Keeping staff motivated, focusing on good news helps sustain auto sales

With new-car sales beyond slumped, what's a salesman to do?

Cheer about what's going right.

That's what happens every week at most car dealers in town during sales meetings, where the pep rally atmosphere is loud enough to drown out the bad news about the floundering auto industry and keep the staff enthusiastic about moving cars off the lot.

Although dealers have been having motivational meetings for years, there's urgency to the message now.

The multicar pileup the industry experienced last year is continuing. There were 2,654 fewer new cars titled in El Paso County from January to April over the same period last year. That's a 37 percent drop.

Falling car sales across the nation, federal bailouts, Chrysler's bankruptcy and General Motors' looming June 1 government deadline to restructure the company, though, are the outside world.

Inside dealerships, there's a job to be done. Money to be made. Families to support.

"They're on stage; if they're not smiling when the customer walks in the door, the customer's not going to be smiling," said Todd Hilleboe, general manager of Phil Long Ford in Motor City.

At a recent Friday morning meeting for Phil Long Ford's 30 salespeople, the upcoming weekend activity is the focus. About 50 percent of business occurs on Fridays and Saturdays, Hilleboe said.

There's hype about current radio, television and newspaper promotions the dealer is running. The manufacturer's strengths are talked up. The attributes of the dealership, its support for employees and the community get mentioned. And the benefits of Ford vehicles are driven home.

"The glass is always half-full. We don't want to hear anything negative," new car sales manager Brent Hall tells the group.

There's a lot of clapping and shouting.

The fact that Ford Motor Co.'s U.S. sales topped Toyota Motor Co.'s last month draws another round of applause.

"The industry's down 37 percent year-over-year. Who's down the least? Ford!" Hall shouts.

Mike Cimino, who manages three Phil Long Ford locations, stands and acknowledges that "there's a lot of bad news out there."

His own stores have not been immune: Sales at Phil Long Ford in Motor City are down from the 2004 high of 400 new and used cars a month to 250, he said.

"But we'll fight and turn it around. There's a lot of opportunity out there," he tells his people.

When times get tough in the industry, car dealers return to the basics of their business, said Jay Cimino, chief executive of Phil Long Dealerships.

"You make sure you take care of the customer. You make your calls. You follow up on sales. You learn to keep your ear tuned to the future, but you focus on what you're doing today, and today will take you to tomorrow," he said.

Most of the more than 1,000 local salespeople at new-car franchises work on commission only, unless they're in training. Some dealerships, like Phil Long, offer incentives and pay a basic wage if a salesperson has a really bad month.

Some months are better than others, Cimino said, but for the most part, salespeople are professionals who know how to sell.

"The industry may be down nearly 40 percent, but the great salespeople don't see a 40 percent decline in their income," he said.

To ensure that salespeople have a fair shot at making a living, Jerry Colten, owner and general manager of Al Serra Chevrolet-VW-Hummer, adjusts his staff to match market conditions.

"We'll have 10 salespeople if we're selling 100 vehicles a month, 20 if we're selling 200," he said. He has 12 to 14 working the floor at each store now to handle the 150 new and used cars each location is selling.

"We pump our people up by keeping the right number of salespeople, giving them reasonable hours, offering a nice place to work and providing a strong service, parts and body shop," Colten said.

Hap Norris, who has sold cars at Al Serra Chevrolet South for 19½ years, said his dealership's weekly sales meetings also help keep attitudes upbeat and improve sales techniques and knowledge about the cars on the lot.

"Sales is sales," he said. "It's all about customer service, being friendly and treating people like you'd like to be treated. You have to give them what they need and want. People are still buying cars."

Mike Cimino sees reason for optimism, as more troops arrive at Fort Carson in June and July, closures and consolidations of dealerships open up more market share and the economy climbs out of the recession.

The new-car market also is expected to get a boost from discounted prices, government tax incentives and manufacturers' incentives and rebates, experts say.

Which leads Jay Cimino, the consummate salesman, who's been in the auto business since 1965, to declare: "There's never been a better time to buy a car."