My Car Guru Podcast Oct 15, 2025

People are different....that's something I learned at a young age and it still gets me in trouble today

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21:28

Term

smart ignition

Smart ignition is a feature in some cars that lets the car know you're nearby because you have a special key fob with you. This means you can unlock and start the car without taking the key out of your pocket.

Car

Ford Expedition

The Ford Expedition is a large family vehicle that can hold a lot of people and their stuff. It's great for long drives and has lots of modern gadgets to make driving easier and safer. The 2025 version has some new features that make it even better than before.

Term

squared off steering wheel

A squared off steering wheel has flat sides instead of being completely round. Some people like it because it feels sportier, while others find it uncomfortable.

Term

SYNC

SYNC is a system in Ford cars that lets you control things like music and calls using your voice. It makes it easier to use your phone while driving.

Term

rear emergency braking

Rear emergency braking helps stop your car automatically if it senses something behind you when you're backing up. This can help avoid crashes.

Term

blind spot monitoring

Blind spot monitoring helps drivers see cars that are in areas they can't easily see. It warns you if there's a car in your blind spot, making it safer to change lanes.

Car

Ford F150

The Ford F-150 is a popular truck that many people use for carrying heavy loads or towing things. It's known for being tough and reliable.

Term

air pressure

Air pressure is how much air is in your car's tires. It's important to keep it at the right level so your tires work well and keep you safe on the road.

Term

nitrogen inflation

Nitrogen inflation means using nitrogen gas to fill your tires instead of regular air. It can help keep the tires inflated longer and may be better for the tires overall.

Term

VIN number

A VIN is like a social security number for cars. It's a special code that helps identify your vehicle and can tell you important details about it.

Term

trade cars

When you trade cars, you give your old car to the dealership and they give you money off the new car's price. It's a way to make buying a new car easier.

LIVE

Hey, folks, Lenny Lawson here, the car guru.

Occasionally, I do get in trouble because I see something behavior wise on another individual,

maybe going down the road or just see, well, let's just say how somebody looks and I'll

make a comment and she'll say, well, that's being judgmental.

She being my wife and I'll say, no, I'm just making an observation and then she always says

the same thing, PAD, people are different and she is 100% right.

My mom taught me that many years ago.

I had a bad reaction to the chicken pox when I was four and I fainted in the bathtub

and went under the water.

Well, my mom had left me for just a minute.

When she came in, there I am submerged.

Well, she reaches over, jerks me up out of the water and I was okay, but I was heartbeat

and all that stuff.

She called the ambulance, but I was still with her.

They rushed me to the hospital and I remember just bits and pieces of this.

They hooked up all these wires to my head and I remember that.

And I was in the hospital room and I had an African American nurse.

And quite frankly, I hadn't really been around black people that much in my youth.

One of my favorite shows was Amos and Andy, however.

And mom noticed me.

I was one of those kids that would just blurt out things, can you imagine?

And when I saw something, I called it out.

And so if mom saw somebody interesting coming down the street when I say

interesting, you know what I'm talking about.

And she felt like I was getting ready to unload a comment.

She would actually cross the street so that she could avoid the embarrassment.

Well, in the hospital room, you know, with this nurse going around checking

if she saw me, I was giving her the eyeball the whole time.

And finally one day I said, ma'am, she said, yes, son.

And I said, you are blacker than George Kingfish Stevens.

Now if you don't know who he was, he was on Amos and Andy.

And this is an innocent little child, so don't judge me in this regard.

But that's an example of me and of people being different and making observations.

I talk about observations a lot on this program about how people respond differently

to certain types of stimuli when they come into a car dealership or doing business

in general with anybody.

And it's the way they approach it that I try to help coach folks

into approaching it differently so that they can be more successful.

Another thing my mom did several years ago was she had a marketing company

where they would go into businesses and help them improve their customer service.

And one of the things that she always did, of course,

with the approval of management was to give the key employees personality profiles.

The ones that she used was by a company called Performax.

And so it would identify certain types of personalities.

I've got a little card that she would pass out showing all the different personalities.

Agent pattern is one of them.

Counselor pattern, a developer pattern.

When I flip over, I can find mine here.

Let's see, inspirational objective.

Yeah, I was actually in the inspirational or no, I was in the, here it is,

persuader pattern.

Let's see what that says.

Emotions, I trust others.

I'm enthusiastic.

Goal, authority and prestige, a variety of status symbols.

I don't know about that.

Judges others by their ability to verbalize and flexibility.

Influences others by a friendly manner and openness.

Bullseye, a value to the organization.

A seller, closer, delegates responsibility, poised and confident.

Okay, overuses.

This is what I overuse.

Enthusiasm, sometimes over sale.

That was a big problem when I was younger in my sales days and optimism.

Under pressure, I don't agree with this at all.

It says become soft and persuadable, organized when desires to look good.

Okay, I'm throwing this thing down.

That's not me.

Yeah, but it is interesting though when you take this, there's a sheet that you fill out

and it just has four different words and you have to describe the one that best fits you.

I think it has the best and then the least.

And you have to choose.

Been a long time since I took one.

And it's really a good exercise for any business to understand the personalities.

I can't tend to over talk in a meeting.

I got that from my dad.

Can be very opinionated and but I'm not easily offended.

I used to be a lot more easily offended.

My son had a problem with that when he was a service advisor for us.

He would just, somebody would get really difficult, which some people tend to do sometimes

when they go into a service department and they're, they're upset.

They've been there several times.

They tend to unleash occasionally.

Sometimes they absolutely go off like a bottle rocket and those are the people that end up

not getting what they want.

Hint, hint.

But my son had a big problem with that.

He'd get real defensive and, you know, try to defend the technicians.

You know, they would accuse him of doing things.

He said, well, I didn't do the work on the car.

You know, that's the guy back there.

Don't blame me.

See, you can't do that.

You have to take ownership of it and he struggled with that.

I did too early on, but I used to listen to Zig Ziglar a lot and he said that you get

what you want by helping other people get what they want.

And so what did I want?

You know, I wanted their business and I wanted to have run a profitable business.

But in order to get that I had to be nice even when they weren't.

And to fix it right the first time and do all the things that people need and deserve

so that they want to come back and do business with you again.

So if more people had that kind of attitude, it would be better, wouldn't it?

Wouldn't it be a better world?

So is that a gift?

Is that just a personality trait that you kind of roll into?

I did by necessity because I knew that eventually all these people in the dealership were

going to be working for me and I need to win their affections.

Not just their affections, but respect as well.

And that was tough.

You know, when you're the owner's son, you're going to be treated differently.

But thank goodness I had some people that, or my dad had some people that worked in

the dealership that were determined not to treat me differently, to treat me just

like everybody else, which was good, but you know, no special breaks or anything.

And that's important when you have kids working in your business.

Now I have two daughters, a son-in-law and my nephew, and they're all working here.

And lots of the time I'm just trying to stay out of their way so that they can make decisions

that I used to have to make.

And that includes some bad decisions because that's how you learn.

So I'm going to get out the personality profiles.

I have some left over from when mom was doing this probably 20, 25 years ago.

I don't think personalities and people have changed that much since then.

A lot of our habits have changed, you know, with the advent of cell phones and the internet

and all that stuff.

Yeah, these first personality profiles were done by her in our dealership back in the,

I'm going to say early 80s, maybe sometime during the 80s decade.

That's when I found out what my personality was.

And I'm just going to say that I have aged like fine wine.

You'll see.

I think I'll be back in just one minute.

Okay, let's talk a little bit about artificial intelligence and what it's going to be doing

for us in the not too distant future.

Recently, JD Power did a US tech experience index study.

And it dealt with a lot of different, well, thousands of different car owners and how

they felt about modern technology and vehicles and what AI is going to be able to do to, I

guess, improve the experience with some and eliminate the experience altogether for others.

They talked about something that's really popular with a lot of these folks and that's

smart ignition.

What is that?

Well, that's where the car knows that you're approaching it.

Because you have a key fob in your pocket that tells it that.

And it knows what you typically want when you get into your car.

And so as soon as you close the door, it has learned that you immediately start the car.

So why should you have to do anything?

The car should just start.

And that's what these automated systems do.

So, you know, I know it's a real strain.

I mean, we were used to have to turn a key, which took a lot of energy.

And then for goodness sake, we had to push a button.

Well, now you're not going to even have to do that.

This is coming.

Also smart climate control.

So the vehicle knows that when you get in the morning, you have typically set the

temperature at 68 degrees.

So it automatically does that.

And in the afternoon, maybe you change it, maybe make it a little cooler or a little

warmer or maybe on your ride home, you like to have your heated seats on.

So it memorizes all of this stuff and delivers it to you.

Now according to this survey, I don't know who these people are.

They sound a little overprivileged.

They say that tire, I'm sorry, drivers are tired of trying to manage in-car systems.

So they really don't want to have to do anything.

They just want to be able to think it.

I guess that's coming as well.

We might be plugging into our own cars, have some type of an implant in our brains.

But for now, the in-car systems are somewhat complicated.

I was pretty frustrated yesterday when I was driving my daughter's 2025 Ford

Expedition.

Not only because I don't really like the squared off steering wheel.

That's very weird.

It has mouse pads, basically, that you use with your thumbs on either side of the

steering wheel.

Don't like that.

And also all the different screens and how you change the screens.

I was struggling with that.

Even, of course, I was just sitting still in the car and I still couldn't figure

out how to get a map off of the screen that's right next to the gauges and

all that and then the screen that's on the infotainment system.

Both of them had maps on it.

I don't need two maps.

Just need one.

Couldn't figure out how to get it off.

So with AI, you'll be able to use a lot more voice commands.

So you turn off that upper screen and it goes off.

Instead of showing a map, show me what's playing on the radio and it will show that.

Is that something you want?

Would that make your life so much better to be able to just use voice commands?

You remember how bad they used to be?

I remember when Ford first came out with sync, S-Y-N-C and it was supposed to be the

end all and be all with voice activation.

So you had to push this little button.

It was a person's face with looks like sound waves coming out of their mouth.

And it said, say your command.

And I would say, turn on the air conditioning.

I'm sorry.

Could you repeat that?

I mean, I know I have a Tennessee accent.

But for goodness sake, turn on the air conditioning.

So I would want it to raise the temperature two degrees, drop the temperature,

turn on the radio.

It didn't understand hardly anything I was saying.

That's not the problem anymore because AI has really improved voice recognition.

And it's working in our cars today in things such as smart headlights,

the automatic door opening that I think I mentioned, ambient lighting.

And folks want features that will help them solve known issues,

like blind spot monitoring, rear emergency braking,

without forcing them to basically change how they drive.

Voice commands are fine if they work and if they work the first time.

I've got an AI company pursuing the dealership right now,

wanting to answer our telephone's force and direct phone calls.

And it's slick.

It really is.

I mean, it understands.

Well, I heard some demonstrations of people presenting different types

of issues to the AI bot or whatever you want to call it.

And it pretty much related to that real person as a real person.

I mean, the real person tried to throw some curveballs at it

and it still was able to handle it and end up making an appointment

and scheduling it in the dealership's operating system

and actually even scheduling a tech to actually do that work

when the vehicle arrived.

I mean, that's connecting the dots pretty good.

Does it eliminate manpower?

I don't know.

Maybe it does.

Maybe in the future it will.

Initially, no.

We always want to be able to rescue our customers

if they get caught in or lost in some type of a telephone tree.

Nothing can be more frustrating than that.

So we want to have access to a real person.

I mean, it's a real dilemma.

I know that you would rather talk to a real person.

Well, maybe you wouldn't.

Some of you that are younger, you're used to that kind of stuff.

You're online all the time

and you just don't like human interaction

unless it's absolutely necessary.

You might not.

But I like talking to a human.

But I tell you what, I want to talk to a human

who knows what they're talking about

who can actually get me what I want.

I mean, if I had to call into the dealership

and I wanted to order a bed cover for my F-150

that I just bought, and if there was a voice assistant AI

that could handle that transaction, I'd be fine with that.

I'm not real sure.

I want to give it my credit card number.

But I mean, is that more unsafe

than giving it to an individual that you don't know?

I don't know if it is.

I do use Amazon a lot.

Do you?

I probably use it.

Well, I don't use it as much as my wife does.

She uses it for a whole bunch of stuff.

But when I go into my Amazon Prime account

and I need to order a new American flag,

our American flag is 20 feet by 30 feet.

It's a biggin.

And when I first started buying them,

let's see, that was around 2011.

I was paying about $350 for a 20 by 30 flag.

Now it's $1,200.

Same flag.

Maybe not even as high quality

as the one I was buying back then.

And what Amazon does for me is all these different things

that I've bought.

So if I go in to order something,

it throws up a little reminder.

Hey, you bought an American flag six months ago.

You're ready for another one?

And I might be.

You know, those types of little reminders,

I don't resent those.

I don't mind them.

I get all kinds of reminders from the doctor's office.

All of those are automated.

So do you mind those?

I mean, I think they're handy.

Would you mind it if it came from your car dealer

reminding you to service your vehicle?

Have you checked your air pressures lately?

You know, the air pressure in your tires

is that's very important

because you will lose two pounds per month.

If you just have just normal breathable air in there,

if you put pure nitrogen in them,

you'll lose one pound a month.

If you lose five to six pounds,

your tires are gonna start wearing

but I've seen people come in with their cars.

They got half as much pressure in them

as they're supposed to.

And it's been months and they never checked

or they went to a quick loop place

and they didn't check their air pressures

when they were getting their oil change.

So it's been many miles, many moons

since they had their tire pressures checked.

And they wonder why the outside tread on their tires

is wearing on both sides.

And then they end up needing new tires prematurely.

Would you like those kind of reminders?

Let me know.

Four, two, three, five, five, two, 2020.

And if you want the My Car Guru Godbook

that will teach you pretty much everything

you need to know about buying, selling, trading.

Well, I mean, there's some other things.

I got some chapters I need to add on some mechanical stuff.

I had somebody tell me, get into more detail, Lenny.

I will.

If that's what you really want.

But the main thing I'm trying to teach you

how to do is save money.

Just simple things.

Negotiating, dealing with dishonest salespeople.

How to know.

How to read someone.

There's a few phrases that a dishonest salesperson will use.

Maybe even a dishonest service advisor.

You know, recommending all these different flushes.

Watch out for that.

Because that's a way to spend a bunch of money

you don't need to spend.

Okay, I'll take my last break

and I'll be back in one minute.

Yeah, to get the My Car Guru guidebook, it's simple.

Just send a text message to my cell phone, 423-552-2020.

It's the only cell phone I have.

And I need your email address.

And I will send you a PDF that is a digital file.

It's 32 pages long.

And it's great reading.

You just look at whatever circumstance

you happen to be going through right now.

If you're trying to buy a car, go to the buying a car section.

And it will guide you through all the different things

you need to watch out for.

If you're getting ready to take your car in for service,

certain things you need to look for, certain words.

Also, if you're having a problem

and you don't know how to get it handled,

you've been back to the shop two or three times

and it's still not fixed, what do you do?

It's in the My Car Guru guidebook.

And then if what you really need is not in there,

you've always got me.

So you can text me your concern.

You can text me your VIN number on your vehicle.

I'll tell you what it's worth.

That's pretty handy when you go into trade cars.

That's one of the things I always recommend you do

before you go into trade cars,

is let me make you an offer on your vehicle.

Or let me tell you what it's worth

and then I'll agree to buy it.

If you live close enough or if you live in California,

you can ship it to me.

But that phone number again, 423-552-2020

or my email address is Lenny, L-A-N-N-I-E, Lawson,

L-A-W-S-O-N, 2020, at gmail.com.

And I checked the other day,

I've got right at 500 episodes

of this particular podcast, 500,

covering everything that you can imagine

as far as your vehicle and your car life.

And so you can listen to them any time you want to

in full stereo, if you have a stereo.

And get the full richness of this voice

just by going to Apple Podcast or Google Podcast

or just Google the My Car Guru podcast

and it will come up.

Well, thanks for listening to this edition of My Car Guru

and I'll see you on the next one.

0:00

21:28

People are different....that's something I learned at a young age and it still gets me in trouble today

smart ignition

Ford Expedition

squared off steering wheel

SYNC

rear emergency braking

blind spot monitoring

Ford F150

air pressure

nitrogen inflation

VIN number

trade cars

About this episode

Original notes