Editor’s Note: This article was originally published in the November/December edition of Dealer magazine
The Dealer interview for this issue is with Hansel Auto Group and industry veteran David Long. With four decades of experience in the automotive industry, Long has built an impressive career in dealership operations, holding a multitude of leadership roles including general manager, vice president of operations, consultant, owner and operating partner. Long has helped to open 80 buy-centers in the United States and Brazil.
In August of 2019, Long was hired as executive general manager for Hansel Auto Group in Santa Rosa, CA. Before Hansel Auto Group, Long was the used vehicle director for the Del Grande Dealer Group and vice president of operations at The Niello Company. Outside of the dealership, Long is a skilled public speaker on subjects including training, leadership, and team development.
During our interview, Long discussed his first job in the industry, the importance of transparency with the customer, the impact artificial intelligence has across the dealership and what is the most important trait he looks for when hiring someone.
DEALER MAGAZINE: David, thanks for taking time out of your schedule for this interview. Can you tell your readers your background?
David Long: I have been in the industry for 40 years, including being the number one salesman for the number dealer in America. I then was an executive with AutoNation and, for many years, an executive general manager of multiple rooftops. From there, I bought my first dealership where I partnered with somebody on one of the largest Ford dealerships in the country. I owned that for about four years before selling and moving to northern California. Since then, I’ve been running dealer groups. I have been a husband of almost 30 years, a father of three, a grandfather of two and an avid coach of your sports.
DEALER MAGAZINE: What was the first job you had in the industry? And what did it teach you?
Long: I started in detailing and the detailer job taught me that I never in my lifetime would ever be tough on the detailer because it’s one of the hardest jobs in the whole dealership. It instilled in me discipline, respect, it taught me a lot of different things—the biggest that I never wanted to do detail (hahahahaha). That job was my entry, and I paid the price for admission. I was already dead set on wanting to be in sales because my family was in the auto business; my brother has owned for almost 50 years an independent dealership group in Cleveland so I was kind of walking in his footsteps early on.
Hansel Strength
DEALER MAGAZINE: What sets your dealership apart from others in your region?
Long: The way we treat each other and our customers. I know that sounds very corny but taking care of people drives us. They’re not just words on a wall, you can genuinely feel our employees care for our customers and for one another. I think that’s what sets us apart. Everything’s done by the books—there’s no gray area, it’s very open—the best word to use is transparency.
We emphasis the guest experience so the consumer doesn’t have to wonder what’s next. It’s very upfront, information-based, no hidden agendas—our goal is to keep it easy for the customer, which makes it easier for our employees. If you do it the right way the first time, then you do not have to backtrack and fix things.
DEALER MAGAZINE: What are the current strategic priorities for your dealership and how have they evolved in the past few years?
Long: Our strategy is all about acquisition, acquisition, acquisition. It’s the reason I believe Walmart, wins. I know when I’m on a shareholders call for CarMax or Carvana, the fundamental foundation of all of this success is their acquisition strategy. They don’t win because they have the most creative mousetrap, they win because they have the most consistent acquisition strategy, and they purchase what the market’s asking for. It’s really that simple
For us, acquisition doesn’t just mean user acquisition. We do our best to get right the new cars, the level of color we are acquiring. We are just not taking cars to have a number of cars on the ground; we take the right cars with the right demand, right scarcity, and the right margin. I think the better we get at this, the higher level of success we will have.
Getting a Hold of Inventory
DEALER MAGAZINE: Could you share some recent operational challenges the group has faced and how you’ve managed to overcome them, specifically EV, affordability and inventory?
Long: From an EV perspective, we have a really strong footprint on EV education. I think just to open up and hope people come in and buy them is not the right strategy. We are making sure our team members are completely comfortable in the EV world and language. As a matter of fact, a lot of times we have employees take the EVs for the night or the weekend so they can feel what it feels like to have charge anxiety, for example. It just makes it so much easier on the EV front if you can wear the shoes of an EV customer.
I think discipline is needed around inventory principles, having a 45-day supply of new vehicle by model line, and a 25-day supply of used vehicles by segment. One of the keys to our success is making sure we have the right balance. The segment of the market that is turning the fastest right now is the sub $20,000 price point. We focus our time on acquiring the fastest-turning segment.
DEALER MAGAZINE: Looking at the current trends, where do you see the biggest opportunities for growth in the automotive sector?
Long: Tying back into inventory, I think there is a margin erosion that comes from taking the wrong inventory to either please the manufacturer or stocking to a number versus a strategy. Margins have been compressed, if anybody takes a study which I’ve done with Cars.com and then with several of my partners, all the erosion and margins are coming from the wrong and aged inventory. So, if we can eliminate that and prevent cars from aging, our margins won’t be crushed.
Use of AI
DEALER MAGAZINE: How do you see digital transformation impacting your business, especially in sales and customer service? How do you use artificial intelligence at your dealership?
Long: We use ChatGPT on almost everything…it’s incredibly powerful. For somebody not using it today just means they’re not trying, it is used for everything we do. I go through my chats to see results every day. I’ll take comments from our employee culture surveys and I can match up through my AI to know exactly where our biggest areas of opportunity are, whether they be employee or customer satisfaction. I can also do that with inventory, I can do that with vehicle descriptions, which vehicles and what part of the description do people find to be most valuable. Then all my descriptions will be auto generated through AI based on what the market’s biggest demand.
All my customer profiles and their returns will tell me exactly where my biggest areas of opportunity are; same thing with my internal customers. The fact that we can do this all in one place helps the company prioritize are most impactful initiatives.
DEALER MAGAZINE: What are some of the technologies or innovations in automotive that excite you the most right now?
Long: Vehicle Acquisition Network (VAN) finds privates party vehicles that meet the marketplaces highest demand. VAN goes to the marketplace and contacts customers on our behalf on vehicles that we would like stock.
Bringing People Together
DEALER MAGAZINE: Can you share your approach to leadership and decision-making in such a dynamic industry?
Long: I’m a consensus leader. For me, that means I believe any decision we’re going to make, there has to be total buy in. I’m not a person that says, “here’s where we’re going, here’s what we’re doing, here’s how it’s going to get done.” I’m the person that says, “here’s the map, how do you want to get there” and then gets the buy in that comes with input from the stakeholders. The accountability piece is the reason we have such success.
DEALER MAGAZINE: How does the dealership support the professional development of its employees?
Long: We probably spend as much or more money than any of the other groups. For example, we have an organizational leadership coach that we fly in from South Carolina who spends a complete week at all the stores. We have masterminds for our sales, service and parts departments. We spend a significant amount of time developing our associates and our culture.
Additionally, we have a voicing the technician meeting facilitated by our organizational leadership coach. We take an approach like Noah did when he built the Ark: I try to take two people from each shop—a parts person, a service manager—and we get them all in the same room. Everybody gets a voice, and most times get a vote. Throughout all our shops, you can walk through and see on a whiteboard all their needs and wants so that when we meet, we are able to organize from most to least important. We have two learning management systems, Rev Dojo and Andy Elliott, that everybody has access to and then we train every week on.
Plus we have different speakers come in every Friday morning to train the team. And right now, we have several people going to NCM in Kansas City. In the event we purchase more stores, we want to be sure that we have a group of future leaders that will help us grow.
DEALER MAGAZINE: Can you talk about a mentor who has been critical in your career?
Long: I have a few but the one that stands out to me the most is John Malashenko, who was a CEO for Germain Automotive. Before he retired, we had a call every week for almost six years and he helped me more than any other person on the planet.
John really imparted on me structure and discipline. I’m not a fireman so I don’t run from crisis to crisis; there’s a rhyme and reason for everything we’re doing, a time and a place for everything. So his ability to make me see the importance of structure and discipline means I could create repeatable accuracy and momentum to keep the main thing the main thing; it was just life changing. You will notice that most people that don’t have structure and discipline are running from fire to fire resulting in their business is running them. John helped me formulate a plan so I can run my business versus my business running me.
I’ve had lot of people that have helped me like Dale Pollak, our organizational leadership coach, Chris Hunsicker, and many, many, many, people. But no one as much as John.
DEALER MAGAZINE: How do you mentor others?
Long: By drawing on my 40 years of challenges I have overcome, to help others learn from my experiences and missteps. For me, it’s about staying on message and making sure that I don’t confuse the message with too many agendas.
EQ Needed
DEALER MAGAZINE: What are the key qualities you look for when you hire leaders for your team?
Long: The number one thing is emotional intelligence (EQ). If they have a low EQ, I don’t really particularly care how smart they are— their IQ could be off the charts—but if their EQ is below average, they won’t even be considered. I’m looking for somebody that’s connected emotionally more than I am looking for intellect. You can tell EQ through subtle cues and questions when you first met a person—you can tell when somebody’s disingenuous and saying things that you know they don’t mean. I’ve never seen somebody with a high EQ that had a conversation that was disingenuous.
DEALER MAGAZINE: How do you prioritize community and philanthropic efforts?
Long: One of the rewarding parts of our business is to give back and we find it especially gratifying when we can make an impact in areas that need our resources the most, such as Canine Companions for Independence, Lilly’s Legacy, Salvation Army, United Way, Reach for Home, and several others. Our whole mission is to make the world a better place.
DEALER MAGAZINE: What is one thing you wish more people knew about the automotive industry today?
Long: If I could with a magic wand change that one thing it would be the perception of automotive. I’m an investor in a company called Automotive State of the Union and one of the main focuses is to help people understand all the good that’s happening inside of the automotive industry. One of our slogans is “Love people more than cars.” I wish the people knew exactly how much good dealers do in the world and the impact we have in making people’s lives better. When the general public talks about car dealers, they should realize the world is becoming a little better because of the philanthropic efforts of dealers.
DEALER MAGAZINE: What advice would you give those entering the business?
Long: That’s probably the simplest question you’ve asked. Because I have a training consulting business, I know that dabbler’s are never the ones that succeed. If someone doesn’t go all the way in and burn the boats, they really don’t have a chance to create something special in this industry.
