Ownership, Acquisitions, and Mergers With Tommy Gaynor and Chris Garman of Sun Auto Tire & Service

Chris Garman, Vice President of Business Development at Sun Auto Tire & Service, built up his family’s auto service business from three to nine stores before selling to Sun Auto in 2019. He leads the company’s mergers and acquisitions, significantly expanding its footprint.

Tommy Gaynor, Director of Mergers and Acquisitions at Sun Auto, joined the company after acquiring his family’s successful auto repair shops. With a history in 20 groups and a deep understanding of the industry, Tommy works closely with Chris to grow Sun Auto across various markets. Together, they share a passion for auto service excellence and helping business owners transition smoothly through acquisition.

In this episode…

Are you an auto service business owner mulling over an exit strategy but wondering if you’re “big enough” for acquisition? Is there a strategy that guarantees the continuity of your legacy and provides growth opportunities for your team? Could you envision a future where your hard work pays off for everyone involved?

According to Tommy Gaynor and Chris Garman of Sun Auto Tire & Service, there are significant opportunities for owners of single stores and small chains to sell their businesses to larger companies like Sun Auto. They emphasize that while major acquisitions often make headlines, they are equally interested in purchasing individual stores or smaller groups, especially if they have strong teams. Chris and Tommy stress the importance of having an exit strategy and encourage owners to start thinking about preparing their businesses for sale well in advance, even if they’re not ready to sell immediately. They also highlight the value of retaining existing teams during acquisitions, viewing the employees as a crucial asset.

On this episode of Gain Traction, Chris and Tommy join host Mike Edge to delve into the intriguing world of business acquisitions within the auto service industry. They discuss their journeys from running family-owned shops to becoming drivers of Sun Auto’s dynamic expansion, helping owners navigate the exit process. With a people-first strategy and a track record of employee growth and retention, Chris and Tommy highlight the win-win scenarios they strive to create in every deal.

Here’s a glimpse of what you’ll learn: 

• [1:49] The origin stories of Chris Garman and Tommy Gaynor in the auto service industry
• [4:37] The process of selling an auto service business to Sun Auto
• [5:17] Chris Garman’s transition from architecture management to leading a family auto business and beyond
• [8:13] The internal culture of Sun Auto and its approach to business acquisitions
• [10:48] Why showing gratitude and appreciation can pivot your business culture
• [19:22] How Sun Auto views the private equity sponsorship’s role in company growth
• [22:45] The value of quality over quantity in acquisitions
• [29:00] An important experience that changed the way Tommy did business

Resources mentioned in this episode:

• Chris Garman on LinkedIn
• Tommy Gaynor on LinkedIn
• Sun Auto Tire & Service
• Mike Edge on LinkedIn
• Tread Partners

Websites:

• treadpartners.com
• tractionsummit.com

Quotable Moments:

1. “We’re just trying to build a great company, and that’s the bottom line.” – Chris Garman.
2. “You can raise the attitude with gratitude.” – Tommy Gaynor
3. “All of our managers, all of our tenured service advisors, all the master technicians, all still work there.” – Tommy Gaynor
4. “The biggest thing they get is opportunity.” – Chris Garman
5. “The people that work for them are super valuable; they understand that they’ve put great people in great positions to be successful.” – Chris Garman

Action Steps:

1. Develop Your Exit Strategy Early: Reflect on your business and create a roadmap for future transitions.
   • It’s important to plan; knowing your endgame ensures continuity and opens opportunities for your team.
2. Create a Culture of Gratitude: Integrate genuine appreciation into your leadership style to foster a positive environment.
   • Demonstrating gratitude consistently has enhanced team morale and productivity, as highlighted by Tommy’s example.
3. Embrace Opportunities for Learning: Always assume you can learn from others and provide learning opportunities for your Staff.
   • By acknowledging that everyone has something to teach us, we promote an atmosphere of continuous improvement and expertise sharing.
4. Equip Your Team for Growth: Place people in positions where they can succeed and grow with the company.
   • Investing in talent development leads to higher employee retention and a resilient business model, as seen at Sun Auto.
5. Build Strong Industry Relations: Maintain good relationships with peers and competitors in your field.
   • Networking and sharing insights, as Chris and Tommy practiced through their 20 groups, can lead to mutually beneficial opportunities.

• Chris Garman
• Gain Traction
• Gain Traction Podcast
• Mike Edge
• Sun Auto
• Tommy Gaynor
• Tread Partners

Transcript

Announcer:

Welcome to the Gain Traction Podcast, where we feature top automotive entrepreneurs and experts and share their inspiring stories. Now let’s get started with the show.

Mike:

Hey folks, welcome to the Gain Traction Podcast. I am Mike Edge, your host. We have two great guests today from Sun Auto Tire & Service, Chris Garman, vice President of Business Development and Tommy Gaynor, director of Mergers and Acquisitions. But before we get started, I always got to do our sponsorship. Got to pay for this thing. This episode is brought to you by the ReTread Marketing Program created by Tread Partners. Do you want good customers back that have gone missing? Tread Partners runs a program that guarantees your marketing money no tricks. It’s a customer re-engagement program going after your best lost customers. It’s a one-time 120-day program that generates a 10 to 1 return on investment and it’s guaranteed. Tread Partners get your best lost customers back to spend money with you. These are customers that are currently in your point of sale system right now.

For example, if you were to invest $5,000 today, you’ll receive a return of $50,000 within 120 days from the very target list of your best lost customers. Tread Partners works only within the tire and auto repair industry. Tread Partners specializes for you. The Retread campaign works and every tire and auto repair shop in North America should be doing it at least once a year. To learn more visit treadpartners.com. Also, please visit tractionsummit.com to learn more. I want to encourage you to visit the website first and maybe even sign up to go to the summit. The Traction Summit of 2024 is hosted in Charlotte, North Carolina. It’s August 13th and 14th, and they’re always looking for new attendees. All right guys, let’s get started. So welcome back Chris Garman and Tommy Gaynor to the Gain Traction Podcast.

Tommy:

Well, thank you for having us.

Mike:

Guys. It’s always a pleasure talking to you guys. I know, heck, we could talk all day I think if we wanted to, but let’s talk a little bit about both of y’all’s careers. Just to go back a little bit, how you got to where you’re at today and where you started. Tommy, you want to start that one?

Tommy:

Sure. I think a lot of people in a family business, a little bit of an untraditional start. I graduated college, was accepted at Oregon Health Science to go into their physician’s assistant program, and that started every August. It took me four and a half years to graduate. So I was home just after Christmastime. And a couple of months after being home my family had two automotive repair shops at the time and a service advisor had quit with no notice one day. My dad came home, we were having dinner as a family and he was pretty stressed out about it and I just kept my head down because I could see where this conversation was going and I didn’t want a lot to do with it.

So doing dishes that night, my mom came up to me and said, “Hey, tomorrow would you go down to the shop and help your dad? They’re really short-staffed the front office.” And I said, “Absolutely not.” And she said, “Please for me, would you go?” I said, “Okay.” So I told my dad, I said, “I’ll come down and help.” I said, “You had me until 4th of July.” I said, “After that, I want to go surfing and do some things before I go to school.” He said, “That’d be great.”

So I went there the first day and this little boy came in with this Ford truck, had an engine problem, and I was like a new puppy all excited, “Okay, let’s talk about it. What do you got? What’s going on?” I wrote him up and ran out to the technician and technician looked at it, I’m just passionate, “What’s wrong with you?” He’s like, “Well, it needs an engine.” I said, “Oh, okay.” So I walked in the waiting room and I told the old boy. I was like, “Well, it needs an engine.” And he said, ‘Okay. How much?” I said, “I don’t know.” I said, “Hold on.”

And I went asked manager, “How much?” He told me, he’s like, “It’s got to be like $3,000 at the time.” And I went back and said, “It’s got to be three grand.” And he said, “Okay.” He said, “Well, can I get a ride home?” I go, “Yeah.” And he said, ‘Well, how long is it going to take?” I said, “Probably a few days. I’d guess it’s big job looks like.” And it was like the worst sales pitch ever. And this guy bought this engine from me and it was like someone put a hair and I loved it and I never left. So fast-forward, 25 years, I guess it’s been grew our company to a decent size and ended up doing a transaction with Chris sitting right here with us, Chris.

Mike:

Well, that’s what I think. So cool. About your relationship, you so Gainer’s Automotive to Sun Auto Tire & service.

Tommy:

Yeah. And Chris and I were in the same 20 group for, I don’t know, eight or 10 years for sure probably. We’ve known each other for going on 12 years now probably. And we’re close through that. I considered us in that group. We’re kind of the leaders, bigger groups of stores, pretty progressive, how we operated controlled our own markets. So we became pretty close through that. And then when Chris’s family, I’ll let him tell his story, transacted, he came and did the deal with me. So it worked out really good.

Mike:

That’s awesome.

Tommy:

Yeah.

Mike:

Chris, tell us about yours situation.

Chris:

Similar story. I was graduating college was, I think I was managing an architecture firm or something like that back in my early 20s and family business. My grandparents bought the business back in the late 1970s. My uncle was partner of my dad at the time, came and asked if I’d come help out just doing some back office stuff for him. And that was January of 2000 and I never left. So-

Mike:

Now did you want to or were you reluctant to help out or were you just filling in? I mean, what was your attitude at the time?

Chris:

No. So I was in business, actually I was in college then, so I didn’t graduate yet, but I was in business school and he had an idea to develop automotive management software it’s kind of a weird… the software at the time, the early 2000 wasn’t good. He was using a DOS space program and he said, ‘Look, I wanted you to come help me develop this software and then when we have a product, you can take that product and sell it to other shops.” So kind of created a small business doing that. And for somebody that was in business school that was intriguing. So it was fun. So go over and work with him and dad and about a year into it… A year and a half into it, the developer we’re working with passed away suddenly in a car accident.

Mike:

Oh, man.

Chris:

It kind of got put on hold and while I was put on hold, I just started. I was in business school, so I took over doing some of the marketing and I took over doing the finances and some of the bookkeeping and I took over the IT and eventually I took over the business. It just was natural that just kind of progressed that way. And we had three stores at the time, built it up to nine stores. I took over full operation of the company in 2005 for president and shortly thereafter, and then we sold the business in 2019 to Sun. Spent the first year running their Phoenix Operations Forum where we took the nine stores and we took it to 15 in that first first year. And then they bought a big acquisition in Phoenix that had about 20 stores, one of my, I guess competitors, but we didn’t really compete anywhere directly against each other.

So we were really good complimentary businesses and they had a full staff in Phoenix and a management team that was already in place. And so the leadership at the time came to me and said, “Hey, we don’t really need you to run operations anymore in Phoenix. Would you be interested in running our M&A team?” And at the time, they didn’t have anybody internal in the company that was doing mergers and acquisition it was just the private equity group that owned us was doing it. So I had done some M&A when we owned our business. And so really it was of interest to me. And so I said, “Yeah. I’ll do that.” And so we took off. We had about 80 stores at the time and we’ve spent the last four years just growing. Today we’re at like 470 stores and we’re in 21 states and growing. So it’s been fun.

Mike:

That’s a cool story. And then you called your buddy Tommy and convinced him to sell, right?

Chris:

I call a lot of buddies, actually. I talked to all my buddies, but a lot of guys that we were in 20 groups with have sold not all to us. Some of them have done their own thing and went with different private equity groups too. But I had approached Tommy, his dad and him at the time were together and his dad was interested and Tommy and I talked about it. And so we put a deal together, but I kind of had it in the back of my head to be fair that I kind of wanted to come work with me anyway, so we’d always talked about working together as it was. And so this was just a good way for us to get a chance to work together and do some fun stuff. So there was ulterior motives in there a little bit.

Mike:

Well, it’s a cool story and it’s cool that you guys are… I mean obviously connected the way you were beforehand, but what Sun has been able to accomplish in such a short period of time and it just appears like, I mean… And I know you guys don’t have like, “Hey, we’re going to do this every year.” Or do whatever but your objective is to find just really good candidates out there and take your time and do it right. And man, I’m going to go ahead and mention this, Chris, because I think this is pretty cool. But you and I were talking about kind of a mantra that you live by. I think it’s kind of important to point out here, you try to find the win-win in life. You want to explain that?

Chris:

I just think it’s in anything you do, any interaction with somebody else or whether it’s a business to business or somebody at the grocery store it’s one of those things that you just I try and do, look at both sides of a transaction to make sure that each of us are happy with the outcome at the end of the day. And if everybody’s happy with the outcome, the end of the day that it was a win for me, it’s a win for you and life’s going to be good. And so it’s simple things like that if we just look at things that way.

And so I do that with business as well, right? We buy a lot of businesses. At the end of the day, I want to be, tell me I want to be friends with you at the end of the day and have a relationship on a different level and not just a business relationship, but I want to be able to call you up and go, “Hey, I’m in Kentucky. Let’s go hunt. Let’s go fish. Let’s go play golf. I’m in town doing something else, but I’d love to connect.” And so if you don’t feel like you won the transaction or you feel like you lost the transaction, whatever that is, then you’re not going to want to do that, right?

Mike:

Yeah. No.

Chris:

You won’t [inaudible 00:10:56] so much. So it’s just a little thing, right?

Mike:

I think that’s so important. I mean, we’re talking about it, but I guess it rings with me because I know people that are in business that anytime I’ve dealt with them, I know they have to feel like they beat you. You know what I mean? And it’s almost miserable. It’s like if I don’t have to deal with them, then I’m not going to. But sometimes there’s certain circumstances where I got to figure out something to do. I need the product service, whatever it may be. But it’s always you got to go in with a big caution flag with yourself and realize whatever angle this guy’s taking, he’s trying to stick me somehow. And that’s just a miserable.

Tommy:

You got to keep your wallet in your front pocket.

Mike:

Exactly.

Chris:

Honey.

Tommy:

[inaudible 00:11:42]. Yeah. I will tell you a little bit about our experience. And I think it’s important for the audience to know that I just like an auto repair. There is a few really bad operators that have given auto repair a black eye-

Mike:

Yup.

Tommy:

… they’re out to get. You don’t know anything about this. They’re going to either bait and switch or give you bad information, overcharge you, whatever the scenario is. We’ve all heard the horror stories that really at the end of the day, almost every operator I’ve ever met is not that guy. They’re just not. I can say the same thing about private equity to a lot of people, they hear the word private equity and they’re like, “Oh God, devil.” They’re the… and-

Mike:

They’re Ready. They’re going to come in here and give me. Yeah.

Tommy:

Yeah. And there are some really bad ones.

Mike:

Yeah.

Tommy:

There that have done some really ugly things. And those are the ones that have given that industry a really bad name. The group we work with, there’s stores that Chris and I have evaluated that we look at, we’re entrepreneurs, we, and our businesses, and we look like, “Oh man, this is a great opportunity. If we just did X, Y, and Z, this thing will be a mint. It’ll be amazing.” And our group sits back and goes, you know what? It’s not right. It’s not the right group, it’s not the right situation. We want to buy really, really good stores, individual stores, if they’re in a market we’re already in, or if we’re going to open a new market, a group of stores, and we want to buy a good team, which is the most important thing we acquire as a team. I mean, we all know in this industry used automotive repair equipment’s not worth a lot. It’s the group of people you’ve put together inside that building that can generate that money. That’s the goal, that’s the value.

Mike:

Yeah. And I think it’s important for people to know that, look, why would I want to replace your team? That’s a pain.

Chris:

No. No. We don’t want to do that. We put a lot of effort and emphasis that our whole process is really designed around retaining people. We do a really good job of retention of teams after we close because we recognize that’s the value. Look, my business was Wilhelm Automotive. It was founded in 1928. It’s going to be 100 year old brand here in a few years. The brand still sits on the outside of the door, but the customers that come in don’t come in to see because it says Wilhelm Automotive. They come in because it’s Jim that’s at the counter and they’ve been seeing Jim, they trust Jim and they’ve been seeing Jim and he’s been taking care of their car for generation or more, right? And it’s Adam and it’s Nancy. It’s those people that they know by first name and that’s why they come in and that’s why they come back, the marketing, the brand that got to maybe in the door the first time, but it’s the people behind the counter.

Mike:

Amen.

Chris:

That relationship that they come back for and so-

Mike:

Well, and the Jim’s and the Nancy’s of the world, from what you guys have told me, they really get relieved after the buyout. And they get the feeling because they realize I got maybe a pay bump. I got more stability I got… ’cause I mean, you’re bringing an economy of scale to the situation. So everybody benefits, right?

Chris:

Yes. The biggest thing they get is opportunity, right?

Mike:

Yeah.

Chris:

So yes, those are all things they get right, opportunity to make more money, they get better benefits. Usually our benefit packages are a little bit better. Nobody goes backwards. Everybody is either the paying benefits of where you were or better when they come on board. But the thing that we can offer a team like that, and I have countless stories of people that worked for me and Tommy as well, that had opportunities to go do something bigger. A technician that was in one of my stores is now a district manager overseeing seven stores, eight stores. One of my managers is now the lead trainer for all of our acquisition teams, right? Those are things that I could never give them the opportunity to do.

And so at some point they were kind of capped out in their careers when I own the business, but now that Sun owns it, the upward mobility to go from a manager to a district manager to move. If you don’t want to live in Phoenix, well you can move and stay with the same company and go to Texas or California or the Northwest or Virginia. We’re all over, we’re 21 states. So that to me is the big thing from an opportunity standpoint is, yeah, the pays great and the benefits are wonderful and there’s always the nervousness, but I think when people get on board with us and they recognize the opportunities that we can give them to go do something different. If you really like marketing, we can probably find a role for you in marketing. We need good people. We love good people. So-

Mike:

No, that’s-

Chris:

… one thing.

Tommy:

Mike, that’s to jump in real quick that I want to touch on. I think it’s really important. Chris’ family business transacted almost five years ago, mind sneaking up on three. And between us we had 14 stores. And I can say, and it’s one thing I know Chris is really proud of, also, all of our managers, all of our tenured service advisors, all the master technicians, all still work there.

Mike:

Wow.

Tommy:

No one’s got fired.

Mike:

That’s a great point, man.

Tommy:

They’re all… I probably shouldn’t say this in case someone from our HR is listening, but I probably found a way to figure out that my team, I was able to take a little peek at W2s the first year to make sure they’re all making more money than they were. I was happy to see that. And it’s been really cool. And like Chris said, and I can say the same thing, my general manager is now the Northwest who he managed, he oversaw our five stores and now he’s the Northwest market director over 30 stores.

Mike:

Man. Yeah.

Tommy:

And talk about his next move would be to a regional vice president.

Mike:

Yeah.

Tommy:

So it’s a lot of fun and it’s really the opportunity that some of our team members have been given has been amazing. I mean, literally that would’ve exciting those opportunities at Gaynor’s Automotive or Wilhelm Automotive.

Chris:

It’s exciting to see.

Mike:

Well, and it’s exciting if you’re an owner out there and you’re listening and you’ve always wondered about this, I mean, you guys put it so transparent and straightforward out there that I know it can be a complicated sell, right? You got to do a lot of research, things like that. But to know these things on the surface to know that, man, I can slip away and everybody that I love and have hired and had for years are going to be in good hands. And in some ways, like you said, they’ve got opportunities that I can’t give them today.

Tommy:

Right.

Chris:

Yeah. I had to say they’re in better hands because that’s not necessarily true, but they’re in just as good of hands. And the upper mobility, the opportunities are things that unless you’re going to go to 30, 40, 50, 100 stores, which happens and that’s awesome. I had love to see businesses do that. But if that’s not in your future, go in with somebody like us. If you want X, it gives your team takes care of your team.

Mike:

Let me ask you a question that comes to mind, and I don’t know that I’ve ever asked this from you guys before, but what if I’m an owner and I say, ‘Okay. I like everything I’ve heard, but if your private equity is… What’s your long-term goal as a company? Get to a certain level and then go public or trade it off or sell it to somebody else, sell it to a bigger fish.” You know what I’m saying?

Chris:

Yeah.

Mike:

What is the long-term goal of Sun if I’m selling into Sun?

Chris:

Well, the long-term goal of Sun is just to continue to grow and build a great company. Sun is the company. Our sponsor we’re backed by a private equity group, but the company is the company. We operate ourselves, we make our own decisions and we’re just trying to build a great company. And that’s the bottom line who sponsors us or is the financial back behind us? We’ll change. It always changed. I will tell you though, that our current sponsor, Leonard Green likes the industry. They like this space. They love Sun. And they’ve been known to invest long term, not just for five to seven years, but to keep assets for longer periods of time. So what does the future old, I don’t really know any of those options are possible. We could get big enough and go public, which happens. We could get sold to a bigger fish. We could get reinvested by B Blender Green. Yes, yes. Yeah. I don’t know. But at the end of the day, sun is the company and the goal of Sun is to build a great company. And-

Mike:

I like to think of it like this. Sun’s the company. You guys are part of that company, the people that are building it right now. They’re not going anywhere, right? And the same managers that are out there, you just mentioned Tommy, all the managers that you guys know, everybody’s in place to continue to the success.

Tommy:

Yes.

Chris:

Yup.

Mike:

Yes.

Chris:

Yeah. We’re led by a great team. Our CEO, Tony Puckett came from Valvoline built a great business there.

Mike:

Well, I’ll tell you another thing that makes him great. He lives in Kentucky.

Chris:

He does that does. Yes, that does.

Mike:

Good answer, guys.

Chris:

Yeah. Have a great team here too. So, yes.

Mike:

That’s awesome.

Tommy:

Yeah. Just like Chris said, there’s a pretty big separation between the private equity we work with our sponsor, however you want to say. That relationship to me, I guess to explain to someone on the outside is almost more like a business and a bank. We want to buy something. We come say, “Hey, here’s a business we want to buy. This is what’s going on. You’re invested in us. Here’s our financials. We think it’s a great opportunity.” They sign off on it, we acquire it.

Mike:

That’s a good way of putting it.

Tommy:

They’re not day-to-day telling us how and what to. That’s Tony and the senior leadership team-

Mike:

Yeah.

Tommy:

… that driving the ship.

Mike:

No. That’s a great way of presenting it. Well, I know we are short on time in this, but what’s the toughest question that you get from prospects or the ones that stick out in their head that you could speak to it this opportunity, if you got somebody to listen out there that doesn’t know what they want to do in the future, but they got an idea thinking about, I don’t know if I want to lead this to my family or if we’re going to sell it, whatever, outside of some of the things we talked about, is there anything else that stands out that you guys can think about that a seller would want to know?

Tommy:

You want to go Chris?

Chris:

No. Go ahead.

Tommy:

I think the constant question is, and I think like I talked earlier about most operators in the automotive retire business are really good people and a lot of them are actually very humble. A lot of them came and started as technicians. So they started with that, I want to help people and solve a problem. That’s where their business started from. They’re that type of people. And so coming from that humble background, I get asked a lot, “If I just have one single store, is that something you guys would even be interested in?” Because I mean, you hear in some of the trade publications, we just bought all the caliber automotive repair stores in Texas, 30 some stores and TGK and Minneapolis, 20 some stores.

I mean, you hear all these big acquisitions that get in the trade papers, but if I just have one single store, is that something you guys would be interested in? And the answer is absolutely yes. If it’s in the market we’re in, if you have a good store, you have a good team. So when you exit and you leave, that team can stand up on its own and operate and still do all the things that it was doing with you as an owner. Absolutely. So that’s a question I get often. It’s kind of this humble, well, I’m not sure if I’m big enough for someone like you guys to be interested in, but yeah, and the answer is yes.

Mike:

Well, and the reality is it’s not going to get the press. Why? ‘Cause it’s one store, right?

Tommy:

One store. So people just don’t know.

Mike:

Yeah. No. And I think that’s a great point for the listeners out there that you guys are interested in everybody from one store on up.

Chris:

Yeah. The other thing-

Tommy:

Chris and I work a little yin and yang like that where Chris has been in this for almost twice as long as I have in the business development/M&A role. And so he has relationships, a lot of those bigger groups and where I work and I’ll go in markets we’re already in and start infilling with these single shops and two shop groups to build out a market. So…

Mike:

That’s awesome.

Tommy:

Yeah.

Mike:

Chris, you want to say something?

Chris:

Yeah. I was going to say, if you thinking about it, if you don’t have a firm plan on how your strategy, you should have an exit strategy if you own a business or you should be thinking about the end at some point ’cause it’s going to happen, right? So you should be thinking about it. Even if you’re not ready. I talked to a lot of people that are in there, guys that own shops in their 30s and late 30s, early 40s. They’re not ready to sell. But having a conversation asking about it, ‘How do you prepare your business to get ready to sell?” ‘Cause it’s a process. If you’re thinking about selling in five years, you should be thinking about what you should be doing now, right?

Even if we’re not in a transaction, I’m happy to have a phone to Tommy same thing. Happy to have a conversation. We both went through the sale process, so we’ve been on that side of the table too. We’ve been on the other side of the table a lot. We do a lot of transactions with big deals. And to Tommy’s point to single deals, the biggest we bought is 70 stores, the Plaza Tire brand. So we’ve done everything in between and we do it a bunch. And so things change. So if you’re curious, you want to have a conversation, you’ve thought about it, you have a question, reach out. We’re happy to have either one of us happy to have a conversation, talk about it. And even if it doesn’t lead anywhere, we just like talk.

Mike:

That’s a good point. Tell the audience how they can reach either one of you guys.

Chris:

Yeah. You can reach me at [email protected] or you can call my cell anytime, which is 602… Is that what you wanted? I don’t know what you wanted.

Mike:

Yeah. Absolutely. I think you’ve got listeners out here. I really think you’ve got listeners. I mean, we’re over 4,000 downloads a month now in this industry, which I think is pretty substantial. And I know that a lot of dealers like to hear from other dealers. You guys are previous dealers, but you’re in a different line of work now and it affects everybody. I think people want to know.

Chris:

We just like to talk shop too, right? I think that’s what we love about this side of the business is that we get to go look at, I love 20 groups. I love to go evaluate, look at somebody’s business and just see what they were doing and how do we make our business better by seeing what other people are doing? What was really loved about 20 groups. So this is kind of being in a constant 20 group. We get look at people’s businesses all the time, get evaluated. It’s awesome. So if you do want to get ahold of me, you can call me on my cell phone 602-697-9474. My email earlier. Tommy, you want to share yours?

Tommy:

Yup. Mine is 867-53… I’m kidding. That’s the emergency phone number. My email is [email protected]. And my cell phone number is 360-798-8998. And yeah, call us, text us. Like Chris said, it is, it’s like being in a constant 20 group because we’ll go, literally, we’re going to go here in a couple of weeks. Chris and I are going to, we’ll fly. So Chris spends his summer with his family on the East Coast and I’m in the West Coast right outside of Portland, Oregon. And we’re going to meet in Memphis, Tennessee, and we’re going to tour down through Mississippi and go visit six or eight shops and play golf with some golf owners and then go to Tuscaloosa, Alabama and look at some stores and fly out of to Birmingham. So we’re going to make a whole road show out of it.

So it’s, we’re going to get to see probably six or eight really nice tire stores in that region that we have the Delta brand there that we’d love to grow-

Mike:

Nice.

Tommy:

… in Louisiana and just in the Mississippi. We’d love to grow that Mississippi and Alabama region. So we’re going to spend some time down there. And I mean, we do this quite often. That’s what we do. I mean, not always together, but when we’re going to hit a bunch of stores like that, we’d like to put a couple eyes on them. And so yeah, like Chris said, it’s like being in a 20 group.

Mike:

That’s awesome. I love that example. Well, and it resonates. All right. So let’s go back on a little bit on the personal side. Tommy, I think you said you got a good story to make the audience laugh.

Tommy:

Yeah. Maybe make them laugh, but hopefully to give them a little nugget of information that I really think changed the way I operated my stores and really made successful. So my mentor, John, who’s been my mentor for probably 20 years now. Shortly after I started as the general manager in our group, when my dad was still the president operating, I asked my friend John, I said, “Hey, I said, you own 22 new car dealerships.” I said, “Would you come and shadow me? I want you to tell me what I’m doing good, what I’m doing bad, how I can get better.” And he said, “Great.” He came and he followed me around for a day and he took a bunch of notes I could see.

And we went to dinner that night and he said, “Man, I got a compliment.” He says, “You’re in 20.” He said, “You really understand the numbers. You understand your business. Everybody knows you, everybody respects you. I can tell you’re a good manager and a good operator.” But he said, “Kind of an asshole.” And he said… I said, “This kind of taken back. What do you mean?” He said, “I watched you all day long. He said, you identified every problem you saw and you didn’t tell one person thank you. And you didn’t tell one person they were doing a great job.”

So he reached his hand out and I was kind of scared to take what he had in his hand. He handed me five nickels and said, “I want you to put these in your right pocket tomorrow morning.” And he said, ‘You can’t leave the shops until you… Every time you tell someone thank you or they’re doing a good job, you take one of those nickels and move it to your left pocket. Until those nickels are in your left pocket, you can’t leave.” And it took me a month to where I didn’t have to think about it. And there was some days it was 3:30 or 4:00 and I reached my pocket and I still had five nickels in that right pocket. And I had to find some real easy layups to tell people like, “Hey, geez, Mike, thanks for coming in today. Your toolbox is nice and clean and that’s a great work area.”

Mike:

That’s where everybody, those days, everybody’s like, “What’s Tommy’s deal?”

Tommy:

Yeah. “What’s wrong with him?” Yeah. Geez, I took some happy pills. But my mantra-

Mike:

That’s great advice, man.

Tommy:

… my mantra after that was to raise the attitude with gratitude and you can raise everyone’s attitude with just a little bit of gratitude. It’s amazing how once I got doing that and it made me happier. I was a happier person. I wasn’t on the war path all the time. I was excited when we came across problems like, “Okay. We’ve done a good job. We got a problem here. Let’s figure out how we’re get past it. Keep moving.”

Mike:

Listen, I wasn’t a literature guy or an English guy in high school or college, but I do remember this one poem from Robert Frost and he talked about everybody being… He looked at everybody as a superior because everybody is better than me in something and in there I can learn something from everybody. That was the way he kept himself grounded with humility that everybody is better than me at something and there’s something I can learn from this guy. I always thought, and that’s kind what you reminded me of, just recognizing the people that you work with and giving them gratitude for whatever it is that’s benefiting the company.

Tommy:

Right.

Chris:

What’s that saying is if you’re the smartest guy in the room, you’re in the wrong room.

Tommy:

You’re in the wrong room. Yeah.

Chris:

You got the wrong people. I mean, I believe that too. You surround you with great people and you’re going to be successful. I think the business owners that we’re buying, those companies we’re buying are doing the same thing. The people that work for them are super valuable. They understand that they put great people in great positions to be successful. I think we’re doing the same thing.

Mike:

That’s awesome. Well guys, you guys have similar hobbies too, don’t you? On a personal level?

Tommy:

A little bit.

Mike:

You like to race?

Tommy:

Yeah.

Chris:

Tommy [inaudible 00:32:56] I love to go off-road. We like to be in fast cars one way or the other. So mine are typically in the dunes or out in the desert. Tommy’s are typically on a track.

Mike:

He likes that drag racing, right?

Tommy:

Yes. I do. Yup. My son and I race and my father used to NHRA Super Stock travel all over, I don’t know the Midwest, to the West Coast. And we raced in Billings, Montana this weekend. We’re in Woodburn, Oregon next weekend. Yeah. So we traveled quite a bit. But Chris, I think he’s selling himself short. Tell him about your trip you just took in Mexico.

Chris:

Oh, yeah. Well, we got a guy that works for us. One of our RVPs has a place down there and does kind of like a Baja trip. So we spent a week, my daughter and I went down and took our side-by-sides down and traveled through Baja doing some of the Baja 500 and 1,000 kind of tracks and running 200 miles a day, 150 miles a day down between different cities. And so we stayed in hotels and kind of worked our way all the way down to Peninsula and then back up. It was awesome. Had a great… Yeah.

Mike:

That’s fantastic. Yeah. Man, that’s a bigger stretch than that drag racing that-

Chris:

It is. Yeah. I can function for eight seconds at a time and then I need to have a break. But this is going for days and days. Yeah. We were out for a while. Well, though, it was good. We had a good time. It was fun.

Mike:

That’s awesome. Well guys, I can’t thank you enough for being part of Gain Traction. It’s been great having you.

Tommy:

Thanks, Mike.

Chris:

Appreciate the invite. Always a pleasure.

Mike:

So to all our listeners out there, thank you for being part of the podcast. We’re very grateful for you. If you would like to recommend a guest to me, please email me at [email protected]. Until next time, be safe, be grateful, and have a great day.

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