Brian Dorsett, a former MLB catcher turned fourth-generation dealer group president, breaks down how he “calls the plays” across four rooftops to keep Dorsett Automotive profitable. The conversation covers cutting digital spend, owning local awareness with radio/TV “studio” frequency, and tightening used-car turn rules (including when to drop price). He also shares how they quantify ROI from reconditioning, use warranty/protection products, and manage inventory costs amid auction fee hikes and used shortages. Sports-themed marketing, EV/hybrid swings, and family culture round it out.
Today I'm joined by Brian Dorsett, President of Dorsett Automotive.
Brian breaks down why he is moving away from OEM-mandated digital spend, his "Big Stick" radio branding tactics, and the strict inventory rules required to survive in today's margin-compressed market.
We also discuss the "catcher's view" of leadership and the reality of managing sub-prime and prime brands under one campus.
This episode is brought to you by:
1. Lotlinx - Meet LotGPT, your AI Inventory Strategist built exclusively for car dealers. It reveals competitive insights, shopper behavior, and pricing dynamics, and even identifies underperforming VDPs with merchandising recommendations to boost conversion without cutting prices. Put LotGPT to work for your dealership today, totally free, @ here.
2. Experian - By combining precise audience targeting with deep automotive insights, you can identify high-intent buyers, re-engage existing customers, drive service retention, and grow both sales and revenue with less wasted spend. Visit @ here for more info.
3. CDG Recruiting – Hire top dealership talent, fast. From sales managers to GMs and C-suite execs, we’ve placed over 1,000 roles across auto retail. Ready to scale without the hassle? Visit @ here to get started.
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Topics:
02:10 Why A Catcher Sees The Game Better Than Everyone Else.
08:00 The Sophomore Year Goal Sheet That Predicted His Future.
14:25 Why A $595 Pack Saves Dealers From Bad Inventory Bets.
18:35 Why 75% Of Customers Buy Something Else.
32:15 The Unusual Radio Tactic That Cuts Through Digital Noise.
33:55 Why This Dealer Cut Digital Spend Without Regretting It.
39:45 The Brutal Reality Of Competing Against Tier Two Markets.
41:10 The Crazy Move To Buy An Aldi For A Used Car Building.
52:55 The Honest Truth About Aging That Bothered This Dealer Most.
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"So I mean, I spent a lot of time in the minor leagues as well. And, you know, I just love the game."
In baseball, the “minor leagues” are the lower-level pro leagues. It’s where players practice and improve before getting a chance to play in MLB.
“Minor leagues” are professional baseball leagues below Major League Baseball (MLB). Players often spend time there to develop skills and earn a call-up to the majors.
"And, you know, you're working your pension and, you know, all those good things that you try to do with longevity."
A pension is money you get in retirement after you’ve worked long enough and met the plan’s rules. The speaker is saying he was thinking ahead for retirement.
A pension is retirement income paid after a person completes qualifying work years or meets eligibility rules. The speaker mentions “working your pension” as part of planning for long-term financial security.
"He would go to the auction, just kind of see what the market was doing. But he had some select guys he would buy cars off of."
A car auction is like a bidding event for cars. Dealers go there to buy cars and see what prices are doing right now.
A car auction is where dealers (and sometimes the public) bid on vehicles. Dealers use auctions to source inventory and gauge current pricing trends in the market.
"...h, it's big with zero percent for 72 months on 25 outlanders. We had quite a few left."
The Mitsubishi Outlander is an SUV, which is a larger vehicle than a typical sedan. It’s designed to carry people and gear comfortably. In the podcast, it’s mentioned because the dealership had a financing deal with 0% interest for a long term and still had several in stock.
The Mitsubishi Outlander is a compact-to-midsize SUV meant for families and daily driving, typically with practical space and comfort. It’s discussed in dealership settings when there are strong financing offers that make it easier for customers to buy. Here, the podcast specifically mentions a promotion of “zero percent for 72 months” on Outlanders, and that the dealer had a number of them left in inventory.
"...Mitsubishi back in the day had a deal where anything you spent over $10,000, you would receive half back for advertising, which was phenomenal."
This is a marketing deal where the car company helps pay back part of what the dealership spends on advertising. It makes it cheaper for the dealer to run promotions.
“Anything you spent over $10,000, you would receive half back for advertising” describes a manufacturer co-op advertising program. Co-op (shared) advertising reduces the dealership’s marketing risk by reimbursing part of approved spend.
"This episode is brought to you by Lotlinks. What if you had a strategist that could actually look at your inventory,"
Lotlinks is named as the sponsor and presented as a tool that analyzes dealership inventory and pricing decisions. For listeners, this is a direct reference to a vendor/product aimed at improving retail automotive sales performance.
"So it analyzes your VIN level data and surfaces, which vehicles are at risk, where the opportunity is in your market and what actions you should take. VIN by VIN, no digging through reports, no guesswork."
VIN is like a car’s fingerprint. It’s a unique code for each vehicle, and software can use it to figure out what that specific car is and what’s happening with it.
VIN stands for Vehicle Identification Number, a unique 17-character code assigned to each vehicle. Dealership tools use VIN-level data to track specific cars’ history, specs, and status so dealers can target what to buy, price, or move next.
"We've got a hundred fifty thousand mile power train warranty for five years. I think it sounds realistic."
A powertrain warranty covers major components that make the car move—typically the engine, transmission, and drivetrain. Dealerships often sell extended versions of this coverage to reduce customer risk and increase dealership profit.
"Well, because you're with Nissan right now, we've got Sentra, which is a great car. [1124.9s] Good looking car."
The Nissan Sentra is a regular-sized, affordable car (a sedan). Dealers like it because it’s a common option for people who want something dependable without paying luxury-car prices.
The Nissan Sentra is a compact sedan positioned as an affordable, practical daily driver. In dealership conversations, it’s often discussed as a volume model that can be a good entry point for buyers who want a lower monthly payment.
"And they've even got a Versa, which is going away. [1134.0s] You know, it's not going to be more versus."
The Nissan Versa is one of Nissan’s cheaper cars. It’s usually for people who want to keep the cost low, and the speaker is saying Nissan is phasing it out.
The Nissan Versa is Nissan’s budget-friendly subcompact sedan, typically aimed at shoppers focused on the lowest price and easiest monthly payments. The speaker notes it’s “going away,” which reflects how automakers discontinue or replace models as product plans change.
"it's a price point car. [1138.1s] If somebody wants to get into a payment, it's a great payment range to get in."
A “payment range” is what the customer wants to pay each month. Dealers try to build the deal so the monthly number fits what the buyer thinks they can afford.
A “payment range” is the monthly payment target a shopper is trying to hit. Dealerships often structure offers (price, down payment, term length, and incentives) to bring the payment into the buyer’s comfort zone.
"We've kind of been the truck leader here in the Wabash Valley, even though we're not a GM, we're not a Ford."
GM is a big car company (General Motors). If a dealer isn’t a GM store, it means they don’t sell GM-branded vehicles, which changes what kinds of cars they stock and market.
GM (General Motors) is one of the largest U.S. automakers and a major dealer brand. When a dealership says it’s “not a GM,” it’s describing which manufacturer franchises it carries, which affects inventory and sales mix.
"...gh we're not a GM, we're not a Ford. We did have Dodge Ram for a couple of years and so, you know, it's diff..."
The Dodge Ram is a large pickup truck. People use trucks like this for towing, hauling, and work or family needs. The podcast mentions it because the dealership used to sell Ram trucks for a period of time.
The Dodge Ram is a full-size pickup truck used for hauling, towing, and everyday driving depending on the configuration. Dealerships often bring it up when discussing what brands they carry and how their inventory has changed over time. In the podcast, it’s referenced as a brand the dealership carried for a couple of years, with the speaker contrasting it against other brands they don’t sell.
"I think the consumer thinks it might be a better time to buy a used car. I think they're coming to that reservoir."
A used car is a car someone owned before you. Dealerships talk about it a lot because when new cars are hard to find or too expensive, more people shop used.
The term “used car” refers to pre-owned vehicles sold after their original purchase. In dealership discussions, it often comes up when shoppers delay buying new due to pricing, inventory, or incentives.
"...I don't think this is, you know, EVs are big in your market, but talking. I'm speaking with dealers who are, you know, heavy into EVs..."
EVs are cars that run on electricity from a battery, not gasoline. Dealers watch how many people want them because it affects inventory and sales.
EVs (electric vehicles) are battery-electric cars that run on electricity instead of gasoline. In dealership conversations, EV demand often moves with incentives, charging access, and consumer confidence about range and costs.
"...We're starting to see a pickup in it. Gas prices, you know, people are weirded out over..."
Gas prices strongly influence consumer behavior in auto sales, especially for fuel-cost-sensitive buyers and fleet operators. When gas prices rise, demand can shift toward hybrids and EVs; when they fall, some buyers may revert to gasoline vehicles.
"...We had a call today, a guy that owns some, you know, pizza franchises. He's got a group of his fleet is EV and then another group of his feet. Fleet are gas..."
A fleet is a group of vehicles owned by a business. Businesses may buy EVs for parts of their fleet if it makes financial and operational sense.
Fleet refers to businesses that operate multiple vehicles, often for delivery, service, or operations. Fleet buying can be a major driver for EV adoption because companies evaluate total cost of ownership, charging logistics, and uptime.
"...monetizing that or actually using that in digital for, you know, Facebook, TikTok, Instagram, to try to, you know, make it more organic on the lot..."
These are social media apps where dealerships can post videos and ads. The speaker is saying they use them to promote cars and deals.
These are major social media platforms used for automotive marketing. For dealerships, short-form video (especially on TikTok and Instagram) is often effective for showcasing inventory, walkarounds, and customer-facing promotions.
"This episode is brought to you by Experian Automotive. If you're an automotive marketing, you know how fast things change. Buyers move, vehicles turn over, and yesterday's data doesn't cut it."
Experian Automotive helps car dealers find people who are actively looking to buy. It uses data to help the dealer reach the right shoppers at the right time.
Experian Automotive is a data-and-marketing company used by dealerships to target shoppers. They use vehicle, consumer, and credit-related data to identify in-market buyers and improve timing and relevance of marketing.
"We had a Ford store in Marshall, Illinois, about 17 miles away for about five years."
Ford is the car brand. The speaker is talking about a Ford dealership nearby and how customers in that area interact with their store.
Ford is referenced as the brand of a dealership store in Marshall, Illinois. In dealer-group discussions, mentioning a specific OEM like Ford helps listeners understand which franchise network and marketing rules are in play.
"Um, like we had, we were with, we've been off and on with Cox, you know, auto trader, cars.com. [2123.3s] We’re now just mainly premier with, with car guru."
Cars.com is a website where dealerships post cars for sale. It’s one way dealers find customers who are already shopping online.
Cars.com is a major online marketplace where dealerships list vehicles to attract buyers. In dealership marketing, it’s often compared with other listing platforms based on cost per lead and conversion.
"A lot of guys are going, okay, we're at the expenses on car fax. [2163.2s] You know, you've got, you've got auto check."
Carfax is a report that tells you a car’s history. Dealers use it because buyers feel more confident when they can see that info.
Carfax is a vehicle history report service that compiles data like reported accidents, title events, and odometer readings. Dealerships often pay for Carfax to provide reports to buyers, which can improve trust and reduce objections.
"So when you're competing against them, if you're buying, you know, if you're buying Nissan, if you're buying Hyundai, you know, even, even though it's your name..."
Hyundai is a car brand. The point here is that different brands are all trying to attract the same customers in the same area.
Hyundai is another large automaker with a strong U.S. dealer presence. Mentioning Hyundai alongside Nissan highlights how multiple brands compete for the same local buyers and marketing attention.
"The television, you know, the OEM is with TV because we see a difference when they're all in on television..."
OEM just means the car company that makes the vehicles. When the OEM markets heavily, dealers often get more customers walking in.
OEM stands for Original Equipment Manufacturer—meaning the automaker itself (like Nissan or Hyundai), not the dealership. In marketing terms, OEMs run brand campaigns and influence how much demand dealers see in a market.
"I bought an Aldi franchise, which is right in the middle of Nissan and Hyundai and converted it into a used car building and admin."
Aldi is a grocery store chain. The speaker is saying they bought an Aldi location and turned it into a used-car dealership building.
Aldi is a discount grocery retailer, not an automaker. The speaker is using it as an example of repurposing a commercial property—buying an Aldi franchise location and converting it into a used-car building and admin space.
"I'm a big NASCAR guy. And I grew up in an episode with a NASCAR driver."
NASCAR is a big U.S. racing league for stock-car style race cars. People watch it for the racing and the strategy like pit stops.
NASCAR is a major American stock-car racing series where drivers race highly modified production-based cars on oval tracks. It’s known for close racing, pit strategy, and a strong fan culture.
"We've got a trailer that we own that we're affiliated with Chase Briscoe. Chase Briscoe was he's the top four guy last year in NASCAR."
Chase Briscoe is a NASCAR driver. The guest is saying they work with him and sponsor his racing efforts.
Chase Briscoe is a NASCAR driver, and the speaker says they’re affiliated with him through a trailer and sponsorship. NASCAR drivers often build brand partnerships that extend beyond the race car itself.
Why A Catcher Sees The Game Better Than Everyone Else.
The Sophomore Year Goal Sheet That Predicted His Future.
Why A $595 Pack Saves Dealers From Bad Inventory Bets.
Why 75% Of Customers Buy Something Else.
The Unusual Radio Tactic That Cuts Through Digital Noise.
Why This Dealer Cut Digital Spend Without Regretting It.
The Brutal Reality Of Competing Against Tier Two Markets.
The Crazy Move To Buy An Aldi For A Used Car Building.
The Honest Truth About Aging That Bothered This Dealer Most.
Select text to request an explanation
They're thinking to themselves, I'm going to spend, you know, I'm willing to come in and they think they want a $300 payment.
They leave with a five, you know, or they think they want a 500, they leave with a seven and just, you know,
we know 75% of the customers come in and change their vehicles.
A lot of times unused, they end up coming in for an SUV, they buy a truck or came in for a truck, they buy an SUV or buy a car.
Today, I'm joined by Brian Dorsett, president of Dorsett Auto Sales.
Brian breaks down how he uses his background as a major lead catcher to call the plays across his four rooftops.
He explains why he's cutting digital spend, how he owns his local market through creative branding and the exact inventory turn rules that keep a family-owned group profitable through four generations.
A big thank you to our sponsors for making this episode possible. Lotlinks, Experian and CDG Recruiting.
And now let's get into the show.
Brian Dorsett on the CDG podcast. Brian, welcome.
Oh, see, great to be with you. Legend in the podcast world, the car business.
So it's my honor.
What did I do to have the honor of having you on opening day?
Hey, man. Don't think I didn't notice that. Don't think I didn't notice that.
I love that. You see my shirt?
You like that?
My shirt's got a catchy mask, got the gloves, the bats. I'm celebrating it.
So, you know, baseball is my, it's probably my first love.
So I'm glad we had this chance to talk on opening day.
Yeah. When I looked at the date, I'm like, one second, Brian, former MLB catcher.
I think there's no way you're not going to a game today or doing something baseball related.
But hey, you're recording a car to subscribe podcast accounts.
No doubt. I'll be watching tonight on television.
You know, I was thinking of myself today.
I got to make more of a commitment to, you know, watching a little bit more baseball.
I love baseball and there's so much in the details.
And I've had NFL head coaches and coordinators, friends of mine,
that when they fell in love with the baseball, they've their baseball game.
They're like, man, B, I didn't realize there was that much strategy involved in baseball.
And that's the beautiful thing about being a catcher.
You see the game completely different than everybody else.
You're the only guy facing, you know, all the players and you see it from a different thing.
So I think for me, coming into the end of the game to
watch the last like seventh, eighth, ninth innings, you know,
one of my coaches back in the day when he was a great player was Bob Boone.
And Bob Boone told me, he says, you know what, people have no idea
just how hard it is to win one game in the major leagues, just to win a game
to take that team through all the things you have to deal with,
nine innings, all the circumstances, all the, you know, bad calls,
whatever happens to get your team through the game and manage it that way.
So I think that kind of helps me in what I do in this business.
I I've never played any competitive baseball, you know, played some pickup.
How do you I'm just I'm curious, how do you compare being a catcher, major leagues,
like any other sport you can compare to?
I compared to a quarterback in the NFL because the quarterback knows all the plays.
I mean, the coaches call him the plays most of the time.
He has a chance to audible, whereas, you know, and with the catcher,
you've got to know the, you know, you know, the scouting plan,
you know, you know, the way you're going to pitch guys, you know,
where your team is going to position the players on the field to play
based on how you're going to pitch the guy.
So, you know, you got to keep all those things in mind.
And when you see things changing and what changes is instead of a defense
coming at you, you've got a pitcher who may be struggling with this command.
He may not have those three pitches that day to go to or four.
He may only have one or two good ones.
And can you figure out how to win with just those two pitches?
So I think you're knowing your opponent is huge and making those changes
to put your team in the best position to possibly win that game.
I think, you know, it's similar from that standpoint.
They're all different.
I played sports where there was constant movement.
It wasn't that your entire fate was in one move
and making sure you nail that one move.
So it's I appreciate that.
You know, I wrestled, I played soccer, I played basketball.
You know, it's just constant movement.
Like you can make a mistake, but it doesn't, you know, you don't get a strike.
You don't get an out round.
So, yeah, well, we'll talk, you know, wrestlers and swimmers.
I think the two toughest sports to contend with because of what you have
to do with conditioning, you know, and, and, you know, the practices alone
and keeping your weight and all those things.
Yeah, we have a little bit of a lifestyle.
It's a little bit easier. Right.
You're right. It is.
You don't go and smoke a pack of cigarettes after after work to work out.
Hopefully not. No.
So I'll tell you one other funny thing about my job.
So when we send out our daily email, we have our, you know,
Cardio, some guy newsletter with thousands of subscribers.
And so I receive every response.
I just I never turn it off and I never intend on turning it off.
I love it. I get to see feedback, but I also receive every email responder.
And so it's funny because every morning, like I have a folder in my inbox
with all the responses and, you know, a big chunk are email responders,
but many are also real human responses.
And so one guy today, this is good.
He right. If you're looking for me today, I'll be out somewhere
between a Skyline Coney and a Homer ball.
So good luck getting me. I'm out. I was like, all right, all right.
I didn't know that dealers take off for opening day, but here we are.
Hey, you know, Skyline Chile, it sounds like to me, he's going to be a Cincinnati.
It's bingo. You got it.
Look at that. There you go. Good one.
Yeah. Well, it's an honor to have you on today.
You are third generation dealer.
I'm the third guy and I've got a son.
So it makes us a four generation dealership.
Amazing. So son's in the business.
Son's in the business.
Yep.
Tell us a little bit about, I think through context, people have already
picked up here, but you were a professional baseball player,
eight or nine years or so, I believe.
Well, I played almost 14 years, but I played parts of eight seasons in the major leagues.
So I came out of Indiana State University,
went to the Oakland days, finally got to the big leagues with the Cleveland Indians,
which are they're now the guardians played for the angels, the Yankees,
the Padres, Reds and Cubs in the big leagues.
So I mean, I spent a lot of time in the minor leagues as well.
And, you know, I just love the game.
I was able to, you know, get through raising a family and be able to stay in
baseball because once you get some major league time, even if you're in triple A,
you know, when I was under major league contracts, it made sense financially to stay in.
And then, of course, you're working your pension and, you know, all those good
things that you try to do with longevity.
So I, you know, that's I grew up in the car business and they use car business.
My grandfather started in 1958.
That's all I knew growing up, you know, how my dad
going down there, watching him do his thing, riding around, going to new car stores
when he would go out and try to buy inventory.
Because back then he could, you know, new car guys, a lot of new car guys were,
you know, wanting to move their inventory pretty quickly.
So he wasn't a big fan of going to the auctions.
He would go to the auction, just kind of see what the market was doing.
But he had some select guys he would buy cars off of.
So I would hang out with them and I developed this passion in my mind.
I'll never forget I wrote down when I was a sophomore in high school,
the basketball team I was playing on from the high school.
I don't know why I get to know the player.
We write things down.
We write our goals down.
And first goal was to be a major league baseball player.
Secondly, was to be a new car dealer.
And for some reason, it's just something I wanted to do.
But like we could take our family who I knew wanted to kind of treat it
like it was a new car store with the people, the way they treated people, my dad.
And hey, we ought to be in the new car business.
So that's when that was my goal.
So when I got out of baseball, went to work for my dad and he was
he even asked me, what are you doing here?
So I came to go to work.
Let's go.
And I was 1997.
And then I was, you know, after the races, learning buying cars all the time.
And I'd already been doing some of that in the off season for him and making some money.
But that's how it all started.
And then got into the new car business called the guy named Bob Lawhead.
Because, you know, you've got to have some new car experience
to get a new car franchise, 99 percent of the time.
But with Mitsubishi, Bob Lawhead, he knew that in order to make it work here
in Terre Haute, Indiana, and they he was great about calling me back
and I give him all the props.
He said, you got to be good with used cars.
So we opened up at our location up on Lafayette Avenue, which was a used car location.
He helped us find a location down south.
My wife and I bought the land, built the building and it became, you know, Mitsubishi.
We did really well with Mitsubishi, you know, since a standalone for,
you know, 12 years before we picked up Nissan and picked up on it.
Do you still own a Mitsubishi?
I still have a Mitsubishi.
We're still still battling.
Profitable, barely.
Yeah, it's one of those things that's very,
you know, like this month, it's big with zero percent for 72 months on 25 outlanders.
We had quite a few left.
We were thinking that Mitsubishi would come out earlier with zero for 72.
Didn't happen, but we're doing a good job.
We've only got two of those left.
I was on a couple of regional advisory boards and I brought it up on one of them.
I said with Hyundai and Nissan, I said, Mitsubishi back in the day had a deal
where anything you spent over $10,000, you would receive half back for advertising,
which was phenomenal.
And I was going to the auctions and I'd buy 15, 20 cars off lease cars
because I wanted to get the units and operation up.
We didn't have enough right here in Terre Haute.
So that's what we did.
We went bottom and we blew it up and that really worked for me.
Donnie Deutsch was doing a phenomenal job on marketing for Mitsubishi at the time.
They stood out amongst all of them.
I had other dealers telling me other manufacturers was like, man,
your commercials, Mitsubishi's commercials are amazing.
And we even got to the point probably early 2000.
We were selling 32 a month at a Diamond Chapter of Excellence Award.
We received that very first year offered.
We were way up in the rankings.
And I think, you know, we just believed in and treated it as a standalone and it worked.
They went through their problems.
Their zero, zero, zero was a big problem.
And we paid for that.
You know, and that's one of the reasons I went out and got Nissan and Hyundai
because I knew, you know, with them getting rid of some of their cars,
they no longer had them at the Montero, the Montero Sport, the Eclipse.
They didn't have they are they didn't have the Diamante.
I mean, they'll throw some, you know, some big meals, you know, so we'll diversify you.
This episode is brought to you by Lotlinks.
What if you had a strategist that could actually look at your inventory,
your pricing, your market and real shopper behavior
and then tell you exactly what to do next?
That's a lot.
GPT, it's the industry's first
AI powered inventory strategist built specifically for car dealers.
So it analyzes your VIN level data and surfaces, which vehicles are at risk,
where the opportunity is in your market and what actions you should take.
VIN by VIN, no digging through reports, no guesswork.
And the best part, it's free for dealers.
Just head to lotlinks.com slash lot GPT and request access or click the link
in the show notes below.
You have, you know, Mitsu, Hyundai, Nissan, right, right.
You have in there's no lifeboat coming to save you.
I mean, in this market, you have to lean hard on use.
You have some domestics as well.
Yeah, but you are.
I can only imagine you're not, you know, here with Toyota or anything, right.
So tell me and you mentioned is used as well.
What is your talk to me a little bit about your used car acquisition at your group?
Right. I want to get it to inventory management, understand how your framework for this.
Yeah. Well, my son's a tremendous job.
And he graduated from NCM, you know, with the school and got all that.
So he's obviously moving up in the dealership world for us.
And but he's been he loves these cars.
And that's where I was when I was a standalone guy.
I was always out buying even when I got Nissan and Hyundai.
I probably bought cars all the way through 2019, 2020, very active.
But now it's completely changed, you know, the auction fees are so expensive.
You're dealing with a lot of heavy, heavy fees.
You're buying a lot of guys are buying now online, looking at, you know,
making sure the CR is what it is and dealing with that and trying to find
some strategy around CR, trying to do as much as we can on the service drive
to try to, you know, do a good job of acquiring vehicles there.
We're doing a good job on buying cars off the street.
I think we're just the turn in the management
getting the cars through the service drive.
We spend a lot of money on a certified pre-owned vehicles.
It's a profit center for us.
You've got to be careful with that, too, because if you're spending a lot
of money and a lot of time on your used cars and service,
it does take away from the space in the base that could be there for customer pay.
Customer pay has got to get better, got to grow always.
And we work on that.
But there's a fine line, you know, your detail becomes a profit center
for your reconditioning.
So we do a really good job and we've had some phenomenal months
of, you know, used cars in the used car business.
It's been more of a challenge, I would say, in the last four or five months, for sure.
And I think there's a lot of reasons for that.
But I think for us, you know, most guys that are in the business right now
have to lean heavily on being profitable because I think the used car side
does open up a lot more profitability, especially at the back end.
You know, you're having high monies, you know, some guys have packs,
some guys don't, you know, all those theories.
And, you know, we've we've got a really good system.
Do you have a pack?
We do. Yep, we have a pack.
And we've got it.
We've got a setup we've got, which has helped us a lot
in terms of just allowing us to really be able to put some money back
in case we were right cars down.
What's the pack at your source?
Five ninety five.
And we've got we've also got a
we've got a four hundred dollar pack under just to use inventory pack
for write downs.
We've got some we've got some product that we sell,
which is, you know, going in for the front.
It makes a lot of money.
It makes a little bit of money.
Then, of course, my warranty company is making some money as well in our products.
We've got emboss, pulse and paint fabric.
You know, we've got those three.
But they've they've helped us.
People like it.
We've got a hundred fifty thousand mile power train warranty for five years.
I think it sounds realistic.
A lot of guys are doing two hundred.
Some guys are doing lifetime.
But, you know, we pump it that, you know, Dorset does more.
And we a lot of dealers don't talk about them around here.
Talk about their warranties on in media or even on the websites.
What do you think is really driving demand or like what's your how do you measure,
you know, the return you're offering, you sing, you're paying to offer that?
How do you measure the return on that investment?
Do you quantitatively measure?
Or is it just like a branding thing that you believe in?
Like, what's your what's your thought on that?
Well, we quantitatively measure, of course, our detail,
our reconditioning and and in service expense and in service gross and used.
I don't think it's as easy to quantify it on truly understand the ROI when,
in fact, you know, you've got if you're not moving your cars within at least
45 days, we know we quantify the fact that we know our grosses are a lot
less after 31 days. So we know that's a hit. We're taking that hit.
If we've kept the car that long, we're really adapting and kind of trying
to adopt to say, look, we got to move our cars faster.
We can't get caught.
We've got to make the whole store aware of it.
They've got to understand our processes, all the managers and and put the
others on them to move this car and understand we're going to drop the price.
Right now, you've got a little gross in the front.
And a lot of times, you know, we're moving up to, you know, 97%, 98%
you know, cost to market.
And that's a dangerous spot to be in sometimes when you're up there.
So we're we're trying to figure that out.
Now, a lot of times I've talked to more independent guys.
I feel like independent guys do a really good job of grossing on the front
because they're willing to keep a car 60, 90 days.
My theory on it and I believe that you can.
It's just the carrying costs on the cars that you don't own, that you're flooring.
You know, that's a that's a higher cost that you're paying with interest rates.
But I think those guys do a good job of carrying a car 60, 90 days
and not worrying about where their price they feel like somebody's going to find that car.
If it's got the look, if it's got the miles, if it's got, you know, all the features
and benefits that they're looking for and they keep it up there.
They really don't worry about chasing the Dale Pollock model.
I think, you know, you have a different buyer also.
I think a prime buyer in many cases is going to be, you know, a lot less
price sensitive, right?
They might be they're looking for credit.
And so I think at that case, yes, that I could see that making sense, right?
But I think for for the majority, that's probably not the case
because they have customers more price sensitive.
And Dick, you said you're not competitive after 30, 45 days in many cases,
unless you somehow stole the car or, you know, got a really good deal.
I think you're right.
I think it's also important that, you know, we send ourselves people to training
and they go through training and they have to, you know, meet certain standards.
But it's all experience.
If you're not getting experience, you're not getting swings
and you're not understanding and managers aren't really working with you
on a daily basis, then you may not be able to overcome objections.
Or overcome the fact that you really need to flip this guy to a new car.
You know, and I think that helps a lot.
Why do you say that?
Well, because you're with Nissan right now, we've got Sentra, which is a great car.
Good looking car.
It's not being heavily shopped, but it's a great car.
It's beautiful car.
And they've even got a Versa, which is going away.
You know, it's not going to be more versus.
But, you know, it's a price point car.
If somebody wants to get into a payment, it's a great payment range to get in.
They think they're thinking to themselves, I'm going to spend, you know,
I'm willing to come in and they think they want a three or a dollar payment.
They leave with a five, you know, or they think they want a five hundred.
They leave with a seven and just, you know, we know 75% of the customers
come in and change their vehicles.
A lot of times when used, they end up coming in for an SUV, they buy a truck
or came in for a truck, they buy an SUV or buy a car.
So I think it's really, I don't think it's an exact science.
I guess that's the hardest thing about it is to try to like figure out
for each customer, yeah, we find out what their credit is.
We find out where they are and where, you know, do they have equity?
Do they not have equity?
And we find out a lot of things, but it's not an exact science.
And I think we have got a little bit higher inventory costs than we want.
I think our average cost in inventory right now is around 24, $25,000.
It needs to be about 20 to $23,000, but we have a lot of heavy duty trucks.
Which excuse it, we have a lot of heavy duty trucks, you know, that allows us to,
you know, have a kind of a niche market there, have a lot of halftones.
We've kind of been the truck leader here in the Wabash Valley,
even though we're not a GM, we're not a Ford.
We did have Dodge Ram for a couple of years and so, you know, it's different now.
And I think we do sell a lot of those and people see that.
But and you also mentioned you mentioned Nissan a couple of minutes ago.
In your market, do you feel like Nissan is over dealer?
What's your, how's profitability for you there?
Well, we're sales efficient and profitability has been good.
And especially, I think the last four years ago was tremendous, right?
Three years ago was tremendous.
Now we're taking a bit of a hit, but we are, we've been profitable.
I think every month has been, you know, some months have been
more of a struggle than others last three or four months.
I think it's been pretty much a struggle.
We've been hitting our, we're sales efficient.
So we've been hitting our Nissan numbers.
Now, this month we're off, you know, March has been an odd month.
It's going to be hard for us to hit our number without putting a bunch of, you know,
SRC's or, you know,
Is this across when you say that across every brand or just Nissan?
I think across every brand for us, we've seen a little bit of a dip
from where past March, the past March has been, especially last year, year before.
We I'm seeing it really kind of come to us now.
The last part of this month, we've been having some good days.
But I think in general, it's been a little off.
I think the consumer thinks it might be a better time to buy a used car.
I think they're coming to that reservoir.
I could save money. I'm going to buy a new car. The pendulum swung again.
I think it has. I do. I think it's swinging again.
I think there's been a lack of new car inventory for a while in terms of
and then the incentives didn't match up.
You know, listen, Brian meant stock a lot.
He talks about, gosh, you guys, the manufacturers need to start making more
cars again, get them incentivized.
We need to start trading for cars.
You've got to start trading for these used cars because it's just not easy to find them.
There is a shortage. It's real.
You know, one of the things I was discussing the other day with a Hyundai dealer
is the fact that the return on sales of their Nissan store has eclipsed Hyundai.
Their Hyundai store has a lower return on sales from Nissan.
That wasn't the case beforehand.
Are you seeing something of that as well?
Are you seeing this in your little bit of that at times?
We've had a few months like that.
It's tricky right now. I mean, with all the movement and not to mention,
we haven't even spoken about and I don't think this is, you know,
EVs are big in your market, but talking.
I'm speaking with dealers who are, you know, heavy into EVs,
where they're telling me just in the last couple of weeks,
20 to 30 percent increase in sales.
I agree with that.
And yeah, do you see any of that on your end?
Even in our market, which is not a heavy EV market and it's not.
No, it's not a real prime market.
There's a lot of subprime.
There's prime, but there's a lot of subprime, a lot of subprime in the city.
The county is 100,000. The county is doing great.
We see more interest in EV and we've got the PHEV on with Mitsubishi.
We've got the Iodix, you know, the Iodix brand has been good for Hyundai for us.
Now, we've got a few too many right now, more than I want,
but we're starting to see it change a little bit.
We're starting to see a pickup in it.
Gas prices, you know, people are weirded out over.
We had a call today, a guy that owns some, you know, pizza franchises.
He's got a group of his fleet is EV and then another group of his feet.
Fleet are gas, you know, ice and he loves the Nissan product.
We sell him a lot of Esons and he's going to buy a pre-owned Nissan leaf off of us.
We showed him the new leaf.
I think he might get interested in that new leaf.
It's a beautiful car, but yeah, he's interested.
But we have seen this swing with Hyundai as of late.
I think Hyundai is trying to figure out how they can really make it work for the
dealers in all cases, because you've got these palace issues right now with the
recalls, the safety recall with the safety belt and the headrest on the pre-owned.
And now you've got the new problem with the couple, you know,
the calligraphy and the limits where you're, you know, stop sells.
So these stop sells pre-owned and new are not helping us, but we're certainly
trying to do our best.
They've got a great product.
The Tucson hybrid has been great for us to Santa Fe.
So we just, you know, a lot of hybrid hasn't really been where I thought it was
going to be.
I think they probably need to advertise that a little more.
And I think manufacturers kind of struggle in to figure out what it is.
I think they're struggling to figure out what moves the masses to get
interested in their cars.
Yeah, it's especially in today's market where everyone's crunched by affordability.
I, uh, I got to highlight this.
I, I love some of the creativity I see out there from dealers.
I was looking at some of your commercials, by the way.
So shout out.
I did my homework, but I saw one dealer do, uh, I forget what part of the
country it is, but they're, they're literally doing a pollen sale.
Now it's kind of tongue in cheek, but it's unbelievable because this thing
got 10 million views and you see this guy just walking outside.
All the cars are filled with pollen and he's just like laughing.
He's like, you know, wiping the pollen, whatever pollen sale, but this thing
got literally 10 million views.
I mean, the comments are on fire on Instagram.
I forget whatever dealership this is.
Hopefully someone reaches back out and reminds me the name because I didn't save
it.
The point I'm trying to make is, um, you mentioned moving units, right?
Like I love that type of creativity where there's always some way to lean
into some trend or some macro event, even in this case, right?
The spike in EVs.
I wrote, I wrote in, in circles and CDG circles the other day I said, in the
EV channel, we're talking about, Hey, how's, what's EV business like right now?
And like unequivocally every single dealer in that channel.
And of course it's somewhat biased to dealers who are EV centric because
they're in there, but they're all like, Hey, sales are up this much.
You know, then, you know, they're all sending me information.
I mean, it's just, it's, it's really impactful right now, um, just with gas
prices and you know, the dealers who are leaning into that and capitalizing on it.
Um, so it's happening out there.
And you know, I currently it doesn't look like it's stopping anytime soon.
No, I think you do have to do things that are unique, um, to catch the eye.
We've done a lot more social media, um, we're in terms of doing videos in house
and allowing that.
And then, and then obviously monetizing that or actually using that in digital
for, you know, Facebook, TikTok, Instagram, to try to, you know, make it more
organic on the lot, looking around, talking about cars and then, you know,
figure out what we have to do.
We've gotten a lot of people talk about those things.
Um, we have some commercials as of late, you know, we've been following
a sports theme as of late.
We did a Super Bowl spot.
We got a basketball spot going right now.
We're going to have a baseball spot coming up and we like to get creative with those
things, but I think you've got like right now, we're doing a 4,000 at the, for
the end of the month, we did a $4,000 over Kelly blue book.
Now we're doing $4,000, get $4,000 more for your trade and it's over Kelly blue book.
It's fair, you know, which puts you in line.
If you look at Kelly blue book fair, it puts you in line with, even if they
have a perfect car, you're basically buying that car at MMR, which MMR is
hiring now on a lot of stuff.
You know, MMR has got its own retail site.
Kelly's got its own retail site.
So we're trying to, you know, get in that game.
And what's funny about it though, as a dealer principal, when I'm walking
around the stores, I'll ask people, ask, ask for a say, I said, where are you from?
Okay, lady yesterday, I'm from Brazil.
You know, I said, well, how'd you find out about us?
What made you come in?
I love our commercial and the $4,000 over.
Uh, I was like, Oh, really?
That's great.
Thanks for the feedback.
And I, I showed her how we do it.
Hey, we're going to $4,000 more for your trade based off Kelly blue book fair value.
What we do is we go out, walk around your car.
We'll find out anything that's any paint, uh, issues, any tire issues, you know,
the wear and tear, find out about your service records.
We'll give you all that.
If you got a perfect car, we're going to take care of you.
And certainly we do.
And she loved it.
She thought that was great.
She bought it.
And, um, she bought a vehicle.
But yeah, it's, it's interesting what makes people really catch on.
What are they hearing?
You know, are they really the fact that's resonating with the right person?
Exactly.
Because, you know, I hear all kinds of advertisements, but only 2% of the
people in the population are even in the market.
So what are those 2% really wanting to do?
And then when you, you follow their path to, you know, how they got there,
some of them are like, you know, they're going to 200 or some places before
they even came there.
It's crazy.
And so if you've got somebody live in your, in your dealership, man, you better
take advantage of doing everything you can to make it right and treat them
really, really well, because they're here.
They're here to buy a car.
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They've already made the effort.
So with that said, how do you, like, what's your strategy for competing in
your market?
Or is it ever-changing, right?
Of course, you just mentioned your $4,000 campaign, which clearly worked with
this specific customer.
What is your strategy and how do you stay competitive?
I have to imagine you're very strategic about this.
You're a former MLB catcher, and it's all about, you know, matching up the
right person to the, you know, the right matchup.
So how do you think about that?
I think it's important that, you know, I still tell these sales guys, as much as
we spend on advertising, and I said, a lot of these people, they come back
because of you.
They sure they hear us, but you've got to make that, you've got to make that
connection, and you've got to stay in touch with your customers, and you've
got to let them know we appreciate them and what they're doing, see them in
service, make sure you update your CRMs.
The way we separate ourselves in the market with advertising, though, is we
have a couple of the big radio stations, the big stick radio stations.
We are the, um, um, do like Dorsetautomotive.com studios or Dorset
Nissan Studios, Dorset Hyundai Studios.
And what do you mean by that?
What's that?
What do you mean by studios?
Well, like for instance, every, every time within the hour, they'll come
on and they, they announced themselves, did ETHI, High 99, Dorsetautomotive
Studios, you know, we're just getting their shape with the studios.
And then we get a 10, we've got a 10 second spot every hour.
And on two of these stations, we get 10 second spots.
So what I do is I take seven to 10, sometimes as many as 13 and rotate those
10s, uh, what I'm saying on those, those big stations, every, like I said,
every, every hour for 10 second spots, then I've got my 30s and my 60s
running there.
So in their different, they, they're a variation.
I try to get reaching frequency.
I don't try to get too many of the 30s or 60s, you know, that are different.
I try to, you know, max it out, try to figure it out.
Mostly it's a use car message.
My 10 second spots are mostly new car message.
And then we got television that mirrors what I'm doing on radio, but just visually.
So we're on the, we're on the two television stations.
There's two here and they both are like ABC, NBC, and then Fox and CBS is the other one.
So we kind of blow it up.
We do a lot of four second IDs, five second IDs, just to get the name out.
Hopefully they think about us.
Yeah, we hear you all the time, you know, and we at least want to look at your inventory.
Brian, what are you betting on when you're running these spots?
Like, where are you betting on getting the eyeballs and attention of that potential customer?
Is it like a doctor's office anywhere?
Or like, what's what's the bet you're making given?
And I ask that given, of course, the increasing every single year, there's more hours being
spent on social media on our phones.
So what's what's your bet here?
My bet is that they're going to hear us.
We're going, we're going out 40 miles.
So we have a 40 mile, we're on the border of Illinois.
We get a lot of Illinois customers coming over here.
For whatever reason, it's just, it seems to work.
We had a Ford store in Marshall, Illinois, about 17 miles away for about five years.
They know we got the new car franchises, you know, and I feel like they're going to
get at least give us a look digitally.
We've gone through the eyes and lows.
Just, you know, when you get into these in the OEMs right now are telling you, you've
got to, in order to get certain credits for, you know, advertising credits, you've got
to be with certain digital providers.
And it's almost like they're forcing you to be in certain, you know, with certain
providers and they're very contentious point.
It's a very contentious point.
It's the ours.
Absolutely.
And then you're spending all this money to try to chase and the people that you're
going in with sometimes really don't have your best.
They're really looking out for your best interest a lot of times.
So what I've done is try to, I've tried to figure it out.
Okay, let's find some digital experts to help me understand.
So I've cut back my digital budget and I don't think it's hurtless at all.
I think, wait, what did you buy back specifically there?
What did you cut back?
I just cut back search a little more, you know, within trying to go.
We're still doing search.
We definitely do a Pmax shopping.
We're spending that money there hoping that organic is going to take care of itself.
But sometimes, you know, and you use great technology, you can see where the market's
doing, you know, I advocate for getting with somebody that can at least tell you
what's selling in your market.
Every week you can see what's going out, what's selling, what's hot, those price
points, but for us, we know that, you know, we get 20% of our spend is actually
working on search some days or some weeks.
We might pump it up a little bit, try to get 30, 40% for the end of the month and
just see if it works.
It's not magic.
You're not for sure if it is going to work.
You know, the shopping's got to look good.
Your car's got to look good.
If they're going to shop you, you know, you've got to make sure your pictures
look good.
Everything's up to date.
It's a challenge.
I mean, it's a grind.
The car.
I have to imagine, though, given your, your heavy unused, you probably lean into
the endemics, the third party listing sites pretty heavily.
Is that we are really mainly car guru.
You know, we found that we didn't see a big shift.
Um, like we had, we were with, we've been off and on with Cox, you know,
auto trader, cars.com.
Um, we're now just mainly premier with, with car guru.
We can, we can at least identify there a little more where we're, where we're
getting our action.
Um, I think it's been working.
Okay.
You know, I'm not saying it's great, but I think it's okay.
Everybody would like to tell you that, you know, need third parties, but, you
know, I think you do get something out of those third parties for sure.
Is it worth the bank for the buck?
Maybe not, but you better figure out, which, you know, I haven't done yet.
How to make it work on the use car side without them.
And, um, I think it works for a while, but I don't think it's a, you got car
fax in the game now.
A lot of guys are going, okay, we're at the expenses on car fax.
You know, you've got, you've got auto check.
We're still with car fax, but you know, looking to save some money, what are
you looking at your expenses all in?
Where do you want to be?
And I think guys are trying to trim back and do more of the social
media side themselves to give themselves the best chance of getting
in front of the public.
We've got a lot of good responses since we've been doing more of this organic.
And I'm hoping that we can cut our TV budget back down and we've cut it back a
lot, hoping to continue to cut it down.
That's, I'm just thinking, I mean, between everything you just mentioned,
organic social media, I am curious to know what are your biggest challenges?
There's all the technology you just mentioned.
And, you know, you're, do you have someone overseeing all day?
So are you the person?
Are you every day identifying a different one?
Like ultimately the question I want to get to here is if you could wave a magic
wand or if someone is right now listening that could fix any big problem for you.
What are the biggest challenges on your plate right now?
I think really it's capitalizing on your, in figuring out your budget.
You know, what's that budget really need to be for used?
Are you talking about like understanding the attribution within marketing?
So you know how much you invest or specifically?
Well, I think it's, I think it's new and used really.
It's not, I shouldn't say used, new and used advertising for attribution.
You can easily go out and buy new cars.
It's just a matter of though, are those guys, is the main, are the manufacturers
doing their job because I'm not in Indianapolis.
So I'm not in a tier two.
I don't have a tier two outlet.
You know, get that.
I don't get that benefit.
We pay, we pay more for Nissan and we're linked up with Vincennes, Indiana.
But we're not getting that extra boost that the Indianapolis dealers are getting,
you know, or Chicago dealers are getting because those manufacturers
are spending more money in their, in their markets.
So when you're competing against them, if you're buying, you know,
if you're buying Nissan, if you're buying Hyundai, you know, even,
even though it's your name, we've got guys in Indy that'll come over here
and trying to swipe our people because Indianapolis is a very big
service industry for restaurants and shopping, right?
They're going to go over there and shop.
People think that I got to stop people all the time and say, hey,
I think we're going to go to India shop.
I said, why? Where are you going to go to India?
I can get you anything you want. We've got everything right here.
You know, you're going to have some tactics over there that may not agree
with your personality and what you really want to see.
And typically we do a really good job of holding on to those people.
But I think in general, the manufacturers don't have it really helped us enough.
On the on the tier one, I think tier one, they're in and out of the market themselves.
And, you know, is tier one really doing what they wanted to do?
People are are they really capturing their attention in tier one?
The television, you know, the OEM is with TV
because we see a difference when they're all in on television
and they're going gamebusters on it digitally.
You know, it works. It helps us.
We benefit from that.
But then we have to go and spend more money when they're not heavily
heavy in the markets and we know what they're spending.
They give you the ends of compressing your margins.
Very much so.
But you do have a pretty diversified brain mix in your local market.
Right. Does that does that?
But then again, you are very heavy used, right?
So how do you see like, are you competing against yourself
to a point where it's inefficient?
Have you thought about this or is it actually like a net positive for you?
I think it's been good.
I mean, you know, the dream would be right to have us all under one roof.
I want to one building everybody.
That was always my dream.
That was always my dream.
Wasn't it? Oh, my gosh, because you don't you don't need all these disparate
locations when you know, you have that one, you know,
I always looked up to the Reedman tolls, right?
Reedman toll in Pennsylvania.
They have like a fricking test drive track in their in their facility.
I mean, it's just or like, look at Longo Toyota and I'm going very extreme
right now, right? They have a DMV, a Starbucks, this and that and third.
But yeah, of course, that's always the dream.
I have it all consolidated, centralized, you know, have the team together.
I mean, all the vehicles there.
It's just it's the best if you can address.
I guess I've got about a 10 acre campus, which is good.
We're all connected.
I have a Nissan store that originally was a Mitsubishi store.
It's been, you know, made into a Nissan store
back in 2014, you know, standalone Nissan.
And then we've got the new Hyundai, you know,
the everything's up to date with Hyundai, beautiful down in the corner.
You updated your facility.
Updated a facility like two years ago, two and a half years ago.
It's really beautiful.
They did a great job with that.
The middle, my middle building with this, which is Mitsubishi standalone
now, back in the day, Hyundai and Mitsubishi were in the same building.
I bought an Aldi franchise, which is right in the middle of Nissan and Hyundai
and converted it into a used car building and admin.
And in detail, the only business with lower margins in a car dealership.
There you go. There you go.
An Aldi franchise.
What is that, like one percent net margins or something?
And I don't know. They do.
But here's what they did.
I bought a piece proper enough of them, probably 15 years ago.
And I stayed on. I said, hey, look, going forward,
if you guys ever want to sell, I'd like to buy it and be great for me.
Well, they came into the market and said, you know what?
We're going to build two stores here.
We're going to build two brand new stores.
So I bought that middle store, turned it into a new car franchise now,
which is Mitsubishi, and it's all connected to the other store.
So it really works out well. It's on seven on five acres.
But then I've got the Dodge Ram, the old Dodge Ram building down in the
where I had Dodge Ram, and that's sitting on six acres.
That's where my administration is now in over detail.
I'm selling off some partials there.
So I don't know how long we're going to have that building either.
But the essence of everything is like, man, if I could just, you know,
get it to where I know that I know that I know everybody complements one another.
I think Nissan and Hyundai sure there's some competition.
But you know what? I let these sales guys sell whatever they want.
If it doesn't work for Nissan, they've got a Hyundai that might work
or they've got a Mitsubishi that might work and I let them go down there and sell it.
How do you incentivize that? Like specifically, we're paying guys on units.
So we've got fast starts, we're paying them on units.
And so we've got some they're making good decisions based on that.
I mean, we do throw out some stuff with some incentives
down there on stuff that's getting aged.
But otherwise they can sell from anywhere or anything.
Anything at any time.
I love it. I love it.
But that's what you think about.
What's your what's your long term plans?
Are you are you going to sell this thing, you know, when I hand it off
to the next generation or buy more, more acquisitions?
Where are you at?
Kind of looking, you know, in my in my head
and looking at the business in general, I see
certainly it's always been a great business.
You know, it is a grind.
I'll be 65 in April.
You're young. Yeah, you go.
I'm young. Brandon, my son's in it, doing a great job.
And I know there's people out there that that would probably,
you know, jump on this deal.
But it would have to be he and I agreeing, you know, when the time
and if that would ever even come that we would say jump on the sale of the group.
Sell the group. Yeah, I'm sure they would.
Yeah, I think there's definitely if you even got there.
I'm sure people listening right now are already licking at their chops.
Well, hey, it's hey, you know what?
You've got to be you've got to be open.
But it's one of those things for me.
I think with Brandon that, you know, he's learned so much and seen so much.
And obviously, you know, I love the industry.
I love it. And there are things here.
I could see myself still getting involved in and possibly picking off
other franchises that maybe I would want to go after that.
I think maybe could be, you know, right for the taking in due time.
It's got to be the right one, though.
And I think for me, this is enough for now
until something better comes along.
I think if it ever gets to the point where acquisitions a little easier
on use cards, because that's what we really, really know,
then I think it would make it easier for us to figure out, you know,
which way we want to go.
But for now, you know, we're here for grinding.
We're making it happen, working on our business.
And like I said, trying to manage that game, you know, we're coming out of the
trying to win that game every day.
And that's what's funny about my business coming out of baseball.
Everybody, though, knew how well you did in baseball.
They saw the box score.
They saw you play on television.
They knew if you water lost and here you don't.
You know, you don't know that people don't know from the outside what's going on.
But we do. And I look at it that way.
I look at you're always good as your last day.
Everybody wants that way. How'd a great day? Well, great.
Let's go back tomorrow. Hit it again.
You know how it is.
It's nice. It's car business.
You know, tomorrow's not promised.
Start all over. Right.
You know, April one is going to be here.
Here we go again.
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So so when you say that, like, what's the context of that? Right.
You're right. No one knows if your store is unprofitable right now
or if it's, you know, doing really well.
I mean, you still see the big fancy building with, you know, the shingles
and it looks looks expensive, looks like, you know, you're successful.
So, you know, why do you think about that?
Like, why is that? Why is that a thought that's top of mind?
I'm curious.
Well, because I don't think I don't I don't think anybody really understands
unless they've sat in that seat, you know, even even your now
my director of operations would understand it.
You know, he's looking at all our numbers
and he's looking at the finer details of what we're trying to get to.
OK, where can we where can we cut some expenses?
Where can we make it a little easier on ourselves
to not have to really grind it so much?
And, you know, where are we?
You know, we step in on ourselves somewhere.
I like, you know, we've got a lot of nice under the line money.
That's working good for us.
And I think but in general, I think people that work for stores,
they want to come to a nice place to work.
They want to have great benefits.
You know, we offer all those things and that you want them to also understand
though, man, there's been a lot of sacrifices for this place
to even be where it is right now.
So you want them to understand, let's perpetuate the success.
But let's understand that nothing's given, you know, without being hard,
you know, work, work for, you're not just going to be given something
because, oh, I've been here, I deserve it.
No, you have to work for it.
And, you know, certainly we've seen a change in some of the mindsets
in general of people.
I think everybody knows right now, if you look around, doesn't matter.
I was talking to a media guy the other day was running these radio or TV stations
and, you know, he's having big cuts in people.
I'm like, wait a minute, you're what are you doing?
You're cutting people. Why?
Well, you know, we just bought some other stores.
We just bought some other markets.
And so we're going to take some money away from some of the smaller guys.
But, you know, there's always things you've got to look out for and watch,
roadblocks, make sure you don't get roadblocked.
And I think for us, we got to stay relevant all the time.
And so we mix it up, change things up.
But I don't think you can ever take your eye off the ball that every day is a new day.
Your process has got to get better.
Got to start all over.
Start over.
So, Brian, what do people not know about you?
What's what's the secret here that you should
going to tell you're going to share with them?
Yeah, you know what? I love, you know, I love marketing.
And so that's so much fun.
I get it. I love it.
But I love NASCAR.
I'm a big NASCAR guy.
And I grew up in an episode with a NASCAR driver.
Yeah, I heard that, Joey Legato.
Yeah, do you remember the name better than me?
Well, he's so, you know, right down the street, not even half mile away
is one of the world's most prominent and famous
jerk car tracks called the Toyota Action Track.
And I actually promoted that track with two other guys for about three, four years.
But my dad got me into the love of racing.
And I still have that love of racing.
We've got a trailer that we own that we're affiliated with Chase Briscoe.
Chase Briscoe was he's the top four guy last year in NASCAR.
Phenomenal guy from Mitchell, Indiana.
He's got our name on his helmet.
We sponsor. We help him with his sprint car teams.
And you know what? I think what I love about it, it's man and machine,
you know, trying to figure out, you know, in dirt track racing is amazing.
But we get the symbiotic relationship.
Yeah, exactly. Right.
And we get this, we get this benefit of having our name on his helmet.
And we've not even really blown that up yet.
We have not taken that to the next level.
I also own a collegiate baseball team played in the summertime here called Tarot Rex.
I managed that team for three years as a head coach.
I love to play golf. I love golf.
So you're a sports guy through and through. I love it.
I've got grandkids got number six all the way.
Any collectibles, any any fun collectibles or anything?
Well, I'm yeah, I've got a I've got a I've got a Roush 2020 Roush,
you know, one of 60 cars that I bought one as a four dealer Mustang 700 horse.
I've got a I've got a challenger.
You know, the last the last call challenger got that I got a vehicle collection.
Yeah, I'm starting a little bit more of that.
My grandpa was big and he was big and antsy cars.
And my dad never really loved it. Yeah, he never loved it.
My grandpa did. I bet he owned.
And I bet he owned a couple hundred cars over the course.
He buy and sell, buy and sell, buy and sell.
He got out of the business in his mid fifties because he was tired of dealing
with the public. He loved the public, but he was tired of dealing with it.
So he sold the business to my dad and he went off and did real estate.
My grandpa did. He just loved the Pittle.
Just love to have fun.
You know, my dad, unfortunately, it's his birthday today.
So wow. Yeah, he passed.
He passed about seven years ago.
But man, yeah, he was my guy and we love and miss him.
And so, you know, these things, the family name, the family business,
it's been great for us and Brandon's loving carrying that around and sharing with him.
So it's who we are, man.
That's a dude.
I'm like I'm I'm I'm like terrified of, you know, this is completely
a deep conversation, but you mentioned that I'm terrified of death.
Just idea like people around you.
That just freaks me out.
Think about it sometimes or maybe a little too much.
Maybe I'm a little too morbid lately.
But you got to be ready.
Oh, my God. This is just the idea.
It's just a scary idea.
But that's yeah, I don't think it's this fight is right.
You go to sleep every night and you don't think about it.
You don't think you're not going to wake up.
No, you don't think you're not going to wake up for all that time in there
that you didn't wake up, but you woke up. Oh, my God.
So, you know what I mean? It's like, no, because I'm I suddenly look back.
I'm like, where did the last 10 years go?
Like where? Oh, it's just like, and I'm I'm just getting at that stage of life,
right, where they say as you get older, time goes by faster, right?
It does less, less novelty as when you're a child
and just things are going quick.
I'm like, what is going on?
You know, suddenly I'm hearing like a friend, you know, calcium score test.
You know, the other guy who's older, like, you know, colonoscopy
and all these things that I'm not there.
Yeah, but you know, just all these things.
It's you're looking at me like you're a spring chicken.
I've already been there. Oh, man.
It's stuff stuff now that I'm seeing myself go through that, you know,
you do take these precautions and you have to have these tests
and things are going on and, you know, knowing I'm turning to 65.
I remember 40 didn't bother me.
Forty five, fifty, fifty five didn't bother me.
Sixty bothered me.
The number 60 bothered me. It really does.
But 60 is the new 50.
I know.
Hey, with the current with the way the longevity is going over here,
you're going to lift 120.
I love it. I hope so.
I'm a big vitamin guy trying to stay in shape.
You know, heck, little things have happened as a catcher.
I have my knee replaced, have my hip replaced,
just all in this in the last three years.
I feel great. I feel great.
But, you know, I don't want to have any more.
I don't want to have any more replacements.
But yeah, I love it.
I'm a believer, though.
You know, I'm a group of Christian home
and I have a good sense of who I am.
Nothing's promised.
You know, no, no, nothing's promised to us, you know,
in terms of every day, the next day is going to be this.
But I try to set it up.
You know, I've got two other children and they're girls
and they would have been phenomenal in the car business
and their husbands would be phenomenal in the car business.
But what's the but?
But, but they married two really smart guys
and their financial planners, financial advisors with Edward Jones
and they're killing it.
So they don't need to come over here and they live in Indy.
They live over in Indy.
So, but we see you never know.
Maybe you're into the business.
You never know.
You never know.
Amazing.
Brian Dorsett.
Wow.
Fun, fun conversation.
Any anything I didn't ask you that I should have asked you before we wrap up?
No, I think you covered it, man.
It's been a pleasure.
It's been my honor.
I really have always enjoyed your show
and my son's a huge Janninger show.
And because we go back and forth and share things
and you know, you guys are killing it.
So I'm so glad you're here.
So thank you.
And we have I'll tease a little surprise,
but in about a week and a half,
we are recording a new segment of the show.
And it's going to be live here in Florida.
It's going to be me and three dealers
who you've probably heard on the platform before.
We're going to talk about all the all the juicy stuff happening in the industry.
So this is the first teaser for that, but expect a little, you know,
we're trying a little, a little innovation, something,
something new and different to spice things up.
So it's exciting.
You've got so much to talk about in this industry now more than ever.
And so having a podcast and having these people
that you get to talk to every day is going to be a blast.
It's literally why this was created,
because there's all this stuff happening and all this change and it was needed.
Right. Suddenly they're like, wait, there's lots of things happening
and and there's not enough transparency.
So you're right. That's the story.
Brian Dorsett, Dorsett Automotive.
Brian, thanks so much for coming on the podcast.
It's my pleasure.
You're the best. Thank you.
Thank you.
All right. Hope you enjoyed that episode.
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Consider subscribing to the show and check the show notes for links to what we talked about.
Thanks for tuning in. I'll see you guys next time.
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