Convention mood from NADA in San Francisco projects an industry on its game again

Convention mood from NADA in San Francisco projects an industry on its game again

WANADA dealer members joined their counterparts in San Francisco, CA, last week for the 2011 NADA Convention, and if one message came through loud and clear, its that business isnt bad, its good. Attendance at the annual convention, appropriately themed a bright future ahead, was far better than that of last year, as was the San Francisco weather, which offered up sunny skies and 70 degree temperatures each day, a stark contrast to the cold and rainy days conventioneers endured in Florida last year.

Jim Lentz, COO of Toyota Motor Sales/USA, keynoted the opening general session, urging dealers to pay attention to two groups that are ever more critical to their profitability: women and Hispanics. In the same session, the gavel passed from outgoing NADA chairman and Oregon dealer, Ed Tonkin, to Steven Wade, a multi-franchised dealer from St. George, Utah.

Tonkin and Wade both acknowledged that the dealer community was not only coming back from the financially depressed years of 2009-2010, but moving forward as a more unified group. Weve never had more challenging years than the last several that tested our resolve, both in the automobile business and on Capitol Hill, said Tonkin. In this latter regard, Tonkin praised the state and metro dealer association network, Automotive Trade Associations (ATAE), through which NADA worked to steer dealers clear of inclusion in the draconian Finance Reform law that passed Congress last fall.

Tonkin, a second generation NADA chairman and dealer since 1981, said the victory over the burdensome new finance requirements would not have been possible without dealers impressive grass-roots action. Simply put, the deck was absolutely stacked against us, Tonkin said. This was a grass-roots effort the likes of which Washington has never seen.

Incoming Chairman Wade said that he was looking forward to working with manufacturers, regulators and Congress to ensure that the nations economic recovery continues as vehicle sales rebound this year. And even though NADA succeeded last year in protecting dealer-assisted financing from the burdensome and unnecessary regulatory structure of the new Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB), Wade said that auto loans are still very much under scrutiny, which challenges an already stressed part of our business. On the other hand, Wade conceded, new vehicle sales are trending upward at a robust pace from where the industry was in 2009.

Going forward, well work with Congress and the regulators to structure the CFPBs rules in a way that works in the real world for dealers and our customers, Wade added.