to using vAuto was the high cost of advertising inventory to attract customers outside of its local market. The company indicated store managers knew they needed to find more efficient ways to attract these customers in order to decrease their average days in inventory and increase their turn rates.
TRADER reiterated vAuto is the only inventory management solution on the market that integrates live local market data powered by autoTRADER.ca. With more than 8,500 dealerships subscribing to vAuto in North America, the solution can offer unique tools to help dealers make better and faster sourcing, appraising and pricing decisions.
“We needed a way to attract customers without spending thousands of dollars marketing every single unit,” Dunn said. “vAuto helped us realize that the only way to do this was to not only source the right vehicles that are in demand in our market, but to find the perfect price to market those vehicles right off the bat, even if it meant pricing our inventory lower than market average.”
Dunn admitted that while it did take some time to get a buy in from his team, vAuto has made a huge impact on his dealership performance, bringing in more and more customers from surrounding areas.
“Since using vAuto, we’ve improved our volume and gross per unit every year, the sales guys are happy, the customers are happy, and we continue to sell more cars,” Dunn said.
TRADER recently kicked off the second annual Driven to Perform Contest and invited all qualified dealerships to participate. The winning dealership will receive its current vAuto subscription free for 2017.
For more information and to sign up, go to this website.
We gave a call for nominations for Remarketing’s Under 40, and were impressed by the number of submissions that came through. Our readers were intent to point out the best and brightest in the industry, and we thank you for your support and participation in honoring the following remarketing leaders.
The following group of 21 industry stars includes digital marketers, auction managers, dealers, sales professionals and more. Without all these players, the automotive remarketing industry wouldn’t have turned into the massive, successful market it is today.
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Ford Motor Co. of Canada is taking the time to honor its top-performing auction partners. The automaker recently announced the recipients of the 2015 Auction Quality Award and the 2015 Reconditioning Excellence Award.
The Auction Quality program is designed to assess and evaluate the service provided at each Ford sponsored auction facility. The program encourages the auctions to provide a high-level of service as it relates to the standards and metrics established by Ford of Canada. All ADESA Canada auction locations, as well as two Manheim Canada auctions (Manheim Toronto and Montreal) participated in the 2015 program.
The Ford Auction Quality Awards are given in recognition of the facilities’ outstanding contribution to auction quality excellence. Performance is measured by evaluating operational processes coupled with measuring satisfaction scores from Ford of Canada dealers across Canada.
Auctions are divided in two categories to compete for the Auction Quality and Reconditioning Excellence Awards. Group A includes larger auctions, while Group B includes smaller auctions that host Ford-sponsored sales.
Ford of Canada has compiled the results from 2015 and announced the below recipients of the 2015 Auction Quality Award and Reconditioning Excellence Award.
The 2015 Auction Quality Award winners are:
Group A: ADESA Montreal, with an overall score of 9.02 on a 10-point scale
Group B: ADESA Quebec City, with an overall score of 9.00 on a 10-point scale
Ford of Canada congratulated the leaders of the winning auctions on a fantastic year. ADESA Montreal is led by Simon Robitaille; ADESA Quebec City by Daniel Demers.
The recipient of the 2015 Reconditioning Excellence Award is the facility that achieved the highest satisfaction rating in the area of automobile reconditioning from Ford of Canada Dealers over the course of 2015.
The winner of the 2015 Reconditioning Excellence Award is:
ADESA Halifax, with an overall score of 5.00 on a 5-point scale
Ford of Canada recognized and further applauded the continued efforts of both ADESA Quebec City and ADESA Halifax by honouring them with their 2nd and 5th consecutive award wins, respectively.
“We thank our Ford Sponsored Auction partners, from both ADESA and Manheim, for their continued commitment of delivering exceptional services. Their contribution has been instrumental in ensuring that we continue to offer our customers an impressive selection of high quality, pre-owned vehicles,” concluded Doug Collis, Ford of Canada’s remarketing sales manager.
The Automobile Journalists Association of Canada, or AJAC, announced the nine best new car category honorees this past November, and the organization revealed the two final winners at the Canadian International AutoShow in Toronto late last week.
AJAC has named the Honda Civic the 2016 Canadian Car of the Year, while the Mazda CX-3 took home the award for 2016 Canadian Utility Vehicle of the Year.
The two models were category winners, as well: the Honda Civic in the Best New Small Car segment, and the Mazda CX-3 for the Best New SUV/CUV (under $35,000) category.
The nine “Best New” category winners were eligible for the two awards; Volkswagen and Mercedes-Benz were double winners, and other brands recognized included Chevrolet, Honda, Kia, Mazda and Volvo.
The popular Honda Civic took home top honors this year, and Jerry Chenkin, president of Honda Canada Inc., had this to say after hearing the news:
“On behalf of the thousands of Honda associated across the country including the more than 4,000 at our HCM facility who lead global production of the 10th generation Civic, I’d like to thank AJAC for this award,” he said. “The all-new Civic is the most innovative, ambitious and advanced iteration Honda has ever produced, setting a new benchmark in the compact car segment, and we’re both elated and humbled that AJAC has recognized this achievement.”
The new Mazda CX-3 was also honored at the AutoShow, earning recognition as the best new utility vehicle.
Vincent Reboul, director of marketing at Mazda Canada, said, “We are absolutely delighted that AJAC members have voted for the Mazda CX-3 as the Canadian Utility Vehicle of the Year. Being chosen over the very worthy competition we faced is a strong endorsement of everything the CX-3 brings to the table: show-stopping KODO design, excellent real-word fuel efficiency, thanks to SKYACTIV Technology, and all-weather capability with Mazda’s predictive i-ACTIV AWD system.”
AJAC will also announce the winners of its Canadian Green Car of the Year awards at the Vancouver International Auto Show in March.
Check out an earlier Auto Remarketing Canada story out for more on how AJAC chooses which vehicles to recognize as the best new models of the year.
Mobials, the software developer behind Reviewsii.com car dealer review website, and autoTRADER.ca, announced this week the winners of their 2016 Dealership of the Year Awards program.
To be considered, dealers must have demonstrated consistently high Reviewsii ratings for consumers satisfaction, that would have put them at the top of their class.
The Reviewsii rating is determined using an algorithm that factors the dealership’s average five-star consumer rating and the total number of reviews written about the dealership during the 2015 calendar year, the companies explained.
“On behalf of Mobials and autoTRADER.ca I want to congratulate the winners and finalists of the 2016 Dealership of the Year Awards. These dealerships are market leaders who recognize the benefit and power of online consumer reviews and the positive impact it can have on their business.” says Robert Rath, vice president of dealership products and business development at autoTRADER.ca.
The 2016 Dealership of the Year Award winners and Provincial Finalists are:
Franchise National Winner:
Boyer Chevrolet Lindsay
Independent National Winner:
Haldimand Motors
Franchise Provincial Finalists:
Alberta: Sherwood Honda
British Columbia: Coastline Mazda
Manitoba: Murray Chevrolet
New Brunswick: Moncton Honda
Nova Scotia: O’Regans Toyota Halifax
Ontario: Parkway Honda
Prince Edward Island: Experience Hyundai
Quebec: Elite Kia
Saskatchewan: Saskatoon Motor Products
Reviewsii is available to dealerships across Canada. Interested dealerships can sign up for free by visiting www.reviewsii.com.
