Ferman Automotive Group, an independently owned and operated group of franchise car dealers, serves the Tampa Bay area and Florida with 14 major automotive franchises, including Acura, BMW, Buick, Chevrolet, Chrysler, Dodge, Ford, GMC, Jeep, MINI, Mazda, Nissan, Ram Trucks and Volvo, as well as five Harley Davidson franchises. From its modest origins in 1895 as a bicycle company, Ferman today is a prominent player in the retail automotive industry. It is among the small, elite group of dealerships to receive the prestigious NADA Century Award, reserved for dealers who’ve been in the transportation business for over 100 years.
Our interview this month features Brad Wise, general manager at Ferman Chevrolet Mazda. Brad started in retail automotive in 1988 at a large Chevrolet store in Illinois and has never looked back. Now, thirty years later, he can’t wait to get into the store each morning. A seeker of best practices and a self-described cheerleader, Brad is a strong believer in hiring the right people and giving them whatever they need to succeed, whether it’s on-going training or a family-friendly work schedule. Please read to learn more about his plans, as well as what he considers to be the biggest hurdle facing the car business.
Dealer Magazine: Good afternoon, Brad, and thanks for agreeing to be interviewed. We usually start by asking for a brief history of our interview subject. With that in mind, please tell us how you got started in the car business.
Brad: It was 1988 and I was just out of college, living in Joilet, Illinois, in an apartment with somebody who worked in the parts department at a huge dealership in town, Bill Jacobs Chevrolet. My roommate thought I should talk with the store’s general sales manager because he and I had played baseball at the same college but at different times. That baseball connection paid off, and I was immediately hired. The general sales manager took me under his wing. I was there for 25 years and worked my way up from top salesperson to sales manager to general sales manager and, eventually, to general manager.
Dealer Magazine: What still interests or intrigues you most about the business?
Brad: The entrepreneurial and competitive aspects. It’s a great business for being creative and testing out ideas, and you get 100 percent of what you put into it. I describe myself as a passionate seeker of best practices. The trick, of course, is implementation. A lot of dealerships have the knowledge but fail to execute due to poor training or lack of a supportive culture. It’s not easy putting ideas in the field and then having the team execute those ideas. But it’s there for the taking: improving lead handling or the sales process or service retention. Maximizing these areas will show up in your financials.
Dealer Magazine: You’re working for a company that has deep retail automotive roots, dating back to 1895. Why do you think Ferman has survived and succeeded in such a competitive industry when so many other dealerships have faltered?
Brad: The Ferman family early on encouraged personal relationships with their teams. They truly treat us like family members. I’m new to the organization, but there are a lot of long-term employees who work hard and share the same sense of loyalty to the Ferman family. I think that’s rare in this industry. People ask me on social media for advice and I tell them they really need to get into a good store with a good culture. It makes a huge difference in your career.
Dealer Magazine: A business with such longevity must also have deep connections with its local community. Please tell us about the various charities or non-profits Ferman Chevrolet supports.
Brad: Mr. Ferman’s civic and community involvement includes past Chairman and Campaign Chairman of The United Way of Hillsborough County and past Director of the Community Foundation of Tampa Bay. He is past Chairman of the Greater Tampa Chamber of Commerce and its Committee of 100, past Chairman of The Tampa Museum of Art, past Chairman of The Florida Aquarium, and a past member of the Board of Directors of the Ocean Conservancy.
Mrs. Ferman, likewise, is involved with a number of Tampa organizations and philanthropies. She currently serves on the Board of Directors of Moffitt Cancer Center and is an active member of Hyde Park Methodist Church. She has served as Chair of the Board for United Way Suncoast and as President of Meals on Wheels, where she maintains a role as a route driver.
Dealer Magazine: Could you talk a bit about your management philosophy? For example, are you more of a hands-on or hands-off manager?
Brad: I would classify myself as a very hands-on cheerleader type. I enjoy being out in the front lines, mixing it up with the team, and believe my job is to observe a lot and manage by walking around. We have quite a few sayings here at the dealership. One is called “Nothing bad happens here.” I borrowed that from one of my trainers Mike Udell. Another saying from a culture standpoint is “What is true?” That means the team feels open to say something is not working or we should go in a different direction. Basically, what they’re saying is I’m wrong. I love it because I don’t want to hear what people think I want to hear, I want to hear about my blind spots. That pretty much sums up my philosophy: it’s centered around encouragement and building people up, not bringing them down.
Dealer Magazine: What do you look for when hiring new talent?
Brad: Desire is number one. It’s that feeling you get when you wake up before the alarm clock because you’re so excited to come to work. I feel that way still. Secondly, I also look for people who might have struggled in their background. A lot of gifts can come out of a struggle. Thirdly, how open-minded they are to learn and grow. Perhaps I’ll ask about the books they’ve read. I like to know if they think you can change by exposing yourself to something positive.
Dealer Magazine: Clearly, training is mission-critical for today’s dealerships. How does Ferman address training across its 13 stores?
Brad: We have a management company nearby that handles all our training every month. Additionally, we bring in outside trainers each quarter to address such topics as lead handling or used car management. I’ve sent many team members to Tony Robbins’ events, which is something I have personally benefited from as well. Truth is, we train every single day. For instance, we do motivational training on Tuesdays and CRM training on Wednesdays. Our Saturday meeting might be watching a video of someone who overcame a huge obstacle. Self-development is a huge part of our training. We want our people to be better people first.
Dealer Magazine: On a more personal note, what retail automotive training have you had, or would you recommend?
Brad: I started with Joe Verde training, and even today I believe in his three principles of what’s wrong with the car business: bad schedules, bad pay plans, and bad managers. That’s why I try to offer pay plans that work for different backgrounds. I encourage time off and flexible work schedules, including weekends off. We only hire people who are multipliers; we don’t hire diminishers here. We don’t want anyone who rules with an iron thumb, the kind of manager who tells people what to do instead of showing them. The bad schedule is really holding back the car retail business. Great talent leaves the car business every day. They might love the car business but can’t deal with working every weekend and every holiday for no guaranteed money. I think that’s the biggest stranglehold in the auto business, thinking there’s some honor in being open seventy hours a week or getting a zero paycheck.
Dealer Magazine: How important is digital to your marketing mix?
Brad: A large part of our budget is dedicated to all things digital. We use Cox Media for most of our digital initiatives. What I particularly like about this arrangement is that our Cox reps are interested in our overall success, not just what we’re doing in the digital realm. Truth is, it’s hard to understand everything digital. We have a third-party company that provides us with metrics to show which digital efforts are working best so we know we’re spending our marketing dollars wisely.
Dealer Magazine: What is your investment in social media and has it paid off?
Brad: This is an exciting subject for me and is probably my #1 initiative going into 2019. We do a lot of Facebook ads, and our sales reps are branding themselves over social media and we strongly encourage that. But this year I want to focus on referrals. We all know, referrals are easier to sell, easier to close, and generally more profitable than working with strangers who show up on the lot. Yet, we seem to spend most of our time trying to attract strangers. Here’s what I hope to do in 2019. When one of our guests takes delivery of their vehicle, we’ll give them a $500 referral coupon to share with family and friends. We’ll encourage them to post a photo of their vehicle and the coupon on their Facebook page. And we’ll pay them a referral fee for any sale we can track back to their post.
If the average Facebook user has over 300 friends, we can reach those people at zero cost. I think most people would give a shout-out to a friend who bought a new car and give him a thumbs-up. Basically, the guest would say I bought my car from these people and so should you, and here’s a $500 coupon for you to use. I’m very excited to see how this idea plays out.
Dealer Magazine: How do you leverage technology throughout your operation?
Brad: I consider call monitoring as an important technology for us. We use a call monitoring company called Call Review. That service not only gives us the ability to listen to a call, but it also gives us a written transcript of the call. The transcript is sent to managers as a text or email, who review it to make sure the BDC has offered the best solution. We can also follow up with a guest with a text message video. We have four people at the dealership who are designated as our video marketing specialists, and all they do is film content. We text message those videos to prospects. Those are just two examples of how we use technology: call monitoring and text message videos.
Dealer Magazine: Which DMS and CRM vendors, as well as third-party lead providers, do you use?
Brad: All our stores use DealerTrack for DMS and VIN Solutions for CRM. We’ve been pleased with both. For third party leads, we use many of the standard services: TrueCar, CarGurus, AutoTrader, Edmunds, Cars.com. It’s hard to know which service is delivering more or better leads than another. In my opinion, they’re no longer true lead providers but are influencers.
Dealer Magazine: Could you elaborate on this distinction?
Brad: Sure. Ask yourself, what is the journey that a prospect goes through when they start thinking about buying a car? They could make fifty different moves before buying, from googling local dealers to visiting Cars.com to looking at Edmunds for car reviews. Perhaps they missed their turn and had to make a U-turn, which is when they saw a jeep on special in front of your store and pulled right in. Or maybe a neighbor next door bought a car at your store and encouraged them to see you.
Dealer Magazine: In this case, how do you know which lead vendors to use?
Brad: Good question. Although there’s a certain amount of faith involved in using some lead providers, I’ve come to the conclusion you can test things. You’re not married to a lead provider forever. You can use a lead provider for three months, say, and see if you’ve noticed a bump in traffic or sales. I like to bring people in and ask questions and get answers I can sink my teeth into.
Dealer Magazine: In what ways does Ferman reach out to millennials?
Brad: First, we have something here that appeals specifically to millennials, and it also appeals to everyone. It’s our VIP appointment process. They get a tropical smoothie or a Starbucks coffee, their choice, upon arrival. We also send text message videos confirming the appointment. And we reduce chances of friction by making our price transparent.
Millennials aren’t using email. They might not even check their voicemail. So, texting is a big part of what we do, even in Service. With our service advisors at the beginning of the year, we talked about how texting between service advisors and the guests is the only way to communicate because of phone jam. Service advisors are the busiest people in a dealership. They’re not just sitting by the phone waiting for a call. It’s a topic we discuss all the time: service advisors deal one-on-one with guests and not through the BDC or a switchboard operator.
From the beginning, we let millennials know we’re serious about earning their business. If we agree on the numbers, there’s no reason we can’t proceed and do business. Millennials like things done fast, if you think about it. They’re used to buying online.
Dealer Magazine: As a dealership with more than one-hundred years under its belt, the Ferman automotive family has seen it all. What’s ahead for retail automotive in, say, the next five years?
Brad: Whatever happens, car dealers are resilient. Whatever you put in front of us, we’ll still find a way to be successful. I think GM’s stair-step programs, for instance, is a big game changer. Stair-step money used to be extra money – the cherry on top – but now it’s survival. We need that money to stay in business. So, I’m interested to see what changes will be made to stair-step programs and how dealers respond. I don’t think the autonomous car discussion is going to be relevant. I think we still need to do a lot of research on autonomous cars to see if the public really wants them. Certainly, the technology we are creating in pursuit of that mission is creating some really fabulous features.
I also don’t think electric cars will be as important to the economy as some think. If there’s not a charger at every corner like there is a gas station, people won’t be as interested in buying electric cars. I’m certainly pro-technology. I’m just not sure how long it’s going to take for consumers to get there.
Dealer Magazine: More specifically, what’s on the horizon for Ferman Chevrolet?
Brad: We’ve experienced a lot of growth recently, and we plan to take advantage of these extra units of operation. We’ll be focusing more on our Service department. We have a tremendous gross producing Fixed department, and really top-notch leaders and employees in that area.
I’ve been pondering the quote, “It’s Sales that sells the first car and Service that sells the rest.” If that’s really true, then we need to wrap our arms around our Fixed people who see our guests every day. We need to understand that when we get it right from a guest-service standpoint, we all reap the reward. So, I’m working on a way where service could share in any sales plateaus or objectives that we set forth because they play a big part in that.
Dealer Magazine: You will be presenting a breakout session with David Villa at the upcoming Digital Dealer conference in April. Why should dealers attend this session, and what can they expect to take away from it?
Brad: Our session will be focusing on what I call the lead we can’t see. The showroom has now become a fulfillment center. That’s because all the action now is happening behind the scenes online. Yet dealerships still have their top-line talent managers and high payroll employees overseeing the showroom, where not much is happening.
My talk will be about that paradigm shift. Why put your major talent on leads you can’t see? Granted, BDCs play a very important role in what we do. But they don’t have the problem-solving skills of an experienced sales manager. The BDC puts the ball on the tee and the sales team hits the ball. That’s why I want my most talented and most experienced, involved in the first couple of steps in the sale, online, and not at the end.
Again, I must give credit to Mike Udell. He opened my eyes to this, and we’ve been diligent on it this year. We talk about it constantly, and I’m expecting what my managers are doing behind the scenes is exactly what I just suggested.
Dealer Magazine: Thank you, Brad, for your insight and time. We look forward to seeing you at the conference!