Stay Cool and Compliant: Know Your Window Tint Laws Before You Tint
April 2013 AutoSuccess profile on the Neil Huffman Auto Group
1. 26 autosuccessonline.com
In the field of car sales, family-owned
dealerships are a fairly common occurrence.
Doing business with family, however, can always
be a tricky affair, especially if the ground rules
aren’t firmly established from the beginning.
The Neil Huffman Auto Group, a six-
roof (soon to be eight-roof) dealer group
headquartered in Louisville, Kentucky, is
no exception. Established in 1969 with a
Volkswagen dealership, the family knew it had
to make some hard decisions when founder
Neil passed away in 2007. One way would
have been to split the business up into separate
dealerships. Instead, after some planning —
and after ground rules were laid down — two
of Huffman’s children, Kim and Dow Huffman,
and Neil’s grandson, Shane Huffman, decided
to keep the business together and in the family
by becoming co-owners of the group.
So far, it seems to have been the right move.
The business, which sells Volkswagen, Mazda,
Nissan, Subaru, Honda and Acura vehicles,
is getting ready to expand. Construction on
a new 10,935 square-foot Subaru superstore
has just been completed as part of a multi-
phase project to expand the group for new
generations of the family.
We recently sat down with Kim, Dow and
Shane to ask them what it was like growing
up in the car business, how they decided to go
forward with the company, how they keep it
running smoothly and where they see it going
in the future.
AutoSuccess: What are your first
memories of the dealership?
Shane: One of our service advisors, who’s still
working here, would hang me by my ankles off
the balcony of the Volkswagen store.
AS: Growing up, what did you think of
the dealership?
Kim: I was proud of the fact that my parents
created something, they were working at it and
that they made it theirs. I was very proud of
them, and I was very respectful of everything
they gave us, because I knew what they had to
give up to give to us. I never took it for granted.
AS: When did you decide you wanted
to be a part of the dealership?
Shane: As a kid, my mom would drop me off
at the Nissan store, and I’d wash cars on the
weekends and through high school. That was
Family-Owned Neil Huffman Auto Group
my job. From there, I went into parts delivery and the service department. When I came home
from college, I went into sales.
Kim: I didn’t know I was going to. My father didn’t want me to go in this direction. He said you
had to put in very hard hours. He didn’t know if it was an area for a woman to go into, but he
knew that I liked to work. I started working at the dealership, in the office, when I was 15 or 16.
When I went to college, I had a lot of part time jobs. I went on to get a degree in marketing, and
got a job in advertising. Dad thought, “She’s safe — she’s not going to go in this direction.” My
mom, though, said, “You need to bring her back in.” So, Dad asked if I’d come back and work in
the marketing area of the business, and that’s where I started.
AS: Kim, describe what happened at the dealership after Neil passed away.
Kim: I had worked at the dealership until I was about 32 years old, and then I “retired” when
my kids got a little older. A few years later, my father passed away. When he made me the trustee
of the estate, I asked what that included. He said “Let me send you to the attorney, and they’ll
give you the information.” I went down and talked to the attorneys. They introduced me to the
trust department and gave me a class about being a trustee. Dad then made me the successor for
the Nissan store, and the lawyers told me more. I asked him “what do I do?” and he said “Don’t
worry about it — the managers are all here; this is what you have to do.” We went through the
information and I thought, “OK, I’m qualified.”
And then he passed away, and that’s when I knew that I really didn’t know what I was doing.
Fortunately, Dow stepped in and said “I’m going to send you to the NADA school.” It’s a year-
long program, with trips to Virginia for a week here and there, and it teaches you everything you
need to know about every department in running a dealership. After going through that, I knew
I could do it. I was the oldest person in the class, and one of only four females. It was the scariest
thing I had ever done. Fortunately, they walked me through the entire process, and I came out
with one of the highest grades. I knew I could do it, then. I’m sending my son there right now, and
periodically I send different managers to different classes.
AS: Shane, you moved into your grandfather’s office after he passed away.
Shane: My office was across the hall from his, and he was still coming in once a week. When
he died, a short time later I started moving my office into his, but I didn’t really want to change
anything. It’s still got his old notes, and pens and rubber bands that have turned old and are
falling apart. It didn’t seem right to change it, so, with the exception of a drawer and a file cabinet,
I just left everything the way it was.
AS: Describe the family dynamics in your business.
Shane: We’re on the same page as far as wanting to grow the business and the family name.
Where we used to not talk as much to each other; now, we communicate almost every day, so it’s
actually brought us closer together.
Dow: The family dynamics do change a little. Shane and myself have worked together for several
years very successfully. With Kim, now, it rejuvenates me because I get to watch her blossom into
a wonderful “car guy.”
AS: What are some of the advantages of working with family?
Shane: We’ve got two other people to bounce ideas off of and talk through business scenarios and
planning. You’re not in it alone. You’ve got your partners, and you can trust them because they’re
your family. They’re looking out for your best interests.
AS: And what are some of the disadvantages of
working with family?
Kim: The disadvantage in the past would have been one
person thinking they had a little more knowledge, power or
entitlement, which is why we brought in an outside company
to help us put together this management partnership.
DowHuffmanShaneHuffmanKimHuffman
leadership solution
Generation
2. Continues Traditions While Confidently Stepping Into the Future
AS: When you decided to come together and keep the auto group one entity,
what went into that decision?
Kim: In my mind, it’s been four years in the making of how I wanted to do it. Because I knew
I didn’t have the ability to put this together, we reached out to a professional company to put a
legal corporation together. I knew what I wanted and what I did not want. We needed everything
to be set where we were starting out equals, so that there wasn’t any entitlement. When we
started out four or five years ago, I didn’t care, because in my mind, I was learning everything.
Whichever family member was in place had the right, because they were already there. We’re
at this point right now, however, where we’re all equal. We’re going forward, and we’re all equal.
There’s no disadvantage anymore.
AS: How do you handle the inevitable disagreements?
Shane: We disagree through them. Each person may have their sticky point, so you know it’s
coming. You know where each person’s going to be, so you talk through it and you have respect
for one another’s opinion. You’re not going to win every disagreement. Everyone wins some, and
you just go on with it. We communicate well, and that’s important. We give everyone a chance to
talk about it. You wind up finding out that you’ve come to an agreement and didn’t even realize it.
You’ve just talked your way into it.
Dow: Handling disagreements is still work for me. Since Dad’s passing, I really haven’t had too
many to deal with, but when they occur, I do have to bite my lip on occasion. Let’s just say, I’m a
work in progress.
AS: What is your training philosophy?
Kim: When I got involved and came back from NADA School, I figured the best way to give
customers what they needed was to have employees who knew what they needed. For instance,
in fixed-ops, I went back and made sure all
of technicians had the most training they
could get. I made my service advisors and
all of my technicians get what they could
get. Nissan provides a lot of training online.
I made sure everyone was certified to their
standards. We send a lot of our technicians
to Nissan training — we pay their way, and
it can be expensive. I also send my service
manager to training. I started doing that
three years ago — it was necessary. If you
don’t train them, you’re not giving your
customer the best.
AS: How do family values translate
to business values?
Dow: Family values are our business values.
Always. There isn’t a day when I don’t
approach a situation thinking, “Is it the right
thing to do?” and “How would Dad handled
this?” Family values are everything. Period.
nal Drive:
Shane: The biggest thing is taking care of the
customer. That is what’s been pushed into my
head the most. You’ve got to take care of the
customer, because it’s not about the first car you
sell them, or the first time you service them.
It’s about the second time and getting them to
come back and do business with you. If you
don’t take care of their problem quickly, when
they arise, they’re not going to come back and
do business with you. If you don’t have them
coming back to do business with you, you’re
not going to be in business very long.
AS: With the next generation starting
to work at the dealership, what do you
want for the future?
Kim: When we put the legal corporation
together, we knew that we needed it to be
fair, and we knew that we needed it to be
long-lasting, so that the third and fourth
generation could at it and say “this is equal;
this is fair.” We needed to have the structure
for our generation to be the same for the next
generation and the next.
Shane: You bring young people up
and they’ve got new ideas and different
technologies, views and thoughts. You see them
add more resources to the table to strengthen
the dealership into the future.
Neil Huffman’s office has been kept largely as it was
by his grandson, Shane, who now uses it. The family
has continued Neil’s legacy by not only keeping the
company together, but expanding it with the new
10,935 square foot Subaru Superstore.
From the
Past to
the Future: