According to an Associated Press (AP) report, the clearest evidence to date of women’s increasing presence at the helm of US car dealerships could be found over the weekend at the renowned Plimsoll Club on top of the World Trade Centre in New Orleans.
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After 88 years of meeting annually to discuss avenues for selling more cars and trucks, the National Automobile Dealers Association (NADA) held its first full-fledged gathering for women dealers – a breakfast on Saturday that attracted upward of 200 dealers as well as other women with management and sales positions at their respective shops, AP said.
Twenty years ago, a similar function might have drawn a handful of women owners, because that’s about all there was, the report noted.
Last year, however, nearly 7% of the nation’s approximately 20,000 franchised new vehicle dealerships were owned by women, AP said, citing CNW Marketing Research of Bandon, Oregon. That’s up from 2.9% in 1990 and 5.9% in 2000.
Observers reportedly say the growing trend of female ownership is a sign the multibillion-dollar, male-dominated industry is further embracing the realities of the American marketplace, where statistics show that women act alone or have a say in roughly 80% of all vehicle purchases.
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By GlobalData“People like to see people like them when they come into a dealership,” Barbara Lupient, chief executive of Minneapolis-based Lupient Automotive Group, which owns 37 franchises in 15 locations in Minnesota and Wisconsin, told the Associated Press.
AP said that in the past, women attendees at the annual NADA convention were largely dealers’ wives, but the brand meetings and training sessions are becoming more populated by women owners, managers and sales representatives.
What’s more, though hard statistics are difficult to come by, automakers and analysts say women dealers generally are at least as successful as their male counterparts, AP added.
“When we look at the performance of our female dealers, they’re at parity with the majority – which means their profitability, their sales effectiveness is on par with male dealers,” Patricia Roberts, who head of General Motors’ Women’s Retail Initiative, told the news agency. The initiative was launched in 2001 to increase the number of women-owned car businesses.
Marianne McInerney, president of the American International Automobile Dealers Association, told AP a listing of the top 20 retail dealers among several foreign nameplates would include strong representation from women.
The number of women-owned, foreign-brand stores grew from 115 in 1997 to 558 last year, according to the AIADA, which represents 7,200 dealers, the report said.
McInerney reportedly said she expects the number of women owners to reach 600 by year’s end and to grow significantly in the next few years. First, she said, companies such as Honda and BMW are making aggressive efforts to recruit more women and minority owners. Also, some Asian nameplates continue to expand their US dealer networks.
According to the Associated Press, since starting its women’s retail initiative four years ago, GM has added 63 women owners, bringing its overall number to 262 – about 3% of its 7,400 dealers. Ford reportedly said its women-dealer rolls have grown from 231 in 1997 to 342 at the end of 2004, more than 6% of its dealer population.
AP noted that, in some cases, women dealers are wives who succeeded their late husbands, or daughters who bought or inherited the business from their fathers. Barbara Lupient said she began her evolution to the top of Lupient Automotive Group when her husband, founder Jim Lupient, was diagnosed with Parkinson’s disease in 1988. She’s the first female to sit on GM’s National Dealer Council.
Roberts told the Associated Press that GM’s biggest obstacle to increasing its women-dealer ranks isn’t finding potential owners – it’s locating car businesses for sale. With Americans buying new vehicles at or near record levels for the past several years, most owners are hanging on to their lots.
“We have more women with capital who want to become dealers than we have opportunities each year,” Roberts reportedly said.
Art Spinella, president of CNW, told the Associated Press that his staffers who visit women-owned dealerships to gather data – researchers known as “mystery shoppers” – typically find operations not too different from those run by men. The one exception: stores owned by women typically have more women on the job, not only on the showroom floor but in the service bays and finance and insurance departments.
Spinella reportedly said it might make good business sense for some women dealers to note their ownership status in advertisements. The reason: men generally aren’t concerned who owns the business, but women are more apt to gravitate to a dealership with a woman in charge.
“It used to be that women-owned dealerships never made mention of the fact that a woman owned it,” Spinella told the Associated Press, adding: “That’s not always the case now, and for good reason. It tends to work in their favour.”
