The Dealership Fixit Podcast

Randy Felice joins me as guest on this, his second episode of three to discuss why it's important for dealership owners and managers to ask for help. He describes his experiences starting in powersports and realizing he had a lack of actual management experience. He reached outside the industry and started his journey then in was probably a standard corporate America style management course. It started him on a journey where he hired a business coach and learned the importance of evaluating the state of a business as it is now, them creating the vision for where you want to take it. Sounds pretty logical but as you know, once you set foot inside a business all the best ideas can go right out the window without a plan and accountability in the way of, as Randy said a few times "how much and by when" He describes several places a typical dealership has business relationships with that can help get a dealership staff trained, including any manufacturers you are partnered with, insurance companies, OSHA and more. Pretty surprising, actually. There are some books he recommends as well as podcasts you may want to check out (wink wink) and he gives some examples from his years of involvement in a major powersports 20 group - including his feelings about the Spader Group and his Facilitator, Mark Sheffield.  Please share this podcast with everyone who should hear it. Feel free to contact me at: dealershipfixit@gmail.com The Dealership fiXit podcast exists to help dealerships plug into high performance ideas!

Wanted to share the obituary of my friend and Trader co-worker Patrick John Bridgford from Lodi, California.  You were a good man P-Town. Quick with a compliment and always found a way to uplift our team.  You will be missed my friend.  Godspeed.  A hui hou. https://www.legacy.com/obituaries/lodinews/obituary.aspx?n=patrick-john-bridgford&pid=193867385

How does a mission statement set the bar in your organization? You may want to have a look at yours and determine if it fits to get your vision implemented on a daily basis, to your customers, by your staff.    It was a pleasure tonight, getting the chance to talk shop with Randy Felice. His shop, A&S Motorcycles in Roseville, California is one I have been to although it was probably almost 10 years ago. Randy has many more years experience in this motorcycle business we love and I'm glad he let me pick his brain on the Dealership fiXit podcast. He is Dealer Principal of A&S Motorcycles, making him a BMW, Ducati and Triumph motorcycle factory authorized representative in his market. Interesting to me is that he is a DP that chooses to sit daily in the Sales Manager role within his organization. Why would he do that? It seems a less likely occurrence in the stores I have interacted with over the years. It would seem, he sees that role as a very important one in an owner's ability to engage with his customers, in a time when customer engagement is how you can aspire to providing the ultimate buying experience. We discuss in depth some checklists he has fine tuned (and continues to fine tune) as a way of minimizing likelihood of system breakdown and the fallout it can have when consumers expectations are at levels like never before. Randy says he is happy to share the checklists with dealers who are interested. Please email me at dealershipfixit@gmail.com to get you in contact.  A&S Motorcycles: Website: https://aspowersports.com/ If you get value from the podcast, please help me grow the audience by sharing an episode with someone you know should hear it. The Dealership fiXit podcast exists to help dealerships tap into high performance ideas!

Hey there - I am still alive! Seasonality got me... In the heat of a summer season in the powersports business, I put the podcast on the rear most burner for a month. Sorry about that!  But, as we know we experience some pretty strong seasonality in this business. It's September. My kids are just now back in school. The days are getting (noticeably) shorter. What changes are you making in your business? How are you preparing for Fall & Winter 2019? The year is 75% over according to the calendar so I wanted to get the pulse from you listeners on how your 2019 is looking and what you are planning for last quarter of 2019 and into 2020? (insert your 20/20 vision reference here! Lol). Thanks for missing me. I got a couple messages asking where the heck I was. I appreciate that. It means this little podcast and the thoughts we have in it mean something to some other people. I take that seriously. The podcast has now been moved from rear burner to front! And the bigger and better front burner - you know what I'm talking about!   Please share this podcast and please share with me, some ideas for future sessions or people you'd like to hear from.  More coming soon! Thanks for listening! The Dealership fiXit podcast exists to help dealerships tap into high performance ideas!

You may not know the DFW (Dallas/Ft Worth, Texas) area but it's a massively populated metro area surrounded by some sprawling suburbs, full of powersports riding Texans. Bobby Whitney has come to powersports within the last year, from 20 years in high line, high volume, luxury automotive business working with Sewell Auto Group. This is where Bobby learned Mr Sewell's "Customer For Life" philosophy (as the book by that same name expands upon). "Customers For Life" book by Carl Sewell: https://www.amazon.com/Customers-Life-One-Time-Lifetime-Customer/dp/0385504454/ref=sr_1_2?keywords=Customer+for+Life&qid=1564187839&s=gateway&sr=8-2 What you should be able to takeaway from learning about Bobby and his plans are that the days of powersports dealership staff that "sorta" care just enough to prop up a stool at a parts counter at fading fast. Bobby seems to have crystalized what I have preached for years, which is that each interaction deserves 1000% effort. I know 1000% isn't a thing but I'm being dramatic to illustrate the point that the 100% effort of old days is long gone. Time to reset that effort meter. Progressive Powersports is currently 2 locations in Granbury, Texas & Arlington, Texas but sounds like some more spots are coming soon. Keep an eye on them and please share this with anyone you know that needs to hear it. Check Progressive Powersports out here: https://www.progressivepowersports.com/ Thank you! Brian Dealership fiXit exists to help dealers tap into high performance ideas!

If you work in the F&I side of a powersports business, you'll want to listen to this episode. I got a few minutes of Tony Tarell's time to chat about his wizard-like products he provides to dealers to sell thru their F&I departments. I'm told it's a very profitable product for the Finance and Insurance staff to sell as well as a new product named Little Brother is also pretty trick for using in house and always knowing where you units are. Check them out here:  https://al3rtgps.com/ Here is an excerpt from their site on why dealers should know them and sell them... AL3RT GPS BENEFITS FOR DEALERS MAKE MORE MONEY WITH AL3RT GPS AL3RTGPS IS A STATE-OF-THE-ART GPS BASED SECURITY SYSTEM that is exclusively sold by dealerships in F&I and Parts. AL3RTGPS is a cutting-edge GPS location and personal security system that can be easily and quickly installed on every vehicle. With AL3RTGPS, your customers get multiple layers of security needed in today’s uncertain world. SELL YOUR CUSTOMERS PEACE OF MIND -Powerful theft recovery system - Easy to use and dealer platform - Small rugged device virtually indestructible and impervious to heat, water and vibration - Advance power management, won’t kill the battery DEALER BENEFITS -Easy to sell because AL3RTGPS offers great benefits to the end user - Make a great profit and give your customers peace of mind - Perimeter, low battery and speeding alerts - Monitor rentals and company vehicles - Easy to install (2 wires) and remove - Simple registration and bill of sale creation - Free Dealership use of lot management  Please share this with anyone you know in powersports. Thank you! Brian Dealership fiXit exists to help dealers tap into high performance Ideas!

Have you ever gone to a merchant and left, feeling underwhelmed? Yeah, I bet you have. Most likely today or within the last 24 hours you have had that experience. I just wanted to have a quick episode as a reminder that you, fellow Dealership fiXit, are empowered to be sure you are the Hugger! I like to imagine that each interaction with a fellow human being is an opportunity to embrace them (figuratively) and solve a problem they have arrived at your doorstep about. Are you front line in parts department, service department, sales, management or a dealership owner? Guess what? It's on all of you to be sure you are giving out hugs today. And tomorrow. And every time you unlock the doors, turn on the lights and invite the public into your building. I haven't ever and won't ever say it's easy to do this. But, if it was easy it wouldn't be so special. We all go around and interact with other businesses daily and see the gamut of examples in customer experience (good and bad). Please take this as your reminder that you need to think on, watch/listen and act on making your business the example in your corner of the world, in exceptional customer experience. Hug your customers! (figuratively - unless you have real hug waivers signed!) Thanks for listening and thanks for making right now, today the time you level up in this area. The Dealership fiXit podcast exists to help dealers tap into high performance ideas! Please share this with anyone you know that needs to hear it. #powersports #dealership #business #podcast #dealershipfixit #customerexperience #customerservice #freehugs

I read and discuss the blog post from Cycle Trader's Cycle Dealer Insider blog, which is directed at you the powersports dealership. My hopes are that I can get some dealers thinking about what they are and are not doing in regards to content marketing.  Wait, what is content marketing?  ;-) Listen and see... Link to the dealer facing blog post here: http://cycledealerinsider.blogspot.com/2019/07/whats-fuss-about-content-marketing.html Link to Cycle Dealer Insider main blog page: http://cycledealerinsider.blogspot.com/ To sign up to get emails when new blogs posted (at right side): https://blog.cycletrader.com/p/dealer.html In a contrast, you'll see we have a blog that is CONSUMER facing like this one here: https://blog.cycletrader.com/ Please share this podcast with your powersports dealership peers nationwide so we can continue to have the best and most comprehensive discussions about how dealerships can tap into high performance ideas and excel. Thank you!

Motorcycle sharing is rentals. Why would normal powersports dealerships be interested in understanding motorcycle "sharing" when they want to sell more motorcycles? I think they should learn about it as, like most other tools available to you - they are also available to your competitors. This is why I asked Austin to speak with me about what he is doing, so powersports dealerships can understand how the landscape is changing and the options of an UBER-esque population begin to hit where we live. Know the change so you can be decisive in how you deal with that change. That's my opinion anyway. Austin Rothbard is Founder and CEO at Twisted Road, a motorcycle sharing community that empowers riders (possibly future owners) to try different motorcycles where they live or while traveling elsewhere in the US. Like an AirBnB in homes or TURO in automobiles, TwistedRoad.com allows rental of others bikes or you can be the owner who lets others use your motorcycle when you aren't. A potentially nice financial offset to your ownership cost when you were going to have it sitting still anyway... Check them out here: https://www.twistedroad.com/ Austin admits that not everyone wants someone else to ride their motorcycle - and he says that's ok! He says the majority of people he has surveyed would like to rent someone else's motorcycle while the minority of people are initially interested in letting some "stranger" ride theirs. Sounds like sound logic to me. LOL. We are all likely to fear an unknown like this... I know I did.  Listeners to this podcast are likely to have in the past or do currently work in a powersports dealership, so the idea of getting (or letting) a potential buyer pay to try a motorcycle rather than just become an owner may have you feeling skeptical at first. Trust me, I am not an investor in his company and he has not paid me anything to speak on his behalf but I can tell you I see some reasons to be optimistic about this business model in relation to dealership business. Demo framework. Could dealers who shy away from doing motorcycle test rides be more confident in letting consumers demo their bikes? I'm talking a day or two day, get-to-know the bike. Do you think a consumer/renter would fall in love with a bike if given a bit more time to romance it? I think they might.  Austin and Twisted Road seem to have a framework that may let a dealership put a unit or some into rental listing, get paid for the "demo" while being covered by their insurance and then offer up an offsetting amount of the rental incurred, if the renter buys the bike. Sounds like a less commitment/more attractive rent to own program. A customer would start to have some skin in the game that way. And as he mentioned, the owner gets to determine if the renter is actually qualified to be on that bike, baed on their riding experience.  Parts and Accessory sales.  According to Austin, a renter would already be licensed and insured or they wouldn't be able to rent from Twisted Road. If the owner (a dealer) chooses, they could have a certain availability of gear or they could obviously just be there to sell the renter gear, if needed. Could be an opportunity at a bit of a captive audience in front of your well stocked accessory walls. If the shift to sharing model becomes more reality as some studies say it will be - are you, as a selling dealer prepared to stay in play with that consumer? It's my belief that the vast majority of the dealers I have worked with in my 20 years in powersports, nationwide, may not be. The understanding of this process as I've written above is just my opinion. I don't work for Twisted Road so please form your own opinion by checking them out. Here is the FAQ page for answers to some FAQs: https://www.twistedroad.com/faq

With an actual weekday off, this 5th of July, I took this time to chat with my buddy Joe Johnson about the motorcycle business. I love talking about ideas with folks looking to serve powersports folks and find new ways to do that. Joe and I get down a rabbit hole or two about our thoughts on serving powersports dealerships and how these dealerships can get more accomplished with less wasteful energy expended.  Some ways that reps like us can help our dealer clients be better:  Get nosey in their business.  Train to NOT Judge A Book By The Cover – Joe’s “Elvis Story”  Help in Differentiating – Reps can bring perspective in this.  Building Advocates and Evangelists.  Move From In A Rut – To A Place of Creativity for Growth.  “Here you go competition!” – Alpha Guy secret (LOL) The Strength of Looking Inside VS Outside your organization - in building Evangelists aka Influencers.  Entrust Your Staff To Gain Their Creativity Unlock.  The Idea Box to Grid Out/Plan New Idea Implementation (It isn’t what you’d think!) Barista style competitive tip jars approach.  Plug into Creativity. Embrace “Skippy level” ownership freedom from management to staff.  Dealership fiXit Episode 14 with Ryan McPherson here: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/need-insight-on-sort-pg-folks-you-should-hire-ryan/id1449367603?i=1000430366176 Keep the needed SOP but add perspective to know what needs changed, example thru communication with your outside vendor reps.  There are a couple books he recommends you pick up if you like some of the ideas he keeps as go-to for how to best serve “Thinkertoys” by Michael Michalko - http://creativethinking.net/#sthash.pss0C7YW.mWM32h10.dpbs “Steal Like an Artist” by Auston Kleon - https://austinkleon.com/steal/ Link up with Joe here: LinkedIn - https://www.linkedin.com/in/joe-johnson-78abb010/ Facebook – https://www.facebook.com/joseph.d.johnson.56 Facebook Page - https://www.facebook.com/Powersports-People-331038881155600/?__tn__=%2Cd%2CP-R&eid=ARACFgxZuh0ZFMPJAVwD927WexgAFgdJvqC0afZk9v1k2VhtdWC47KcnOcJJvsEadRsBCZg7Q0fCgEi3 The company Joe works for (as I’m sure you are aware of if you’ve worked in powersports industry for more than 5 minutes) - Tucker Powersports: https://www.tucker.com/ If you want to discuss anything talked about in this podcast or my others, please email me at: dealershipfixit@gmail.com Dealership fiXit is a podcast about sharing ways to make your dealership better. Basic premise is that you are the fiXit for your dealership.  I hope to offer fresh perspective thru interviews of others who have been where you are or offer a product or service to propel your results. Dealership fiXit exists to help dealerships tap into high performance ideas! Please share this with anyone that you think will get something out of it. Thank you!