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December 22, 2009Click Here to Subscribe to This Newsletter
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FINANCE SOLUTIONS Get Ready for a Stronger Year-End Financial Finish Sherralyn Peterson Now is a good time to start preparing for year-end. Waiting until the last minute or right before closing the final books is a recipe for disaster. Even though this year was one of the worst in automotive history, you still want to make sure you can finish as strong as possible. Nothing is worse than trying to purify inventory, reconcile schedules, research rejects and charge-backs, correct set-ups, and adjust journal entries under pressure and in a short period. These important responsibilities require adequate time to properly complete.
Incentives are one of the largest receivables for a dealership. With thousands of dollars passing through deal jackets every day, dealers should make sure they are all accounted for and no incentives are left unclaimed or unpaid! Here are a few general points... |
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F & I MARKETING SOLUTIONS Changing the F & I Line-Up Jan Kelly In today’s marketplace, change seems to be the theme. The lending advance model is not immune to this wave and it has changed over the past year. Advances for the traditional F&I products and services have been curtailed by the lenders. As we all know, when the advance is cut the F&I income streams are the first to be sacrificed. Yet, it is vital to the health of the financial statement that F&I remains a critical profit center. Therefore we must rethink the F&I product and services line-up. It is no longer the line-up of the usual suspects.
Think about F&I selling accessories that are considered by the lenders to be “hard adds.” Hard adds are defined as things that need to be added to the vehicle. Once they are installed they cannot be removed. Make a list using the used car guide as a resource to identify the ... |
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USED CAR SOLUTIONS Dealer Inventory—Buying and Selling! Robert Colby Today’s auto dealer has many options when buying and selling units for their used car inventory. The traditional brick and mortar auto auction has always had many competitors, but in the past several years, who would have foreseen that competition would be coming from the internet.
Once looked upon as confusing and complicated, the internet may be the single largest game-changer when it comes to how dealers move inventory. With the vast number of online companies, dealers now have a virtual and physical buying and selling environment to enhance their business.
Auto auction managers have always worked hard to create and ... |
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BIZ DEV SOLUTIONS The 2009 SEMA Convention Proves it Kristin LeClaire If the SEMA convention is a barometer, then there is no doubt that mans love affair with the automobile is as passionate as ever.
Back in1963, nine guys who were in the business of manufacturing and supplying performance equipment for early hot rods, got together (for a beer and a smoke perhaps—it was 1963 after all) and came up with the idea to organize their own fledgling industry. Thus was born the "SpeedEquipment Manufacturers Association" or SEMA.
Eventually, they had to change the word “speed” to “specialty” (evidently political correctness has been around longer than I thought), but make no mistake, as long as there are automobiles, man will continue to find ways to “make ‘em go faster and look slicker.”
The first SEMA Show (with about 100 booths) has grown to over 2000 exhibitors and nearly 7100 corporate members. The SEMA Show is the world’s largest automotive specialty products trade event, drawing over 110,000 industry leaders from over 100 countries, to the Las Vegas Convention Center. Thousands of SEMA-member... |
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BIZ DEV SOLUTIONS Going Green Doesn’t Have to Cost a Fortune Courtney Paris Every time you turn around, there’s an article, news story, or website talking about steps we can take to “be more green.” This happens, not only in our personal lives, but on the business side as well. And the automotive industry, in particular, has come under fire recently regarding their impact on the environment. While there are plenty of drastic and costly measures to reduce our environmental impact, there are also several small, cost-effective measures that both individuals and companies can take. One of the first steps is to reduce the amount of paper waste in your dealership. Do you often have memos for staff or new information that you want to distribute? Instead of handing out individual, printed copies, send an email instead. And, when there is a need to print a document, use recycled paper whenever possible. Set up a box in the office for people to drop off their misprints and wastepaper... READ MORE... |
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