Digital Dealer - March 2018 - 36

C O V E R S TO RY

Continued from pg. 35

is more than $69,000 a year. As an
industry - the nation's franchised
new-car dealers - we employ more
than one million Americans in
communities from coast to coast.
We have more than $200 billion
invested in our brick-and-mortar
storefronts. Obviously, I'm proud
to be part of this industry, because
I ran for chairman. I don't regret
being in the car business a day, not
one day.

I'D LIKE TO SHIFT TO THE
TOPIC OF TECHNOLOGY FOR
A MOMENT. AS THE FORMER
I.T. CHAIRMAN FOR NADA,
WHAT DO YOU SEE AS THE
MAJOR TECHNOLOGY ISSUES
FACING DEALERS?

I have to tell you the industry has
gotten pretty sophisticated over the
last few years. You have to remember, when I was starting we were
using a DOS in-house business
system. We had fax machines. We
had adding machines with tapes
and you had to crank them. Now
we can do a deal and scan it. The
convenience for the customer has
greatly improved.
A challenge we're going to have
with new vehicles is explaining the
technology to consumers at the
point of sale, because there's so
much sophistication in these cars
today that it can be daunting. Take,
for instance, my 91-year-old mother. Every time it's daylight savings
time and the clock changes, she
comes to the dealership so we can
change the clock in her car.
I use Microsoft Word, we
probably all use it. But I probably
know one-tenth of what Word can
actually do. That's kind of like the
vehicles today. People are unaware
of the many things a vehicle can do.
We're getting incredible feedback
about peoples' driving habits and
what kind of maintenance they
need and so on. I don't know if
those are challenges. I just think
there's a lot of opportunity out
there to become a better service
industry than we are.

MARCH 2018

WHAT SINGLE PIECE OF
TECHNOLOGY MAKES THE
GREATEST DIFFERENCE TO
YOUR DEALERSHIP?

The most valuable piece of technology in our dealership in the last
15 years is probably individual cell
phones - handheld mobile devices
that we use to stay in touch with
consumers. We're constantly communicating with our customers via
text, email and voice. That's a game
changer. In our service department,
as one example, we text our customers about the status of their car
throughout the day so they'll know
when it's ready. We text them when
it's done. That's very convenient.
Handheld mobile devices have been
the most innovative addition to our
process and to the industry.

COULD YOU DISCUSS YOUR
EXPERIENCES WITH DEALERSHIPS TOOLS, SUCH AS A
CRM OR DMS SOLUTION?

At Extreme Dodge, we've used a
PC-based system for more than 20
years, probably 30. Years ago, there
were two companies that dominated
the market. Dealers didn't have that
many options. Because we wanted
to plug-and-play with Microsoft
products, we decided we would use
an independent in-house solution.
That's why we picked PBS, a Canadian company, and we've been with
them for more than 20 years.
There are a lot of great PC-based
products out there right now. Then,
again, the two big traditional ones
are still out there and doing a great
job, too.
I've been in the business before
Silicon Valley started to make a
difference. The auto industry always
had a lot of money on the OEM side,
so dealers have always been on the
leading edge of technology. All the
processes are smoother, everything's sleeker, more user-friendly.
Everyone in our business, everyone,
is on the computer and sharing
data. Technology has provided a
great support system for us, for
what we do.

D I G I TA L D E A L E R . C O M

YOU'VE LED NADA'S REGULATORY AFFAIRS COMMITTEE, AND POSSESS GREAT
INSIGHTS INTO THE IMPACT
OF REGULATIONS ON OUR
INDUSTRY. ARE THERE ANY
SPECIAL REGULATORY OR
LEGISLATIVE MATTERS YOU
WISH TO PURSUE DURING
YOUR TENURE?

First of all, I would like to give a
shout out to the NADA staff over
the last half-dozen years. We had a
real issue with what we felt was unfair treatment by the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB).
In response, dealers mobilized with
their legislative representatives
and we pushed back successfully
against the CFPB's attempt to upend the entire auto-lending market.
We thought it was very unfair to
our customers. That became a huge
undertaking by NADA and all the
dealers across the country.
Just recently, under the Republicans' tax plan, the dealers fought
to maintain interest deductibility, which is a cornerstone of the
dealership business model. The
initial versions of the tax bill would
have severely limited our ability to
deduct interest expenses for floor
plan financing. When I look at our
financial statement, the No. 1 expense is always people. The second
one is advertising, typically. And
then it's interest, because we stock
such a huge selection for customers. If we couldn't deduct that, it
would have been terrible for our
business model. But we were successful in explaining to Congress
that losing the ability to deduct
floor plan interest would have had
widespread negative repercussions
throughout the industry, so it was
maintained.
Under the original tax plan, they
also wanted us to amortize our
advertising over 10 years. Can you
imagine that? It's 2018 and I advertised a 2008 Wrangler and I am just
now writing off that expense in the
Continued on pg. 38

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