We welcome John O’Hanlon from Waylands to the podcast this week. John started his career as a chartered accountant with Grant Thornton, specialising in consultancy in the motor trade. He then set up Ridgeway Garages with David Newman, and built it to a 30 dealer group which was subsequently sold to Marshalls.
John believes that great dealerships and groups all have a culture that cares, with their staff taking pride in the business and having a ‘can do’ attitude. He also emphasises that its important to be visible, showing your team that you care about the little things, which then becomes part of the ethos.
If your dream is to own your own dealership, we delve into how achievable this is in the current market.
This is the first instalment of a two part interview that is full of insightful tips and strategies.
Here are the highlights:
{04:42} Recovering accountant
{11:10} Know your numbers
{13:43} You control what happens in your world
{20:50} Be visible
{26:00} Peach
{30:30} Owning Your Dealership
About Symco Training:
Symco Training was founded in 2000 by Simon Bowkett and it was his belief that the business had to offer its clients something different. That difference was clear to Simon from his days in the dealership when he experienced many sales trainers who had all the answers, but were unable, unwilling or both to actually show the delegate how they could be implemented. It remains the ethos of the business today. You see, Symco only employ trainers that are committed to delivering not only in spiring and insightful training, but are equally as happy to demonstrate these skills and techniques with real customers in your own showroom. We believe in order for sales training to be effective and in Simon’s words ‘real world’, it needs to be tried and tested in the only place it matters the showroom floor. There is no room for theory when your goals are for your team to sell more cars, hours or parts and retain more profit. In dealerships around the world the focus applied by many of the sales executives is to try and sell a deal. Symco specialise in getting your teams to focus on selling themselves, the product and then supporting this with the deal.
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Welcome to the Selling and the Motor Trade Podcast, an association with Symco Training. This is the weekly podcast where we share best practice tips and ideas on how to sell more cars, improve your service department and generally put more profit into your dealership or dealer group. I'm your host, Simon Bowkett. As some of you probably already know me as Skippy, I will start by saying thank you for taking the time to listen to this podcast. I'm walking to another episode of Selling and the Motor Trade. Today I'm joined by John O'Hannelland and I'm really excited to see John here today because I've followed him on social media for many years. I know a little bit about what John has done from the outside. I bumped into him at the National Automotive Dealers Association. He made my day by walking past me and said, ah, the podcast man. John Smythe was with you from memory. I had to say, ah, John, you're coming on the podcast. He said, of course I would. I'd love to. John, welcome aboard. Thank you very much for your time. Thank you, Simon. The only thing you missed out there was we were both in Dallas. We were in Dallas. It's not a bad place to meet someone for the post time, is it? That is true. Although I love the NATA conference. I'm a sucker. 22 of them I think I've been to now, 23, something like that. I just always amazed me that so many times the American market seems so far ahead of what we're doing. But sometimes so far behind. That's kind of, I think you're right. When you look at what you've got on the East and the West, some really, really advanced thinking that does lead to our thinking over here. But then there's so much in terms of the rest of the country. You do have something really? Are we still talking about this? Yes. You know, it's 23. So true. And I always love to go to real dealership visits whenever I'm out there. And what they talk about in the shows and what happens is often two different things. Yeah. But the other is huge scale businesses aren't they? Huge businesses. Yeah. But people who may not know you, people living under a rock. I understand you ran the Ridge rate group from 97 through 2016. I think from memory, you started with two dealerships at the beginning. And it was 30 odd dealerships when you sold out to the marshals. And can you just give us a little bit of a your background? How did you get started in the motor trade? Yeah. And I'm famous. I'm an accountant by training. So I qualified as a charge accountant, but I was lucky enough to work with a firm, Graf Thornton, a heavy involvement in and around a more retail. You had a more retail group and through that was able to visit Melbourne, Australia. And they're MDS group, the more dealer services, a couple of charts called Mark Cummings and David, that's terrible. I better remember his name before it for a go much about that. And they just showed me that we have in the motor trade, you know, it's not a unique industry, but it does have a few unique points. And actually, it was a business that I believed I could add some value to. So I started consulting with Graf Thornton doing controls review, diagnostic reviews, and got out and met a lot of dealers. So I spent best part two and a half years with GT, fundering all over the UK, you know, from Cornwall, up to Glasgow, over to Northern Ireland. I really, really enjoyed what I was doing, but it was three, four nights away from home doing that. I just got married and I was looking to put my, you know, put my feet under a desk somewhere. And I met through one of those reviews, a chap called David Newman, who had literally just set up the rich week route. So I joined him, firstly, I spent on the controller, then Zepdi, and then I think you could see I was getting itchy in terms of kind of getting involved. So I got, I generally managed one of the businesses, started running one of the brands, and then I was going to get a bit more freedom. So I clearly done enough to prove that I could take a little bit more responsibility. And then 2007, I was chief exec from there, through to bed 16, we ran, we ran the business together. Okay. Well, a friend of the show, up at the John Clark group, there's a man called Colin McAllister. Yeah, he said to, you describe yourself as a recovering accountant. Would that be a fair description? I think you'd never get away from a co-insight. And it is always there. If you do look around, and more businesses, there are quite a few accountants who do run the businesses, you know, where capital intensive, lots of investments, where a very long-term business that does make short-term decisions, you know, in terms of how we drive the business, I guess the background of heavy investment. So I think it does play to someone who does know that numbers, and that then again plays to the accountants within the organisation. But now I, yes, I am an accountant, I'm proud to be an accountant, I'm still a fill of dentistry. But I don't, that's not the first thing that I put on the CV as we go out now. Well, going back to when you were with Grant Thornton, you would have seen a lot of dealerships, good, the great, the ugly, probably sometimes as well. And I always think I would love someone that we're training with to do our job for just three months, because you see so many dealerships, and you see the same trends all the time. And I ask you, from your opinion, what separates the good from the great in either a dealership or a department when you walk into it? I think they're, and you'll hear this a lot from me, is around that culture. That's culture that cares, it's cultures about being can do. And when you walk into a business and you're walking into a lot of businesses, you can smell it, you can taste it, are people looking up? Are they smiling? Do they want to talk to you? Or do they just want to keep their head down? Do they want to be there? Yes. Do they want to be there? You know, my, before I ever entered the building, I always walked a lot, go around the car display, are they looking, are they lined up? Are they looking prepared? Is it reprised? Are the tires up, down, select? All those real basics that show there's a pride in the business, there's a caring in the business, you know, then you get into financials and, you know, very quickly, you could tell, there was usually a cash issue where they're looking after the cash, where some of the basics being done. And of course, the businesser doesn't care about the use-pass calls for people who don't care about the business, are not looking after the numbers either. And that's the businesses that were probably the most interesting, but also the ones and most difficult. Yeah, interesting from a Brent Thornton point of view, because you can go and fix it, buy it out. Yeah. And I was looking, so the controls review was just looking at some of the basic controls that every dealer should be exercising. And it was on a question on your basis. The diag was just looking at some of the percentages, some of the margins, and you put those two tools together and give you a really lovely, you know, future in time for a business. And all both of them, you had to go and talk to the managers in the business, other people who were responsible for each of those streams in a business. So it was really, it was a great way to very quickly, to test. But that was one of the reasons why I couldn't do it anymore. You do get to a point where you, it's almost, you begin to think, I know what I'm going to find as soon as I walk in the door. And again, you can't do that. You can do that. You've always got to be able to say, okay, there might be a reason on this day, the few people have seen are having a bad day. But you didn't often get it wrong. And you'll get a sense for it, don't you get feel for what a great business looks like as a good or an average business. It comes out the phrase that was jumped, drummed into me when I started retells in the detail. And I suppose that's important today. Walk around and use cars when you're first walking. I imagine you still do that when you go inside. And then go in the back, jump in the front, just pop that, see a lot of the boys that you walk through and just see what's about, you know, and I've always got, you know, the teddy mains are profitable, take mine, because there's a reason why stuff just gets left, and if we talk about being premium businesses, and I'm really keen to talk about that, if you're a premium business, then hopefully you can try to premium margins. And then you can invest in the premises and the people and your balance sheet. And actually that's got to look as good as the part that customers can see. And that's the challenge. I'm more than happy to take anybody through any part of the business. A lot of, you know, a lot of visitors to a dealership would never get to see the parts, you know, parts, you know, parts, but it just doesn't happen because that's the bit that we don't think about. And yes, it's so important to what we do. So everyone gets the full tip. Simon, if you're ever passing, I will get me the full tour, any paycheck out. But that is important to me. You know, I'm not, I don't expect it to be almost military, but I don't want to be far off in terms of changing shoes and buckles. I heard the story. I don't know how this story has been embellished in time, but I believe it was Robert Penske was going into one of these dealerships. He got out of his car, got a piece of newspaper, screwed up and threw it in the car park. And in turn, it's the man that we're showing around. If that's still there when we come back, I'll send the dealer principal. Yeah. I'm sure the story may have been embellished, but I love the theory of it. It's retails in the detail. Let's make sure that it's so important. Yeah. But also, if we see that baby, but we should be picking up as well, no matter what position we're in, so yeah, I love painting a bad paper. And as the walking in, the guys about paper, you know, where's the bed? Because I'm willing to do it. Yes. Everyone should be willing to do it. And we should save pride in every part of the business. Yeah. Now, this is a shameless plug for our first 90-day sales training program. We often say that the skills we learn in the first three months, good and bad, last as for the rest of our career, can I ask you to think back, when you still as an accountant now, before you went into Ridgway? Is there anything that's important now that you learned your first 90 days, that's important for someone starting now in the business? Yeah. And I assume, mentally, you know, I still talk about the numbers and actually knowing your business, you've got to know your numbers. And whether that's for a sales exec, knowing how to stack his deal, so we don't know how much money you're making a car, how do you know how much commission you have? And it's the same in terms of the workshop or parks. We don't control the margins, then become busy fools. And then it's having that capability of actually not only knowing where you are, but then beginning to learn to do the forecasting, because that's when it gets much more exciting as a manager in the business. And that was some of the disciplines that I was able to bring and enhance because we did have some good tools in Ridgway, you know, the guys were ex-hardwell, which had some really good PLC disciplines. And if we can take some of those PLC disciplines and then enhance them with the culture, just a little bit softer, with much quicker decision making, then you begin to get to a very place. So yeah, absolutely. Know your numbers, know what you've got to do. Because if you know your numbers, know what you've got to do, it allows you to see where your efforts, where you're focused, where your priorities have got to be. And that will make every part of what you do every day a little bit easier. Yeah, can I ask you as well, with your time for Grant Thornton, does anyone stand out as a mentor? And the reason why I say that, when I started when I was 17 years old in the motor trade, I was one of these cadet salespeople, which of course is 12 months of washing cars, making the teas and coffees. But I had two mentors that really stood out and it's Tony Island. And lastly, it was Mike Carney. And I always said, what were Tony doing this situation? How would he deal with that? And I always, even now, I'm going to be 50 this year, I sit back and think, hold on, how would Tony Island have dealt with that? Like dealing with a staff member, the car park walk, dare I say, that's so many different things. Is there anyone that really stood out for you as a mentor earlier? I think, you know, I've mentioned Mark Cummings, who was the lead partner in the Australian Grant Thornton and the Motor Dealer Services, who actually just took me aside and said, John, I think you've got a bit more about you. What are you doing? Why are you sort of gently plugging? I said, I've got to Australia. What more does it have? I was actually, what can we say? We'll go write your business plan and you go go back and present it. And actually, what reinforced to me at that point was actually you control what happens in your world. A few allow things to happen around about you, things will happen, but it might not be for your benefit. And actually, you've got to go and grab it. You know, the oil goes to the noisy wheel and it's actually, but it also showed me how I had to, you know, how I could actually make the argument, do the presentation in a way that would allow me to do that. And that was first time all the skills falls from your eyes. And that's when you realize that you can make things happen. Yeah. And that can be for anybody and every business. But for me, coming back, I was just a senior accountant auditor and I came back and I'm with a manager's proposal. So Mark, absolutely. Another chap called Preston Ayers, Preston led the Grand Thornton, more retail group. And again, thoughtful, intelligent, intellectual. Again, learned me a lot about thinking, do a little bit more with this because I was 100 miles an hour and always wanted to get, and always wanted to do the pitch, always wanted to get the job and just occasionally just slowed down and helped me understand the most important thing is the most important thing. So those two guys from Grand Thornton helped me and allowed me to then become more of the person I am today rather than the person I was before I went out to Australia. I love that someone like Mark seen something in you before you saw yourself. And I see that so many times I get senior managers we're dealing with and they're just got all the ability in the world. Just don't sort of get there. They just don't want to sort of apply it. And I just wonder sometimes why, why do that? And something that again, my mentor said to me, all good things come to those who wait. Only the things left behind, those who parcel. And it seems like things you remember and it's so true, isn't it? Yeah, thank you. And again, just occasionally when you do get yourself into that little run, you just have to remember actually, I do need to do what do I need to do to get to the result. Because it's me. Because we can all sit by, but then it'll just happen around about you. So go and get involved and get the best solution for yourself. And that was, that was from Mark. And everyone needs someone like that in the world. You know, whether it's parents, whether it's managers, everyone needs someone just to give you that little help in direction. So the step into Richway Group marriage, want to get your feet under desk and I understand that spending four nights a week away from home at the moment, that's still our life. And that's what we do. But can I ask you then? So from Richway, you've got 30 dealerships there. You decide to row your own boat there. You're going back to Waylands. I believe you start with one Volvo dealership. If I've got that correct. So essentially we started with nothing. We started off by buying some trade and employing some people. But it was a business that had been gently run down, gently squeezed out. We started off in a trade company unit, which is not the best place to run a major franchise in a big territory. So can you talk about some of the challenges there? I don't want to offend you now. But when you've got the scale behind you of Richway, that must be easier when you actually have Group HR functions. You've got marketing people around you. You've got so much resource you can pull on. Going back to one dealership, lots of that has to go out the window. What are some of the challenges you have? I don't want to offend you saying running a small organisation. But it must have been a different kettle of fish. No, as I'm doing, I again don't forget what we did in Richway. It wasn't always 800 million ton over and 30 dealerships. It was the first couple of years we worked with two and then we got a very small school with a dealership and we got our You Know What So We Through With The Business. I understood what it was like when I turned up with my laptop, I doubled the computing power of Richway. I was all dumbed out here. I understood a lot that but what I allowed you to do was understand what was really important and what you needed and what you didn't need. So, unashamedly, I knew I could do the sitting in the seat and doing the general manager role. I needed a fantastic sales manager. I needed a fantastic sales manager to help me with that. But I guess the part that would surprise someone was my first employee was April, said, help me with marketing because it's an awareness that I don't have and for a single site working from that trade company. This is it. One dealership you employ your first market and she's still with you now. She's still with you now. She's now with her market. And I think that's the joy of we had a clear plan. The vision was always to keep growing then obviously. It was to grow a day one. It grew up quite late. And to grow up quite late. We set out 100 million in five years. Let's go. We achieved that within three years. It was then okay, what do we need to do next? It's 250 million. That's where we want to push to. And in fairness, we're going to have to refine that again because we're following wind. The cars arriving. And without talking about agency, we should get to a 250 million tonne over business in terms of the volume that we'll do. So it's absolutely, I'm super, I'm on record. I'm super keen to say you do need a scaled business in more retail. You can't do that. I think there'll be fewer and fewer one to say dealers and dealer groups. Maybe with some of the Chinese coming in, there could be another little burst around the boats as they just look for opportunities. But I think generally it's bigger groups. It's more scaled groups who can then invest in the professionals that then drive on the business and let them buy things cheaper, run things quicker and have focus in the right areas. The advantages of scales from an economic point of view, you can see it written black and white, more than numbers, and that stacks up. But also I just want to ask you, how do you keep your finger on the pulse when it gets bigger and bigger? Because there's got to be the advantage of the small team that you can walk in there. And as you said, and there's Dave, he's behind the parts counter and you know that Dave's just had a new baby and you can't do that when you had 30 dealerships. You have it. Yes. No, but that, you're absolutely right. And as one of my little sayings to the guys, I can be your biggest asset, but I'll also be in the back of the workshop. I will be in your accounts department. I will be and I'll find out because people can't help themselves. You know, if they haven't got anything, they'll just want to say anything and that's a big flag as well. So yet you do pick up on issues, but also means that you can pick up an opportunities and that's on it very, very quickly. And that's the part that I get more excited about. I didn't quite find where the limit was for still having a speed at, which way I think we were getting there. We were getting there, but we still had a, you know, it was quite, it was a flatter structure and we had to find ways of still getting out, still going round. So you know, we had a commercial vehicles division for Mercedes Benz so they have a trucks and vans. He wouldn't visit that. He wouldn't go visit depot every day, but we had to find ways to make sure in the diary we would get to visit them. We would spend the day just going round. We could see what was happening. They could see us. That's really important. And I become, you know, I do start getting those little shakes when I haven't been a dealership for a while. You know, I hate it if I haven't been, you know, I've only been there for a month. I begin to get, you know, the guys will notice and I can feel it. Yeah. I'm going to show my age now, but when my son, who's 20 now, was just born, he must have been three, four months old. I was up early one Sunday with, um, given his mum a rest and the managing director Tesco's was on some business program, businesses today, something like that. And they asked him, they made more profit than any retailer had ever made in the UK. And they asked him, what's the secret to your success? And I always remember he said, well, it's frustratingly simple. So of course the interview said, well, go on, but what do you mean? He said, well, as the managing director of Tesco's, you would think I spend my life in marketing meetings, board meetings, strategy. Don't get me wrong. I have my fair share of meetings, but every week I like to go to as many Tesco stores as I possibly can. When I walk in, I like to make sure the hand baskets on the left and the right, because I know say we'll get depleted on the left hand side. First, not the right. Then I go straight to the bananas. I like to make sure the bananas are displayed just as they turn yellow, not when they're too yellow. People don't think they get enough life on them. When they're green, they don't look inviting. Now the interviewer turned around, looked him like he was mad and said, you're the managing director of Tesco's. You weren't whatever it was, 6.8 million and shares equaling blah, blah, blah. You mean to say you make sure bananas are the right colour? And of course he said, yes, because when my staff see me making a fuss about the little things, it rubs off onto every single thing we do. And that's what you're talking about there when you're walking in through the parts of the environment, have the back and speak and do it. Dave with the new child. Talking about the use cards when you're walking in, it is get the little things right. It rubs onto everything we do. And that's the part. That's where you do pick up opportunities as well as problems. And it's easy. It's easy. I know it's easy. Pack a car on the front. Walk it straight in and go and sit in the office and start cracking through emails. Great. But that's not what builds your culture. That's not what drives your business. And it's been something that I've always carried. I mean, it's a little bit guilt where I do want to make sure that we are doing as much as possible. Go on. Did you have to learn that or was that in you? And the reason why I say that is we had to change this meeting. Okay. And normally I'd get a text and email saying, oh, we can't do this day. I've got something else. You had the launch of a brand new dealership. You took the time to pick up the phone and phone me and apologize about this. And we had a few messages backwards forwards. Wow, you got so much on your plate on the moment. And only it would be the text email. Can't do that. Can you give me another date? Finished. That is something. Did you have to learn that or is it? Well, maybe as it the way you brought up, maybe that's when we talked about mentors, we were your mom and dad. Actually, if you make it promise, you stand on it. If you can't stand on it, and we've fallen. And say, here's the reasons why I'm really sorry. Can I fix it? And that's just being a good person. That's just being proper, isn't it? That's just the right thing to do. Isn't that what a customer would expect when they're buying a car? Get the car service over as well. It's exactly those same things. And I'm sure that culture robs off every part of it. And people laugh, Simon, when I go on it. And I know you've been talking to Dale. And I absolutely, when Dale, we were lucky enough I worked beside Dale. Dale joined us a Ridgeway. And he did some fantastic stuff in terms of getting a little bit more organisation around about some of the meetings where we were. We just turned up. And of course, as we were getting a little bit bigger, he just felt just getting a little bit more formality into the business. And one of the things he spoke about was peach in terms of culture. And we all laughed. Which you mean peach Dale. But I still use it today, if ever we're doing any sort of... He's not mentioned that to me yet. He's not the peach. He's not been the best for the deal part. This is a John O'Hanlon idea. The peach, you buy a peach. Yeah. But you don't buy the peach for the stolen. You buy the peach for the flesh. And the stolen for me is our processes, our procedures. So when a customer turns out they're going to write first time without fail. So that is the strength of the business. As a customer, you buy it. You buy that peach for the flesh, the tested part. And that's how you feel. That's when you walk in. What does it feel like? Does it make me feel like, you know, we are friends. They do recognise me. They do care about my business. They do value my business. And if something goes wrong, I know they'll be there for me. And that's the part where we talk about, you know, every employee, every member of our team has got my mobile number. And there's a reason why I tell them the guy who made them when we do the induction, they've got my mobile number. Because if there's a problem that their manager isn't dealing with or their general manager isn't dealing with, then phone me. And I'll deal with it now. And we do need people that have ever called me. But that's not the point. The point is they can do. They can't. And that means the general manager will probably deal with it and the manager will probably deal with it as well. I bet you did that red ray as well with 30 idea. Yeah, it doesn't change. It doesn't change. Yeah. That's just those are those are some really basics that what we do, that what we need to do if we want the business to reflect who we are and what we want from it. And I guess that's where you begin to be the DNA of what's important to general handling. Talking about Darwin and people listen to this in Australia, in America, they are. It runs the Suzuki automobiles in the UK and does a great, great job. Really one of the great guys in the industry. But talking about Suzuki, the Chinese coming into the UK market and on the Australian market, Chinese a little bit further ahead with that integration there. I want to get your views on are they going to be like Dash Gupta again for people listening outside the country, Dash Gupta, a great industry leader around the Marshall's organization. It's been on record saying there's probably going to be about five or six super groups in the UK. There'll be some big groups there because of scale there. What are your thoughts? Is there space for the owner driver, the one million bands anymore? Must be difficult to run that. What do you thought say? I think it's really difficult for those businesses. I think in the sort of ballet and it's been progressing. Certainly in the UK, we've seen the growth and growth of our biggest dealer groups. Actually, if you look at the profitability of those dealer groups, even prior to some of the strange times that we've been in over the last couple of years, the bigger businesses, we're more profitable. They're able to share the costs much more effectively over more rooftops. We have been moving that way. I think the some of the dynamics is round about, I guess, Dash, we could be talking about our existing bigger dealer groups. I think that could change where we are seeing much more interest in the UK market from, I would say, foreign from external groups. These groups are huge. Well, as in heading or Lithia, we've seen group one expand. We know a lot of partners, a pentakies here with Sittner. These are big, fantastically well-run groups who can come in and actually add absolutely a lot more scale within our territory that's actually well developed. I think we are in fairly good shape as a sector. We've certainly came a long way from where we were even 20 years ago. Someone listened to this. We have lots of senior managers listening to this, heads of businesses, somewhere within an organization. They might have the dream like you did to own own dealer group, dealership at some point there. Years ago, there used to be the dealer development sites. I haven't really heard about those for a while. I believe Volvo was one of the last ones. I might have that wrong. I know that was the press car. I know a lot of their clients with Honda with the dealer development sites started that way. Owning a dealership with someone listening to this. Is it still an achievable dream? Yes. I would say yes. It has got more difficult. In fairness, which we was a sponsored retailer. So it was a Volkswagen sponsored retailer and that scheme was fantastic. I never knew that. I got it. So we were part of the sponsored scheme that looked after a case. We were maybe 20 to 25 sponsored retailers at the time where you got help in terms of a low or no interest rate loans to get you started because as well, you buy goodwill or where you got to invest in the facilities and the CI and some of the working capital. It's all bigger numbers than where it was. Cars are not cheaper and they've still got to be funded. Interest rates are back to probably more where they should be rather where they were. So you've got lots more costs. You've got lots more investments to make. I think it's going to be more difficult. The interesting area that I don't think we've fully considered is how well some of the new brands coming into the market in the UK. How will they impact on that? Will they want to go with smaller sites? Will they want to go with national groups? You've seen generally the go with national or big regionals. But will there be more room as we see more of these brands arrive? I don't know whether if you've already got three or four Chinese brands, is that enough new entrants or will they act a little bit further down the pecking order? And then suddenly that opens up more opportunities to grow with a new entrant rather than one of the things that's been the same. I think it's much, much more difficult because you've got to find that funding, the sponsored retailer or the VMH, the ROTOM work holdings provide. That just leaves me to say that all details of this episode and other episodes on the selling in the Motor Trade can be found on our website simcotraining.co.uk. Go there to get a copy of our book, Words That Sell Cars. Go there to sign up to a free trial of our sales fitness online sales training program. Easiest way to get hold of me is Simon Bowkett through Link Fit. Thank you.
