By Ben Gill

A Dealer recently shared a story on LinkedIn that stuck with me. A brand-new salesman, fresh from a manual labor job with a wife who just got laid off, received a commission check so meaningful it changed his life. It allowed his wife to stay home with their kids.

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That’s not just business. That’s what dealerships do. They uplift families, neighborhoods, and communities.

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They’re the backbone of local economies, employing over 2 million people in the U.S. They provide paychecks that build futures and create real opportunities, and they generate billions in local, state, and federal tax revenue every year.

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They sponsor Little League teams, fund local charities, and keep Main Street alive. When they thrive, communities thrive. When they struggle, the ripple effects hit everyone.

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Unfortunately, our industry has let them down.

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Dealers get cookie cutter, one-size-fits-all tech from OEMs (even though every dealership is vastly different) which slows them down and costs them sales.

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They toggle between five, six, sometimes seven different technology platforms multiple times a day just to sell a car - platforms that rarely integrate or talk to each other.

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They buy inventory from outdated channels that cost more money and time than they’re worth.

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They deal with vendors who focus on monthly recurring revenue instead of whether products work, or providing adequate support when they don’t.

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High level, there’s global competition breathing down their necks, too. Chinese automakers are rolling out state-of-the-art, brand new EVs for far less money than most used cars cost here in the States. I’m no alarmist, but the writing is on the wall. China is an existential threat - not in theory, but in the way they’re redefining pricing, speed, and quality at a scale we’ve never seen.

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Domestically, when it comes to building cars that Dealers are required to sell, we’ve all but ignored speed of innovation, quality, and most importantly, affordability.

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Today, new car prices have hit $49,000 on average. It’s going to cost you $30,500 to buy a three-year-old used car. And loan payments run about $745 a month for new/$521 a month for pre-owned. Many buyers have stretched their loan terms to 84-96 months just to make the math work for their families whose incomes haven’t kept up with ridiculously overinflated price tags. When cars get priced out of reach, Dealers feel it first.

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Change is way overdue.

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We need fearless leaders who put Dealer success before quarterly earnings.

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We need businesses that make quality and affordability non-negotiables.

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We need tech that empowers instead of burdens.

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We need true partners who answer the phone and fix problems, fast.

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We need to hold ourselves accountable to Dealers, and Dealers should hold themselves accountable to the experience they give their customers. Considering everything I mentioned above, that’s hard to do.

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Thinking about all of this makes me realize how proud I am of Advent.

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We built our company to help Dealers succeed. That’s our non-negotiable.

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We’re a family-owned business that understands family-owned businesses, like many dealerships across the country that have passed the torch through the generations.

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We’re 100% U.S.-based, with full onshore development and the best customer success team in the industry.

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Our Desking and F&I software is the best in the business, too. It’s accurate, fast, reliable, and intuitive. It works exactly the way Dealers need it to – the way they work every day – without requiring them to toggle back and forth from tech to tech.

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And our Remarketing+ platform gives Dealers the opportunity to buy high quality, late model used cars directly and easily from fleets, in a private channel that doesn’t include profit-gouging middlemen.

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For nearly 40 years, we’ve done things the right way. We’re not perfect, but we’ll always take the call, meet our customers across the table, shake their hands, stay true to our word, and work our tails off until we solve problems.

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To us, Dealers are more than clients. They’re true partners. They empower communities, give back to others, support their employees, and support us. The least we can do is give them the support they need, too.

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It’s high time our industry stops treating Dealers like an afterthought. They aren’t just part of the economy.

 

They’re the heartbeat.

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When they win, we all do.

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If you're a dealer looking for a true desking, F&I, and remarketing partner, I invite you to email me. I'd love to get to know you and your dealership better. Please feel free to reach out to me personally at beng@adventresources.com or by phone at (888) 923-8368. 

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I look forward to speaking with you.