Among the car dealerships along Northern Boulevard in Woodside, New York, Paragon Acura stands as a shining exception. Located in a transitional urban neighborhood in Queens, the dealership is anoasis of sorts, welcoming clients with a gleaming exterior surrounded by plants and flowers. For Brian Benstock, vice president and general manager at Paragon Acura, the inviting exterior is a point of pride for the dealership as much as it is a business decision. “We don’t want to have any barriers to doing business,” Benstock says. “Even a small fence is a barrier. We want openness.” According to Kevin Krafcik, Paragon Acura’s American Honda Finance Corporation (AHFC)dealer relations manager (DRM), openness is the cornerstone of the dealership’s success. “Brian and his team are cognizant of the fact that the way
to best serve their client base—at least at first—is through pre-owned vehicles bolstered by Acura Care® Vehicle Service Contracts (VSCs),” Krafcik says. This kind of strategic, customized client service results in a strong bottom line, even when the economic climate continues to be challenging.
THE KEY TO PROFITS
Paragon Acura has accomplished an astonishing feat: They’ve actually managed to beat the recession. “Paragon Acura’s profits for 2009 exceeded those of 2008, which is not the case for most car dealers,” Krafcik says. A key part of that success: Acura Care. Paragon Acura has become the number one seller of Acura Care in Paragon Acura’s success with Acura Care equals client satisfaction and a better bottom line. Open to the possibilities the country. Benstock, for his part, sees Acura Care as a way to bring the sales process full circle. “It’s one more way we have to develop a relationship with clients, while bringing them back to our service department,” he says.
Paragon Acura’s high volume of VSCs is connected to the dealership’s proven ability to move Acura Certified Pre-Owned Vehicles. “It provides peace of mind for clients to know they’ve got bumper-to-bumper coverage—especially for our Acura Certified Pre-Owned Vehicle sales,” Benstock says. The dealership has been so successful with pre-owned sales that in 2007 they opened the first independent Acura Certified Pre-Owned Vehicle storefront in the country. New clients, typically younger, are particularly drawn to pre-owned vehicles. This introduces an entirely new generation of clients to the brand. Any hesitation that clients may feel about purchasing a pre-owned vehicle is quickly assuaged when they learn about the extensive coverage Acura Care offers. “You can see them visibly relax,” Benstock says. Pre-owned vehicles in combination with Acura Care develop client loyalty. “We make no secret that we bring clients into Acura Certified Pre- Owned Vehicles so that down the road we can graduate them to new vehicles,” Benstock says. “And thanks to Acura Care, that strategy works.”
ACURA LUXURY LEASE
A key feature of Paragon Acura’s leasing business is maintaining a client base that already appreciates the benefits of lower monthly payments—and the ability to drive a newer car sooner. “The leasing product is cyclical in nature,” Benstock explains, “so clients come into the dealership every two to three years, compared to every five to six for a retail product.” Benstock says that Power of Leads (POL) reports, which are posted on the Interactive Network (iN), help the sales team track clients who are coming off-lease in a year’s time. Paragon Acura has an end-of-term (EOT) process that starts six months before the lease is due and includes calling the client at one month intervals. “We’ve found that our contact process is exactly right, not too often but frequent enough to generate successful results,” Benstock says.
At the end of the lease term, clients are surprised at the high residual value of their vehicles, which is among the best of any manufacturer. “Acura Financial Services (AFS) also offers end-of-term options, such as waivers, that no other captive finance company offers,” Krafcik says. “There are options on how to come out of that lease that aren’t available with a retail product.”
“With an Acura Luxury LeaseTM penetration rate exceeding 60 percent, it’s easy to understand that the product has become synonymous with the dealership,” Krafcik says, adding that the dealership has actually increased the number of leases in this challenging economy. “It’s less profit per unit, but we sell more units,” Benstock says.
THE 300 PERCENT RULE
Paragon Acura is now on track to receive a Council of Excellence (COE) award for the eighth consecutive year. The dealership has achieved and maintained this level of success through a simple, focused approach that Benstock calls, “The 300 Percent Rule.” “We make 100 percent of the products available to 100 percent of our clients 100 percent of the time,” he says. An integral part of the sales process at Paragon Acura is to offer every client a lease proposal, a finance proposal, and an Acura Care VSC proposal. The process begins when a business manager conducts a pre-interview with clients to assess their needs. The business manager then presents a menu with all the products available, and together they determine which products will best serve those needs. “When you offer all of the products to all of the clients all of the time,” Benstock says, “you’re just going to have a better result.”
TRAINING FOR EXCELLENCE
For Paragon Acura, the three programs—Acura Luxury Lease, Acura Care, and Acura Certified Pre-Owned—all tie into one another, and the dealership’s sales team understands this is crucial. “We think our biggest expense is an untrained salesperson,” Benstock says. Benstock sets aside an hour every morning for training with his management team. While he usually conducts these sessions himself, Benstock also will bring in professional consultants to review sales techniques, conduct demonstrations, and discuss new product releases. This training pays off: Paragon Acura boasts client satisfaction scores in the upper 90s.
NEW MEDIA TOOLS
To address changing consumer behaviors, Paragon Acura has discovered and mastered the use of new technology as a business tool. The dealership is highly visible on the Internet, and has developed a strong presence on social media sites such as Facebook and Twitter. Paragon Acura also uses email to offer clients discounts on service, announce new car deals, and send birthday greetings. Sales team members send EOT reminder emails a year to six months before the lease termination date to get clients thinking about their options. “The rationale behind all this kind of communication,” Benstock says, “is to ensure that the Paragon Acura name stays at the forefront of the client’s mind.”
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