The Federal Trade Commission seems to be cracking down on false or exaggerated advertising, as it recently called into question ads from a group of five dealerships around the country. And Tom Hudson, of Hudson Cook, believes other dealers should take heed. The FTC charged that the ads — which ran on the dealers’ websites, […] [Read More]

Though down more than 3 percentage points from an “exceptionally high” year-ago period, lease penetration rates remained steady in the near-20-percent range during February, thanks to relative stability in lease return volume and consistent incentives, according to J.D. Power and Associates. And while the fallout from the 2008 leasing drought influenced the market in February, […] [Read More]

Vincentric released its eighth annual Best Value in America awards Wednesday and highlighting the list of winners was Toyota, whose brands combined to take home 13 awards. The Toyota division was named the best value for passenger car brands, and the automaker’s three divisions were represented in 12 of the 39 individual vehicle awards. Four […] [Read More]

Having been captain of his college basketball team, General Motors’ Ed Peper is bringing the same mentality to his current position as general manger of GM fleet and commercial operations. Peper highlighted what’s in GM’s vehicle pipeline for commercial buyers, as well as how he plans to lead the automaker’s team to meet the demands […] [Read More]

Given that a white paper from DMEautomotive recently discovered that younger consumers are steering more and more to other sources for their service needs, dealers can likely find some solace in what a different study suggested about customer satisfaction with service facilities. Consumers turning to the dealer to take care of their service needs are […] [Read More]

Mercedes-Benz USA revealed Wednesday it has promoted one of its own to the newly created position of senior vice president of sales.  Tapped for the position is Michael Slagter, former vice president of sales for MBUSA. The promotion is effective immediately, and Slagter will report to MBUSA president and chief executive officer Steve Cannon.   [Read More]

Polk discovered on Wednesday that 2011 used commercial vehicle registrations reached a record level for a calendar year, ending up at 791,288 units. The total surpassed the previous record of 671,887 units registered in 2010, and the rise represented a 17.8-percent increase in year-over-year registrations. Polk’s analysis of new and used commercial vehicle registrations (GVW […] [Read More]

With speakers including Manheim’s Sandy Schwartz, Kia’s Tom Loveless, Asbury’s Ed Curry and DARCARs’ Tammy Darvish, auction executives have descended on Caesars Palace in Las Vegas today for the start of the National Auto Auction Association/CAR event, which also features a meeting of the International Automotive Remarketers Alliance. On Tuesday, a bit of business was […] [Read More]

On Tuesday evening, Manheim’s 24/7 Bid or Buy now wholesale vehicle marketplace OVE.com  held its third annual Otto Awards ceremony at the NAAA/CAR conference in Las Vegas , honoring five auctions with the accolades. “Named for the company’s ferret mascot, the Otto Awards are broken into five winning categories, each including one Manheim and one […] [Read More]

When last March’s Japanese earthquake and tsunami constrained the supply of new vehicles, wholesale channels stepped in again to fill the role dealers have come to expect. Leading wholesale analysts cheered the role auctions and other remarketing outlets played as the automotive industry recovered from a wide array of setbacks the horrific natural disaster caused. […] [Read More]