AutoNation’s stockholders on April 18 elected Thomas Baltimore Jr. and Steven Gerard to the auto retailer’s board of directors. Since January 2017, Baltimore has been chairman, president and chief executive officer of Park Hotels & Resorts Inc., a lodging real estate investment trust. Gerard was chief executive officer of integrated business services and products provider CBIZ Inc. […] [Read More]

Sonic Automotive’s EchoPark program has turned a corner in a big way. The retailer’s line of standalone used-car stores is now profitable and should break $1 billion in revenues this year, Sonic said Thursday in reporting financial results for the first quarter. And the dealership group’s leadership believes its EchoPark operations will eventually outpace its […] [Read More]

PossibleNOW reinforced its compliance resources this week that could benefit the marketing efforts and dealerships and finance companies. The provider of Do Not Contact direct marketing compliance and enterprise consent and preference management solutions, announced the acquisition of the Professional Association of Customer Engagement’s (PACE) Regulatory Guide. The company highlighted the PACE Regulatory Guide is […] [Read More]

Faulkner Honda recently reached a settlement that includes restitution for consumers for what Pennsylvania attorney general Josh Shapiro described as deceptive and unfair sales of a “valueless” warranty product. According to a news release, an investigation by the attorney general’s Bureau of Consumer Protection revealed the dealership that’s a part of Paxton Associates deceptively marketed, […] [Read More]

Wholesale used-vehicle auction environments are often described as “organized chaos.” Hundreds of cars are moving through physical lanes in less than a minute with multiple lanes operating simultaneously. Auctioneers are engaging the energetic crowds while buyers are listening for prices, inspecting the vehicles and checking their phones or printouts for details. With all this activity […] [Read More]

Consumer-centric vehicle trade-in tools are fertile ground today for dealers’ competition for buyers. More sophisticated than ever, these tools offer more confidence, transparency and often a guarantee for consumers hoping a dealer will buy their car — and for dealers looking for the kind of trades (at the right price) for their used-car departments. Whether […] [Read More]

Floor plan financing tends to be a necessary cost of doing business for dealers in acquiring the inventory they need. But which vehicles dominate floor plan financing? New data from NextGear Capital, a Cox Automotive company, shows various trends, but one in particular stands out: Trucks and sedans remain extremely popular. “Our dealer clients clearly […] [Read More]

Liza Myers Borches, chief executive officer and president of Carter Myers Automotive in central Virginia, believes the way dealers wholesale used vehicles is “due for a change.” That’s why her 13-store dealership group turned to ACV Auctions — an app-based, digital dealer-to-dealer marketplace that allows a dealer to offer individual vehicles for sale in real-time, […] [Read More]

Despite the high average sale price of a late-model used Tesla Model S at $68,159, those vehicles sell faster than similar large luxury cars, with an average selling time of 35.5 days, according to a study from automotive research firm and car search engine, iSeeCars.com At the same time, however, among its comparable vehicles, the Model […] [Read More]

It’s a challenge for dealer groups: how to get the right trade-ins to the right rooftops at the right price. The Appraisal Lane says that when a customer with a trade-in is online or in the showroom, dealer groups can access the Enterprise Trade View product from the convenience of their mobile devices in real […] [Read More]