Editor’s note:
To buy something as big as a house or a car, the last thing that one wants is to be taken advantage of. For those newly immigrated to America, this is even so, due to their language barrier.
Which car to buy? You decide. Which dealer to visit? We try to provide some useful information. From now on, the Epoch Times Auto Page will run a series featured articles —the interview of those dealership in Greater New York area, which are with the highest BBB Rating—“A+” and/or BBB Accredited. These can be the reference for those who are buying a car.
BBB (Better Business Bureau), founded in 1912, is not a government agency, but a private business franchise of local BBB organizations based in the United States and Canada, which work together through the Council of Better Business Bureaus (CBBB).
The goal of BBB is to foster a fair and effective marketplace, so that buyers and sellers can trust each other—“Start With Trust”.
NEW YORK—While the auto industry has been hit hard during the crisis, especially in the early of this year, if you were told by a dealership that the business was “Wonderfully Good”, what would be your first response? Do you think he is self suaving, or, stating the fact?
Let’s listen to The Tales of Two Marks, from Mark Lacher—the owner and Mark Harrington—the general manager, of Koeppel Nissan on Northern Blvd of Queens New York.
The Scenery on This Side is Not Bad
Mark Harrington worked in this dealership 20 years ago. Recently he came back from Philadelphia to the once familiar environment. “We almost 100% doubled last year’s President’s Day sale,” said Harrington, “Customers were saying like ‘I thought the economy is bad, but doesn’t seem like it’s bad in this show room’.”
If all one hears everyday is nothing but bad news, then he would either worry or be scared to death. Harrington has his own way to deal with it: “The news sensationalizes it and you got drawn in to watch them. Don’t even listen to them. I don’t want to hear it; I don’t want to understand it. I just want to know how I can continue selling those cars.”
Located in one of the most dealership populated region on Northern Blvd., Harrington doesn’t care much about how other dealerships are doing, either: “No matter the whole industry sells 17 million or 9 million cars, we just want maintain the piece of the pie that we have been getting. If you have treated your customer right in the past, in this recessionary time they will come back to you. They will be faithful to you.”
Selling Cars is More of Selling the Dealership
Harrington understands that the customers come to the dealership for its value. He believes the most important thing is to keep a long and trustworthy customer relationship.
“People want to know that you give them a fair deal, you are honest with them, you treat them right, and you will remember to treat them right after they hand you the money for the car then come back for the service. You pay attention to the entire relationship. That’s what actually sells the cars.” said Harrington.
Harrington oftentimes says, “It’s the relationship, not the building, not the car itself. It doesn’t matter what car I have to sell. What is important is the value of the customer that is coming to you. Really taking care of them, that’s the key.”
BBB Accredited Business With Customer Satisfactory Record
When told of the negative impression people have toward the car dealership and car sales person, Harrington was not offended at all, “We earned this reputation. We’ve done it to ourselves. The sad thing about this whole thing is that you now have people who have no trust and no faith in your business because you have exploited the innocent people and taken advantage of them.”
“When I came back, I wanted to know where we stand in relations to the customers. I went to pull out Koeppel Nissan (from BBB) to find out how they have been. I got a good idea – the important thing, that is – the customers have been taken good care of.”
Mr. Lacher said Koeppel Nissan sells over 6,000 cars a year and service about 50,000 cars. It’s not easy to keep the customer satisfactory record. For this Mark Lacher also takes great confidence and pride in: “You go to Consumer Affairs department, Attorney General office, or BBB, and put my name in it. We’ve got a perfect record.”
Harrington said that he came back is because he and the owner shares the same business philosophy, “The owners of this store are very grounded. They understand why they are in business today. It’s the only reason that I came back. If they were doing some of the tactics that other car dealers do, I would not come back here, because I don’t need to come back.”
‘It’s a moral sin to take advantage of the new immigrants’
Harrington thinks it’s a shame to lose the trust and faith of customers by taking advantage: “Hispanics, Koreans, Chinese, they come to this country as immigrants. They come here for their American dreams. They are handicapped with the language barrier.”
“They come from countries that they learned to trust people. They went to a merchant to buy a car. That merchant says ‘Yeah yeah yeah buy this car.’ They do it because they want to trust somebody. Then they found out that they were taken advantage of because of language barrier. That is absolutely moral sin.”
Harrington advises the consumers to do some homework before going to a dealership: “One of the places the consumers should go is the Better Business Bureau (BBB). Before people spend their money, they should really do research.”
Win Back the Trust by Serving the Community Better
Speaking of all those that should not have happened in the past decade, like Madoff’s huge ponze scheme, Harrington understands the disappointment and frustration of people.
“Look at the greed! It has destroyed the workings of the system. I as an individual, we as a company, we are not going to change everybody’s mind. I can only do it one customer at time. I can only do it when I am out in the community,” said Harrington.
“Whether it’s in the churches, whether it’s politically, whether it’s cleaning up graffiti’s on the side of the buildings to make the neighborhood look better, whether it’s taking an abandoned lot and make it a garden, whether it’s putting up a cloth drive to send clothes to Haiti, until you put yourself out there and involve yourself with the people, until you understand them and they understand you, you don’t break that negative feeling”, Mr. Harrington believes such sincere effort will naturally be rewarded.
Help Customers Buy a Proper Car
Growing up in Astoria Queens, starting as a car sales person, Mark Lacher has worked as a department manager, general manager, all the way to be the owner of Koeppel Nissan.
“There is nothing wrong for a dealership to sell the cars and make some profit,” said Lacher. However, he believes there is a difference whether you just want to sell a car or you are really helping find a car that the customer needs.
“I really try to guide a person to the proper car, after they tell me about themselves, what they want, what they need, how many miles they drive, and what the financial capabilities are. I try to put them into something that at least with 5 years of warranty with reasonable money. To sell the right car at the right price to the right person. No problems, no issues with the car. If an issue does come up, I want to offer them an extended warranty that I never have to see No to them.”
Lacher understands that buying a car is no small thing, “Around here, most people rent an apartment or loan a house. For these people, a car is freedom; it’s their summer vacation; they go to Jones Beach; they go up to Bear Mountains; this makes their life beautiful. It’s one of their biggest purchases. It’s a big thing for them. That’s why I try to tell all my people to make sure they understand this,” said Lacher.
Lacher said people can get low price everywhere yet price is not the key factor for the car buyer and the dealer simply cannot give it for too low: “Unless you want to lose money, otherwise there never can be a big difference in car price. The main thing is that when people spending their money whether they get respect, and whether they feel that people really care about them. We take care of them all the time as long as they own the car.”
The Essence of Doing Business is Make as Many Friends
When coming to the point that consumers tend to buy things according to the size and frequency of the advertising of that merchants, Harrington sees nothing wrong with the advertisement. However, he emphasize that it’s essential to keep those words in the AD, because the community is so small that both good and bad news spread fast:
“Your words are one thing, and your actions speak another way. In the long run it’s your actions that make the big difference. My mission of coming back here is going to be: to at least offer to this community, to all those different cultures, that I want to be a business that guarantee in providing a service that people can trust, people can rely on the fact that they can come here and buy a vehicle.”
“We are not going to be taken advantage of because of any of those handicaps in language barriers, and any of those stuff,” Harrington believes that goes around comes around, “That’s not going to happen, because down the road, life is a circle. It will come back to you. I want people in this community to know that there is a place that they can go in good conscience. When they go away, they’ve got a fair deal, and they have been treated with the respect that they deserve.”
“If you get rid of that stupidity of greed, understand, listen, there is nothing wrong to make a little nit of money on everybody. I would rather make a little money, say, a dollar, on a million people, than a million dollars on one,” said Harrington.
“They are both the same thing, you make a million dollars. But the difference is you now have a million people that come back to you. The guy you took for a million, when he realize that you took him too m much money, he is not going to come back. Friend is gone, everything is gone.”
To Give Back
Mr. Lacher said Koeppel Nissan has been in this business for 26 years, with 3 franchises: Mazda, and Volkswagen. He used to be passionate about it and still love to do it. Now his passion expands and focus shifts.
“I really like to do charity work. I just come back from Ecuador. A friend of mine is a plastic surgeon. Like smile train, we did this kind of work. We go to a little town called Tena. I funded the trip from my own money. You do that because you’ve got to give back. I try to do more every year. We have been doing that for 6 years,” said Mark Lacher.
Lacher prefer to do things that can be improved instead of maintain the status-quo: “If I see somebody begging on the street, I give them money. You just can’t walk pass it.” Lacher called this type of giving as “maintenance” where this person may keep begging all the time as long as there are people willing to give.
“I like giving money to get thing improved. By improvement, maybe at a certain point you finish it. By maintain, you never finish,” this is why Lacher likes to do cleft charity, “Once it’s done, it’s done. It is done at very young age, with no mental scars. And you feel good upon seeing the change the plastic surgery makes on the kids.”
Harrington believes one can only do business when he learns how to give: “Not how much money you have, how big your house is, None of these stuff going with you. At the end of the day. Life is all over, we only have our character. What left are our memories. That’s what eternal, what people think of you, what you did on this earth to give back, all the blessings that you have. That’s what matters the most.”
