Another New Year Resolution...
Just like most of the population in the United States I am making my New Years Resolutions. Unlike most of the population of the United States, I'm dumb enough to put them in a blog post. And since this blog is attached to my Auto Auction website I will tell you my hopes and goals for the auto auction this year. They are pretty simple and I think achievable and the nice thing is, I can look at this in 2017 and see if they happened.
- Double the number of cars that we run through this year. In 2015 over 2000 cars went through Blackmon Auto Auction. For some auctions, that doesn't seem like many. For our second year in business I consider that a good number. We sold a majority of those in the last four months so that shows growth. I'd like to run over 4,000 through in 2016 (or 10,000 but I have to make my goals achievable).
- Get to a point where we are running two lanes of cars each week. We have the room and the ability to easily run two lanes of cars and if we double the number of cars then we need to double the lanes. My goal has always been to get my buyers in and out of the auction in less than an hour and a half. Being open to the public, we have buyers that come to us during their lunch hour and have to be back to work by 1:00. We want to get you in and out as fast yet as efficiently as possible.
- Become the "go to" location in Central Arkansas for the public to buy and sell cars at auction. It is the MOST effiecient way to buy and sell a car. But, don't think we don't appreciate our dealers! Without the dealers and their consistent supply of trade ins and old stock, we wouldn't be in business. We have to keep the perfect mix of public and dealers to stay in business and we appreciate both groups of buyers and sellers.
- And lastly, try to treat all of my customers with respect and honesty. That sounds just like every other business out there but in the used car business, those words are very important. It's not that car dealers are dishonest, but they are selling a product that is prone to break down without notice or have big problems that can't be seen. Have you ever got into your car, started it, drove for 2 miles and something breaks? I have. Now can you imagine selling your car and having that happen to the new buyer? That is what car dealers have to deal with on a constant basis. All you can do when something like happens is deal with it with respect to your buyer and with honesty. Do unto others as you would have them do unto you... even if it hurts a little bit. You know how to tell if you are doing the right thing? Most of the time it is tough to do.
Come see us. Every friday at noon at 5809 South University in Little Rock. Check back next January and see if my New Years Resolutions actually worked out! I hope I ended up looking more like Babe Ruth calling his shot and not Evel Knievel jumpting the canyon.
Thomas