Congratulations Paul!

The other day I heard some great news. One of the dealers in Chuck Bonanno’s Leedom Twenty Group had earned the title of 2010 NIADA Quality Dealer of the Year—Paul Claborn of Albertville, Ala.

I’ve always been a big proponent of this award as well as the NADA’s Time Dealer of the Year Award. I’ve urged the major auto retail vendors like the online automotive classified advertisers, the national auction chains, some of the big national finance companies, to promote the heck out of the national and state honorees. Many of the aforementioned companies do much to support our industry, but I’m a firm believer they should do more.

Some of these companies tout the fact that they get millions of consumers to visit their Web sites every day. Why not put these dealers on the home page of these Web sites, at least for one day? After all, these companies make a living from accepting hard-earned dealer advertising and marketing dollars.

Perhaps I’m a little naïve, but I think promoting retailers who have earned the respect and admiration of their peers as well as the communities in which they reside would be good for the industry and ultimately these vendors.

So while I wait for the NIADA Quality Dealer of the Year to one day be on the cover of a Wheaties box, I do what I can. I quickly prepared a press release, posted the information on my Facebook page, wrote about it on Twitter, shared the information with a variety of Web sites, and reposted what I found from other industry trade publications. So often, we hear negative stories about dealers in the media. Those who violate the many laws and regulations that govern our industry should and must be held accountable.

However, just for arguments sake, we say there are 14 million transactions that occur at independent dealerships each year, it works out to a hair over 38,350 transactions a day, 365 days a year. If you look at the data, there are maybe 50,000 complaints a year filed with the FTC and various consumer groups. That works out to about .0036% complaints, or roughly 3.5 complaints for every 1,000 used vehicle transactions. Not perfect, but not horrible by any stretch of the imagination and definitely not the evil being perpetrated on American society by a group of business people hell-bent on destroying the lives of average citizens many of these consumer groups would have you believe.

So I welcome this time of year when you can take a look at someone like Paul Claborn and the 20 other dealers who earned their state’s top honor as well, and congratulate them on a job well done! You can also point out to the people in these states and the nation that for every dealer like Claborn, who gives of himself, runs a clean, honest operation, employs some great people and pays his taxes, there are hundreds, thousands more just like him. They need repeat and referral business just like the grocery store or shoe store in town and will bend over backward to keep a customer happy and coming back.

So, take the time to go to our Web site and look up the article on Paul Claborn and post it on your Facebook page, put it up on Twitter, send it to your dealer friends who may not know. It’s up to you as dealers to promote yourselves and our industry, because over the years I’ve been preaching to vendors with the all those eyeballs they brag about, I’ve never once seen the NIADA or NADA Time Quality Dealer of the Year on their home page. If I’m wrong, please send me the link.

During the interview with Paul, he did mention something to me I thought was important, but I thought I’d keep for my column rather than the article I prepared on his honor.

Paul told me that he was in one of the education sessions during the NIADA convention, and was surprised by the number of basic business questions being asked by the dealers in attendance.

“There were 50 or so dealers in the room, and question after question were those that I knew the answers to as a result of my Leedom Twenty Group involvement,” Claborn said. “I’m not saying I’m smarter or that I know more, but I finally had to stand up and say, ‘Guys if you’re having trouble with some of these issues, you really ought to consider joining a Twenty Group.’ So much of this information comes almost effortlessly as you share your data, thoughts about the business and your best ideas. I felt like I had offered them good advice.”

Me too!