What To Expect from the CAR Conference 2023

Jeremy Louisos talks with Martin Romjue, show chairman for the CAR Conference 2023, about the event, how it’s different from previous years, what to expect when you attend, and how to get most out of the show.

Jeremy Louisos: Hi, my name is Jeremy Louisos and I’m here today with Martin Romjue, Fleet Content Director at Bobit and show Chairman for the CAR Conference 2023. Our topic today is CAR Conference 2023, an event beginning March 28th at Caesars Palace in Las Vegas where consigners and auctions connect. Welcome, Martin.

Martin Romjue: Hi Jeremy, and thanks for having me. Good to be here.

What Can Attendees of CAR Conference 2023 Expect?

Jeremy: Yeah, well, I appreciate you jumping on. I’m sure you’re a busy person these days, getting ready, final moments before the show. I was really excited to talk to you. First topic here is, what can attendees of CAR conference 2023 look forward to at this year’s show?

Martin: Well, one of the first things they can look forward to is more attendees. We’re trending 20% ahead of where we were last year in this cycle. I think we’re seeing just a gradual pickup since the whole COVID fiasco. We’ve just noticed numbers going up for the last three years. You will definitely see some new faces. You will see more people from the diverse segments of the remarketing industry, and that means there’s a prime opportunity for networking and even reuniting. There might be some people there who were not there in ’21 and ’22.

Jeremy: That’s always one of my favorite parts, kind of the class reunion vibe at these shows. The thing I love most about CAR Conference is it’s really an intimate show. I mean, I’m glad to hear there’ll be more attendees over previous years, but I kind of like that it’s a smaller, more intimate show. I find that the conversations I have there are really quality, with some really top-level people.

What’s Different From Previous Years?

Aside from attendance, is there anything different this year from previous years?

Martin: Yeah, we’re experimenting with different formats. I mean, this is always a work in progress. In addition to the keynotes and the traditional panel discussions, we’re going to have workshops and some round tables that will engage the audience more. We really want people to be involved, and trying to get away from more of that classroom vibe where you just sit there and pay attention for 50 minutes. We certainly welcome audience questions as usual, but the workshops, the two that we have will be more problem solving. We had one last year and it was a big hit.

Then of course we’ll have what we call a giant round table. It’s almost like a talk show format where you have a moderator with some people on stage and some in the audience and they’ll pop up and just kind of get the conversation going.

Jeremy: I love the sound of that interactive experience. I think there are a lot of folks that are engaged in the content, and allowing them more avenues to connect with the presenters or the folks that are up on the stage. Then on the other side of that, I think the people that are on stage will benefit from getting that immediate responsive feedback. Maybe something spontaneous happens that we all learn from. I think that that certainly would add some excitement to the event.

The CAR Conference App & Networking

Martin: Yeah. We also have an app. That’s always an interactive opportunity. You can keep track of people and schedules throughout the event. The app is something that’s always improving. I was asked “if you had the CAR app before, can you use the previous one”? Clearly no, because you want to get the new one and re-download it and just get the latest and the greatest. That’s kind of an important part of the experience.

Just to add to the whole networking aspect and you saying it’s an intimate event, you can network anywhere. As anyone who attends these conferences knows, it can happen in the hallways, it can happen in the back of the session rooms, at the exhibit floor over meals. Guaranteed you will be running into most people who are attending the conference. It’s a great place to either build or cement business alliances, to connect with new clients, new business opportunities. Of course, there are always attendees who carve out their own business dinners in the evenings, which is why we don’t really schedule anything in the evenings. Because it is Las Vegas, you have tons of restaurants to choose from, and that’s also where a lot of the networking happens.

Jeremy: That’s great. You mentioned the app. For folks looking to download that app, where would be the best place for them to find it?

Martin: Just the usual places. The Apple and the… What’s the other one?

Jeremy: Apple and the Play Store for Google, I believe.

Martin: Yeah, yeah. That’s the best place to get them. You download something called Bobit Events and then you just choose Conference of Automotive and Marketing within that.

Can’t-Miss Sessions

Jeremy: Perfect. Talking about some of these great speakers and great sessions, do you have any can’t-miss sessions? You might be in a position where that’s tough to pick a few among all of the great content, but are there any that for you personally, you’re like, “Hey, this is one that I really want to make sure I check out?”

Martin: Well, I really should say you can’t miss any of them because it is a complete conference and there is value in all of these sessions, and it’s a matter of just showing up. We do have places where there are choices of going from one thing or the other, but if I had to just pick five standouts that you definitely want to be at, it would be the keynote address on Wednesday morning the 29th. We have Lieutenant Colonel Dan Rooney from the US Air Force. He’s a real life Top Gun pilot, and now he’s also the CEO of Folds of Honor. He will no doubt be giving a very engaging presentation. There’ll be video, there’ll be effects, and he’s definitely going to get it off to a great start. His topic is “Fly into the Wind: How to Harness Faith and Fearlessness on Your Ascent to Greatness”. There are a lot of techniques and principles that the fighter pilots follow that can apply to the business world. That’s something you definitely want to be part of.

The other thing is, it’s one of the main anchors of the CAR conference, and it has been that way for years. It’s our annual economics and markets panel. As you can imagine, it’s highly relevant this year given everything that’s going on in the economy and in the wider markets. This year we’re going to have a fourth economist who’s appearing for the first time, which is John Coles from ACV Auctions. He’ll be joining the usual analysts, Jonathan Smoke, Alex Yurchenko and Tom Contos. This is a one hour session that is really going to go into how the post-pandemic economy is shaping up, and what everything from rising interest rates to inflation to supply chain constraints is going to mean for the remarketing industry.

Then the next day we have two general session panels. The first one is early in the morning, it’s geared towards consignors. In fact, we are bringing back my predecessor, Mike Antich, known as Mr. Fleet, who pretty much knows everyone and everything. He will be hosting a panel with some top executives from some of the leading consignors.

Then as a follow on to that in the early afternoon, Charlie Vogelheim, who’s the official MC of the event, will be hosting auction executives from three different companies. They will look at the state of the auctions. Just like with the consignors, we’ll really get into what are some of the most recent developments and how is it affecting the industry overall.

We’re also looking forward to the end of the conference because we have a closing keynote from JD Power, and they of course have always been a reliable source of all kinds of analysis and information. Their vice president, David Sargent is going to walk us through a global outlook and what we can expect for the future.

Those are kind of what I call the Big Five, but in between, I mean, I can take up two hours here and go through every single panel and session. We have the complete agenda now, fully updated at carconference.com, and you can click on that and also see who all the speakers are. We have all the photos up, and definitely a lot there to consume.

Bobit, IARA, and NAAA

Jeremy: Awesome. Martin, this show that Bobit puts on is kind of a combined event with IARA and NAAA. Can you maybe break that down for us, how that all works?

Martin: Yeah. The IARA and the NAAA are valuable. I mean, there are all kinds of terms, but they’re partners. They’re official partners at the conference and they definitely help out with the programming. In fact, the IARA is going to be hosting some interactive workshops on Tuesday. Because the conference officially starts Tuesday at 1:00, and these interactive workshops will be a good way to just warm things up. They’re, of course, constantly looking for feedback from industry members, so their top leaders will be there. Then that goes into the opening reception, which is hosted by them. Then they will have two panel discussions on Wednesday morning that kind of play off of the interactive workshops that they had in the afternoon.

The remarkable thing about the IARA is they of course bill themselves as the voice of the consignors, but they have grown into such a comprehensive group that you get people from all facets of remarketing – auctions, auto transporters, recon people, they’re all part of the IARA and they have really put out a professional menu of training and business development that attendees will definitely want to check out.

Of course they’ll have their booth, so as we always say, if you’re not an IARA member, this is the best place and the best time to learn about it and to sign up and to really get some good ROI on your career and also for your business.

Jeremy: Yeah, Martin, I would co-sign all that with IARA. As a subcommittee co-chair, I’ve found a lot of benefit. I mean, just learning about what’s going on in the industry. I mean, my neck of the woods is all auto logistics, so I’m learning tons about the entire remarketing landscape that I had never known, and working with some of the most talented people out there. Like I said, they’re all going to be out there at CAR conference. That makes this all the more powerful of an event to attend if you’re really trying to learn something.

Martin: In fact, I believe you’re going to be on a panel too, on, is it Wednesday morning or are you on Tuesday?

Jeremy: I will, yes. My committee, the Industry Advancement Committee will be talking on Tuesday and that’s open to the public. All those committee meetings, we really welcome people to jump in and join the conversation.

Then on Wednesday I’ll be joining… Tom Stewart’s hosting, but I’ll be there with Michele Pierog, John Mathiowetz and Doug Turner, and we’re going to be talking about how IARA is really making sure that our entire membership base going to be EV ready. It’s coming. We’re fielding a lot of questions about that, so we’re excited to share what we’ve found so far and inviting folks to kind of jump on that journey with us.

Martin: I also need to mention the NAAA will be doing State of the Industry when we kick things off on day two. They definitely have some good insights as to what’s going on. I call it the perfect winning combo for three organizations.

How Can People Get The Most Out of CAR Conference 2023?

Jeremy: That’s well said, Martin. With so much going on, we always like to end with this question. How can folks get the most out of this experience? Do you have any advice for those trying to see it and do at all?

Martin: First of all, show up. I mean, Vegas is a very distracting place, so you definitely want to show up, especially in the morning. There is a consignor’s only event 8:30 to 9:30 on Thursday morning, so for a lot of our attendees, that’s a must-do. I would say just to get to as many sessions as possible, to listen in. I noticed that it is possible to what I call hopscotch. You go into a session, you listen for 10 minutes, you see somebody you know, you go out to the concourse of the hallway, you network, you talk, you go back in, you hopscotch to another session. I think you pretty much understand the flow. While that might not be the most disciplined thing in terms of staying in a session the full time, it is a way to get the most out of it, to just keep circulating, keep moving, keep listening, and flag as many people as you can.

Of course the exhibit hall is an excellent place to take a break. We’re going to have food and beverage there. The exhibitors, I notice a lot of spontaneous conversations pop up when people are going to the exhibitors and they’re seeing people they know and they talk about the product and then they talk to each other. It’s not just about what’s being exhibited, it’s once again, organic conversations bubbling up and the exhibitors are kind of a way to spark that. That’s kind of it in a nutshell.

Jeremy: Martin, that’s great advice. That’s show up, that’s keep it moving, maybe even try the hopscotch method – I like that – then finally, I totally co-sign on this one, connect with the exhibitors. If you’re going to grab a meal or breakfast or lunch, whatever, make sure you talk to the exhibitors. I think that’s all great advice.

Well, thank you so much for bringing us through all that, Martin. For folks that are looking to connect with you at CAR Conference 2023, how can they do that?

Martin: Well, through the app and through carconference.com, and of course I’ll be on site. One of the things I find at these more intimate conferences is everyone is very accessible. There might be moments when people are running around, but it’s, like I said, it’s a calm, laid back vibe. I’ve been to trade shows where it’s in the thousands and it’s very different. That’s definitely a way to also get the most out of it.

Jeremy: Well, that’s perfect. I look forward to seeing you there. Everyone listening, you can catch the PAL team at CAR Conference 2023 in Las Vegas at Caesars Palace, and anytime at preownedautologistics.com. Thanks for listening.

Used Car Week 2022 (with Joe Overby of Auto Remarketing)

Jeremy Louisos from Preowned Auto Logistics talks with Joe Overby from Auto Remarketing about Used Car Week 2022 in San Diego, including how this week combines five conferences in one, and what to expect from this year’s conference.

Jeremy Louisos:            Hi, my name is Jeremy Louisos and I’m here today with Joe Overby, Senior Editor at Auto Remarketing, the news media for the pre-owned auto industry. Our topic today is Used Car Week 2022, an event beginning November 14th in San Diego, California, combining five different conferences uniting all corners of the used car industry. Welcome, Joe.

Joe Overby:      Jeremy, it’s so good to talk with you and appreciate you having me on.

Jeremy:            It’s a pleasure, yeah. We did this thing last year ahead of the event. It was our first time attending Used Car Week and you gave us a great rundown. We are very excited to have you back and pick up this conversation again. Just jumping right into it, who attends Used Car Week and why?

Who Attends Used Car Week?

Joe:      Yeah, so it kind of runs the spectrum of people in the auto industry. I’ve actually got an attendee list pulled up here. It’s a couple weeks old, but I mean, just looking at some of the names and companies they work in, I mean, we have dealers, we have auto auctions, companies that work with both, a lot of the tech providers, a lot of the vendors in the space, transportation companies, auto finance companies, people that work with auto auctions, the reconditioning companies, companies that do online auctions, some of the trade groups. It really spans the spectrum of retail, remarketing, the collections and recovery space.

Then one of our relatively new conferences that we’ve added to Used Car Week is the NAVIcon. That gets into the investment and VC, venture capital, portions of automotive and a lot of startups. A lot of the auto makers, a lot of the companies that have CPO programs, they’re here for the pre-owned con. So it really runs kind of a wide array of automotive companies, anybody who operates in used cars to some degree.

Jeremy: Yeah. Looking over that guest list myself, and then from my own experience last year, it really seems like there is something for everybody, and you’ve put some thought into really encapsulating that whole used car industry ecosystem. Very commendable there and I look forward to trying to soak in as much of it as I can. We’ve kind of touched on it, but what makes Used Car Week such a special event?

What Makes Used Car Week Special?

Joe:      It’s a holistic conference made up of five niche conferences. Each of the five different conferences…the Pre-owned Con is very focused on the dealer space. Not even just the dealer space, it’s the used car dealer space within the pre-owned operations of the auto dealer. The Auto Fin Con really is about obviously the auto finance industry, but also the FinTech piece of that. The Repo Con is largely about the collections, recovery spaces, very niche area. The National Marketing Conference gets into auctions and wholesale and consigner and very much the wholesale side of things. And the NAVICon, which stands for, by the way, the National Automotive Venture & Investment Conference, that gets into the funding, the investment piece of automotive.

You have five conferences that really could, on their own, be their own conference. And for a while, that’s actually what we did. We had individual conferences that were throughout the year and probably, gosh, 12 years ago – 10-12 years ago – we combined them into one conference because we felt like there was a lot of overlap or there was a lot of ways that somebody going to the Auto Fin Con could also learn something by going to Pre-owned Con sessions. And somebody who’s at Pre-owned Con may want to stick around for the National Marketing Conference to learn a little bit about the wholesale side of the business. I think it’s a good opportunity to step outside of your specific lane in automotive and learn how it relates to other pieces of the used car industry.

Jeremy: You’d mentioned that this conference has been going on for quite some time in different configurations, and even in its current form of all these different parts of the industry brought into one. And thank you for the acronym explanation for NAVIcon. I did not know that so that’s a new piece of information for me. Having run this event for so many years, is there anything new and exciting about this year’s Used Car Week?

What New and Exciting for Used Car Week 2022?

Joe:      Yeah, absolutely. We actually are going to be back in San Diego for the first time since 2003, so almost nine years ago. We hadn’t been there in a while; just with the hotel shuffling, you plan these years in advance. And finally, we’re back on the rotation of being back in San Diego. It’s kind of like when the ACC has its basketball tournament, it kind of rotates between Greensboro and Charlotte and Atlanta and Brooklyn, and now we’re rotating back to Southern California, so we’re excited about that.

As part of that, we’re bringing back the golf outing. Years ago, I would say it’s about the last time we were in San Diego, Wednesday morning right at the halfway point of Used Car Week, we have a golf outing and we’re bringing that back this year. It’s going to be at Torrey Pines, which is kind of a big, famous PGA golf course.

And the expo hall, this year, we’re excited about. We always encourage our exhibitors to think differently and try to add something to their booth, do something different than the other exhibitors are doing to draw. One of them is doing stock car racing, that is Preowned Auto Logistics, which you know all about, and then we’ve got a golf simulator by cars.com. It’s kind of cool to see the exhibitors try something else out and add a little side entertainment to the expo hall.

Speaking of us being on a podcast right now, we are doing a Used Car Week podcast stage this year. We basically invited people in the industry who have podcasts who want to come and record episodes of their shows to do so there. It’s going to be pretty close to the main registration desk. It’s going to be in the foyer, it’s called the Palm Foyer, which is near the reg desk and in the main hub of the conference floor. The sound there won’t be projected, but it’ll be a lot of fly-by traffic where people are walking by and are able to just see behind the curtain of how a podcast is made.

We’ve also added a few different awards programs this year. We divided our 40 Under 40 program up into two different programs, one for the dealer side and then one for the industry side. It hasn’t been an awards program, so to speak, it’s just been a ranking every year of the top best-selling CPO dealers in the country. And this year we decided, “let’s recognize those dealers at a breakfast”, which we’re going to be doing on November 15th, which I believe is the Tuesday of that week. We’ve also added a Women in Collections and Recoveries, which is going to be part of a lunch, in recognition. And then we are bringing back our lifetime achievement award.

Lot of different, kind of new, but also bringing back things that we’ve done in the past. Yeah, and then just being in San Diego, I mean, it’s such a cool place and it’ll be nice to go there November, where we’re on the East Coast here, it’s going to be quite chilly probably in two weeks, so it’ll be nice to be in sunny California.

Jeremy: That’s a fantastic highlight reel. This new and exciting stuff ends up being some of the pieces of the conference that I’m most looking forward to. I’ve never been to San Diego before. I’m always excited when the weather’s cold in New England to branch out to the lovely southern places of the United States. Awesome job selecting that location. I just heard a lot of enthusiasm around San Diego and not going back to Vegas for those who are kind of traveling in that circle pretty routinely. Nothing against Vegas, love Vegas, but just to mix it up in that way I think was a really cool move.

And thank you for mentioning the NASCAR simulator. That’s obviously something we’re excited to be a part of, and I can’t wait to check out that golf simulator thing; sounds pretty cool as well.

I also want to thank you for inviting us to be part of that podcast stage. This’ll be an interesting iteration for what we’re doing here, and we’re excited to see what that’s all about and do our thing in front of a larger audience. Those are some of the things that we were pretty excited about. We have some honorees for the 40 Under 40 and Women Remarketing and appreciate those honors as well. That’s what I’m looking forward to. But Joe Overby, what specifically are you excited about and looking forward to?

What Are You Excited About?

Joe:      Yeah. I’m most excited, perhaps self-serving…one of my favorite things to do at these conferences is being able to moderate panels. And I’m getting to do, I think, about six of them this year, a couple each day. And so that’s a lot of fun. I mean, I love being up on the stage and just chatting with these people who are so well versed in their specific segments of automotive, and that’s something I look forward to. It’s a challenge and it’s a process, putting those panels together and figuring out who’s available and who can make it and what the topics will be, and just all the logistics that come with it. But it’s a lot of fun once we get on site and talking with those people. And it’s really a way to make what Nick Zulovich and I cover every day kind of come to life in person and being able to take something that we write about and really explored in depth in a 30 minute panel.

We had Used Car Week last year and it was great to finally be back in person. And after two years of mostly not having conferences, it still feels fresh to get back and see people in person. I’ve heard several people just bring this up over the years, but the best part about being at a conference is just those collisions you make. You might be just going down to the Starbucks at the hotel to get a coffee, and you run into somebody that you hadn’t seen in two years that works at some company in your industry, and you have a five minute conversation. And that’s kind of the cool moments that I always enjoy about work travel in general, but really these automotive conferences and Used Car Week in particular.

Jeremy: Yeah, that’s fantastic. I have had those collisions myself and find that a lot of the stuff…I mean at the event I’ve watched you and Nick up on stage and can vouch for your talents, probing questions. I always love watching any sessions the two of you are hosting and moderating. But the stuff that happens outside of those rooms sometimes or even outside of the hours, you’re in this place with all these folks in the industry, and you’re going to bump into people, maybe it’s someone you don’t know, but you say, “Hey, I just saw you up on stage a couple hours ago and you mentioned something about whatever it was.” And there you go, you’re off and you’ve made a new connection, new contact, potentially new friend.

Joe:      And a lot of that, it does happen spontaneously. But by design, we’ve built in a lot of networking time. I mean, between each group of workshops or group of panel discussions, we have the 15 minute networking breaks where even if you’re going out to grab a snack or a cup of coffee, you have a chance to chit chat with somebody for a minute. And then at the end of each day, we have a reception. And a lot of times the ones that are sponsored, we’ll have different themes to them.

The opening day, obviously Monday, we’re going to have sort of a football themed one with kind of taking advantage of it being in the middle of football season. And I think having those events, both planned and spontaneous, just creates a lot of opportunity to make new friends and professional, new colleagues and that sort of thing, but also just new friends and have some interesting conversations.

Jeremy: Yeah, I think of, actually, the last time we bumped into each other at a reception, some great conversations that actually ended up in a game of corn hole. I thought I’d make a quick mention, we are bringing our boards down. I know you’re going to be a very busy guy, but if we could steal you for a game, we’d love to play.

Joe:      Oh nice, very cool, yes, absolutely. Yeah, I’ll be over there for it.

Jeremy: Awesome, awesome. And we always love to close with this question. What advice would you give to attendees looking to get the most out of this experience?

Advice for Attendees

Joe:      I think whether you are an exhibitor, whether you’re an attendee, just kind of learning your specific piece of automotive, whether you’re there for meetings, to borrow from the old, I think it was an IBM slogan, “Think Different”. Go do something different that you maybe didn’t come to Used Car Week for. Maybe you came for the Pre-owned Con and you were just going to go to those sessions all week. Step out and go to Auto Fin Con sessions or go to the NRC sessions. If you’re in the expo hall, if you’re an exhibitor, try something different like Preowned Auto Logistics, and even if it’s not a NASCAR simulator, try something different in your booth to spark a conversation.

Go out to dinner with somebody you haven’t gotten to sit down and break bread with. Just do something different. Try new experiences each day that you’re there, because there’s plenty of opportunities to do it.

And I would say, also, just wear comfortable shoes, because with the amount of walking that’s done, by the end of it, your dogs will be barking.

Jeremy: From experience, that is a real pro tip from a real pro. Joe, this has been great. Thank you so much for bringing us through this. Joe, where can people connect with you, Auto Remarketing and Used Car Week?

Joe:      Sure. Well, our website, autoremarketing.com. And then usedcarweek.biz. And then on LinkedIn. I’m on LinkedIn. Just look for Joe Overby. And also, if you follow our Cherokee Media group on LinkedIn, we’re always posting conference information. And we’re also using the #usedcarweek22 on LinkedIn and Twitter and other social media, so look for those tags, and you’ll see all the members of our team and people on our conference squad are always posting things. And so you’ll find the latest information, some updates and pictures and that sort of thing.

And that reminds me, during Used Car Week, we’ll be sending out photos from the event on our Flickr account, and we’ll include those in our Auto Remarketing e-newsletters. If you’re on site at Used Car Week and want to check those out, just stay tuned to autoremarketing.com and our e-newsletters.

Jeremy: Will do. Thanks again, Joe. It’s always a pleasure to speak with you. You can catch PAL and the rest of the team at Used Car Week manning the NASCAR simulator booth, as Joe mentioned, and anytime at preownedautologistics.com. Thanks for listening.

What To Expect from Digital Dealer Las Vegas 2022

Jeremy Louisos, Senior VP of Preowned Auto Logistics, talks with Jennifer Allen, Marketing Manager of Digital Dealer, about the Las Vegas 2022 automotive industry conference (Oct 11-13, 2022) to find out more about the conference, what attendees can expect, and how they can get the most out of their experience.

Jeremy Louisos:        Hi, my name is Jeremy Louisos, and I’m here today with Jennifer Allen, Marketing Manager at Digital Dealer. Our topic today is Digital Dealer Las Vegas 2022, an event that brings together the automotive industry’s leading minds in technology to accelerate business and professional growth. Welcome Jennifer.

Jennifer Allen:          Hey, thank you so much for having me.

Jeremy:          Thanks for coming back. We had a great conversation around Tampa back in April and we were very much looking forward to having you back for this event.

Jennifer:        Yeah, we’re excited to be back on the show, and we’re excited to have you guys back in Las Vegas too.

Who Attends Digital Dealer and What Makes It Special?

Jeremy:          Yeah, that’s awesome. So just starting off and setting the stage here, who attends Digital Dealer and why?

Jennifer:        So, at Digital Dealer, the main attendees are dealership professionals and OEM, so anyone from a GM in a leadership role; we have a lot of marketing, marketing managers, marketing directors; and then we also have sales teams as well, sales directors, sales professionals, that come to the show, and it’s anyone looking to get the latest and greatest in technology to enhance their operations at their dealerships.

Jeremy:          What makes Digital Dealer such a special event?

Jennifer:        I think one of the things that really makes it special — and I’m still fairly new to the show, I’ve been here a year – and to me it’s just amazing to see the camaraderie and the bonding and the networking that goes on at the show. I feel like every time I go it’s a reunion. Same thing how we met, and then we met in Tampa, and now we’re going to Las Vegas. Everyone goes and they’re excited to see each other. If you’re new, everyone’s so open and welcoming that you don’t even feel like you’re new after a day of being there, or even an hour. So, I love the networking and how much passion everybody has, to share knowledge with each other. If it’s through the sessions with the speakers, they just want to share knowledge because they want to help each other. If it’s networking people, I hear them say, “Let me know how I can help you.” Or vice versa. And so, it’s really cool just to see the whole industry come together to really help each other grow.

Jeremy:          Yeah, I would co-sign all of that. I’m newer to the event myself. This will be my third Digital Dealer.

Jennifer:        Mine too.

Jeremy:          Yeah, that’s awesome. So, it’s been going on for quite some time before we were involved and I’ve found it to be very welcoming, just like what you said. And everyone’s willing to help. People were going out of their way to ask, “Hey, do you have everything you need? Do you have any feedback from the event?” It really seems like the folks, you and the rest of the team, really care about the event that you put out. And yeah, so I very much appreciate it on this side and I’m looking for that reunion as well, to connect with everybody, because you get to see these folks just a few times a year.

Jennifer:        Exactly. That’s great. And we also added this year, we just did a first-time attendee orientation the other day, and we had a lot of people show up, so it was really cool. We did a Zoom training and we’re going to send that out to everybody. So, even if you’re not new, sometimes there’s good stuff to learn about going to the show. We’ve had a group of women that want to mentor other women coming into the industry or coming to the show and they want to hold a pre-conference Zoom to network and meet each other. So, when you do show up, you already know some people virtually and then they want to have a meeting at lunch. So, it’s really cool. Just like I said, everyone just wants to help each other and meet each other and network and help each other grow.

What’s New About Digital Dealer Las Vegas in 2022?

Jeremy:          Well, that segues nicely into my next question. Is there anything new and exciting aside from what you just mentioned about this latest Digital Dealer event?

Jennifer:        There are a couple of things. One of the newest things we’ve added to this show, we have what’s called the activation quest, and basically it is attendees, dealership and OEM attendees, have the opportunity to win $10,000. And to win this $10,000, there’s a number of things they can do to earn points and then there are thresholds with those points. So obviously the grand prize is $10,000, and you have to get a minimum number of points to be entered to win that. There are also other points after day one and day two. There’s a leader board, whoever has the most points, the top three of those days get a $50 gift card. And then also if you get past a certain threshold after day one and after day two you can be entered to win a pass to a 2023 Digital Dealer event. So, I think that’s going to be fun and exciting.

And ways you can earn points — there are 12 booths that if you go visit them, they’ll flash you their QR code and you scan it, get points. One of those booths is our Digital Dealer 360 photo booth. I don’t know if you’ve seen lately at weddings or sometimes at sports games or whatever they have the cameras that move around you in a circle, 360. They’re really fun. They’re really cool videos. So, we’ve added that, and if you post it to your social media, you get points that way. Even if you don’t post it and you don’t want to get the points, it’s still really fun and cool to have that video.

And then you can also get points by going to the opening keynote and other sessions that are listed on there as well. So that’s something new we’re doing. We think it’s going to be very interactive, very fun, get people moving around the floor. So that’s something new. We’re going to have a show pin, which we’ve never had in the past to give attendees. And we’re also giving attendees an electronic business card, which no one really knows about that yet, so that’s going to be fun and exciting. And it’s our way, our thank you gift, to our attendees for coming and hopefully using this electronic business card to help them with their business and networking and everything. So those are just a couple things that are going to be new.

Jeremy:          I’m really glad I asked that question. So, there are games and adventures to be had. There are prizes to be won. We get one of those really cool pins I see everyone…they might have the car pin or these different certifications, so we can add that to our lapels or wherever. And then, yeah, it sounds like we’re breaking news here on the card.

Jennifer:        The E-card and the show pin hasn’t really been announced. It’s okay if it’s out there. It’s more of a when you show up, “Here you go. This is a gift from us to you.”

What Are You Looking Forward to at Digital Dealer?

Jeremy:          Very cool. That’s awesome. And so, making it a little personal to you, Jennifer, what are you most looking forward to out of this event?

Jennifer:        As a marketer and this being my third show, and I came in about a month before the show last year, so it was kind of just get stuff done, and now that I’ve actually been through an entire cycle and I’ve been planning this one since day one from ground zero, it’s been really cool to see a lot of different ideas flourish and come to fruition. And for me it’ll be exciting to see the buzz on the expo hall, the full sessions and everything, to know that I helped generate all these people to come to the event and see some ideas that I’ve had come to action. So, it’ll just be really cool to see everything together. And then of course, networking. As we’ve mentioned, same thing, now I’m excited to see you when we go to the event because we’ve met and there’s a lot more people that I’ve met along the way too, so it’ll be a lot of fun to catch up with people.

Advice for Digital Dealer Attendees 

Jeremy:          That’s awesome. And a question that I always love to close with here, what advice would you give to attendees looking to get the most out of this experience?

Jennifer:        So, to get the most out of the experience — once you register, you will be emailed a link to the app and the matchmaking platform. I would get in there, explore, learn how to use it. You can use it to match make before you even go to the show and start networking. Then you can go through and look at all the sessions that there are going to be, and you can sort them based on your interests, if you’re marketing, sales, general manager, and then also on a level of advanced or new in the area, and start making your schedule. Plan out before you get there so that when you’re there, you’re ready to go. There’s a lot of people, a lot of sessions, a lot of exhibitors, so try to plan that out before you go so you don’t miss anything.

Jeremy:          I think that’s sage advice. It’s advice that we often receive some version of; make sure you plan ahead. The amount of work that you put in upfront, obviously you’re putting in a ton of work setting this event up, but for the attendees the more work that we do trying to game plan, strategize, understand who’s there, set up those meetings — that work up front, I think, goes a long way. Jennifer, this has been great. Thank you so much for bringing us through all of this. How can people connect with you and Digital Dealer?

Connect with Digital Dealer

Jennifer:        So, I’m glad you asked, but when you register, you can go to digitaldealer.com. Use promo code EMPROMO6 and get $200 off registration. And that’s E as in elephant, M as in money, promo 6, and get $200 off your registration. And you can go to digitaldealer.com and find the registration there.

Jeremy:          Thank you again, Jennifer. That is great stuff. And you can catch the PAL team at Digital Dealer Las Vegas 2022 at Booth 522, and anytime at preownedautologistics.com. Thank you for listening.

Customer Deliveries for Dealerships

Since the pandemic, more and more dealerships are having cars shipped to their customers after purchase. This increase in customer deliveries for dealerships is primarily due to shortages, but it has resulted in some unexpected benefits for some dealerships. Let’s take a look at how Preowned Auto Logistics helps dealerships get their cars delivered safely to their new owners.

Why Would a Car Dealership Need to Ship to a Customer?

Inventory Shortage

The primary reason more dealerships have been shipping cars to customers is a side effect of the pandemic. Since 2020, there has been a shortage of chips needed to complete cars and trucks being manufactured. This stalling of production has led to inventory shortages throughout the country for dealerships. As a result, more dealerships are having cars shipped directly from the manufacturer to the customer to help expedite the process as much as they can.

Service Customers Long-Distance

One of the things that shipping cars to customers has opened up for many dealers is the ability to serve customers across states. The newfound familiarity with auto shipping to customers makes it easier for dealerships to communicate with customers in other states and arrange for shipment without the buyer ever setting foot on their lot. Altogether, this upgrade to services from car dealers has increased their potential client pool and allows customers to find the perfect vehicle more easily.

How to Set Up Car Shipping to Customers with Preowned Auto Logistics

Set Up Communication with the Customer

One of the ways that Preowned Auto Logistics helps to make shipping a car from a dealership to a customer easy is by setting up a line of communication. When we are contacted to ship a vehicle to a customer, we get in touch with the customer to arrange for delivery. By taking over the communications with the customer, we weed out the middleman, which takes stress off the dealerships and allows the customer to be in more control of their shipment.

Our Account Manager, Colby Harlow, often handles communications with the customers directly, which helps to give the client the confidence they need to feel good about their car being shipped. Colby even provides direct contact information to customers so that they can contact him with questions about their shipment at any point. This kind of service is what we pride ourselves on, and it’s a great way to ensure both the dealership and the customer feel great about the car shipment.

Cleans Up the Logistics for Car Dealerships

Preowned Auto Logistics helps to take the responsibility of getting the car shipped off of the dealerships, so that the logistics on their side of things stay easy. We are happy to work with customers directly because it prevents dealerships from having to field questions they may not know the answers to (because they’re not the ones driving the truck or picking the delivery dates). Many of our drivers will stay in contact with the customers during shipment to provide regular updates to help relieve any potential stress about the process.

Increase in Cars Shipped to Customers

As mentioned above, there’s been a significant increase in the number of cars shipped to customers straight from the manufacturer and dealerships. At Preowned Auto Logistics, this makes things easy for the dealers and us. If there are multiple cars leaving the lot at once, we can easily arrange to ship all the cars. In fact, many dealerships that used to ship only one or two cars a month are shipping ten or more in a month today.

Saves Time and Money

Using an auto transport service like Preowned Auto Logistics helps dealerships to save time and money by cleaning up the process of getting a car delivered to the customer. Our team knows all the best routes throughout the country so that delivery will be quick and efficient. PAL will help to assure the customer of the safety of the process, explain how shipping works, set expectations for delivery, and more.

Get The Best Rate on Car Shipping﹘ Request a Quote Today

Are you looking for a reliable auto shipping company to help you deliver your cars to your customers quickly? At Preowned Auto Logistics, we pride ourselves on outstanding customer service, and we have years of experience helping dealerships get cars to customers without the stress. Give us a call at 877.542.1955 and receive a custom quote for your auto transport needs and see how we can help you save time and money by shipping cars to customers.

Customer Reviews

“I love this company! I would absolutely recommend them to anyone Customer service is through the roof! They are amazing!”

– Lance McCall

“Preowned Auto Logistics is a very professional and trustworthy company. Detail oriented. Lisa, as dispatch is awesome, always there to answer your questions and take care of you, the best!!!”

– JPita’s Transport

Read more customer reviews.

What to Expect from the 2022 IARA Summer Roundtable

Jeremy Louisos of Preowned Auto Logistics talks to Tony Long of the International Automotive Remarketers Alliance about the 2022 IARA Summer Roundtable to find out more about its presenters and attendees, as well as getting tips for making the most of this automotive industry conference.

Jeremy Louisos: Hi, my name is Jeremy Louisos, and I’m here today with Tony Long, Executive Director for the International Automotive Remarketers Alliance, or IARA. Our topic today is the IARA Summer Roundtable 2022, an event for sharing ideas and updates in the quickly evolving auto industry, and discovering today’s strategies for tomorrow’s success. Welcome, Tony.

Tony Long: Thanks, Jeremy. It’s always great to be here with you. You of course, are one of our more active members on our committee work, and have a good understanding of what we’re all about. Hopefully, we can share that with the audience today.

What is the IARA Summer Roundtable?

Jeremy: That’s what I’m hoping as well, Tony, and thank you so much for joining us. It has been one of those conversations I’ve looked forward to. Your background with this organization has been inspirational for me personally, so I’m very much looking forward to our conversation today. For those new to the IARA Summer Roundtable, what is this event all about?

Tony: Well, the Roundtable is pretty much exactly what the name implies. The organizational structure of the IARA, or the International Automotive Remarketers Alliance, is to bring all segments of the industry together – give everybody a seat at the table, so to speak. We do that, not only at our meetings, but organizationally as a membership organization. We have people from all segments serving on boards, committees, even at the executive level.

Our primary constituents are, of course, the consignors. We call ourselves the voice of the consignor, but that includes everybody that does business with our consignors. They serve in the presidential role, but from there down, you’ll see logistics companies, tech companies, auctions, other kinds of service suppliers, just everybody that has something to do with moving those cars through the wholesale pipeline.

What’s Different About This Year’s Event?

Jeremy: That’s awesome. For those returning to the event, what may be different this year than in previous years?

Tony: It’s bigger. We’re bound to have a record breaking event here in Nashville, and it’s just amazing to see. We had an overflow hotel that we had to bring into the picture. We’re at the downtown Hilton, right there at the backside of Broadway, but a nearby sister hotel, the Hilton Garden Inn is providing overflow room, and I know a lot of companies are staying there.

So, we have, obviously, a big draw this year. One of our chief keynote speakers, Ernie Garcia, CEO of Carvana who’s in the news daily, and all over the scene. A lot of people are curious, mainly because not only is he a great speaker, but because they acquired the ADESA Auctions in the US this year. And so, everybody’s curious to see what they have to say. Another one of our active members, John Combs, on our board for ADESA, will be basically interviewing his new boss in a fireside chat.

A lot of other great speakers that we have on the agenda. Economists Tom Kontos, Jonathan Smoke, Dr. Alex Yurchenko. Cybersecurity is another subject we’re getting into. And, you’ll just see a lot of other service providers speaking. I know the CIO of Parkmyfleet will be speaking about mobility hubs. So, really the cutting edge topics that are out there, E-mobility with Felipe Smolka. I mean, there’s just one good speaker after another. You don’t want to blink. You don’t want to step out in the hall, you’ll miss something great.

CAR Conference vs IARA Summer Roundtable

Jeremy: Yeah, that’s tremendous. I had the opportunity this past year at the CAR Conference to see some of those names, some of those economists were there. And I guess I’d be curious, as someone who attended that event, how does that event compare to this event? How does the CAR Conference compare to the Summer Roundtable?

Tony: Well, as you know, we partner with our sister organization, National Auto Auction Association, which is an area I hail from. I used to be their president back in ’03, ’04, and spent a lot of years, 20 years of my career, with them. We have a really close relationship and we find common ground topics that are pertinent to the auction industry, and the consignors as well. So, we take on a little different view there.

There’s exhibit halls and things like that going on. This one is a little more personal. We often refer to it as a boutique meeting, because it’s a niche group of decision makers. You’ll find a lot of the key executives, directors, and VP level types who attend this meeting. Doesn’t take you a lot to find who you’re looking for, in the cozy type of atmosphere that we conduct there.

But this is more consignor concentric. It’s all things IARA. We have a consignor only meeting, where they kind of let their hair down, so to speak, and talk about things, pain points that they experience in the field. And we try to come up with solutions, or maybe new ideas that will just make the world a better place for all of us in the remarketing industry. So, yeah. We get a lot done at these meetings and most of the content that we take out to places like the CAR Conference, or if we have panelists or speakers going to Used Car Week and other venues. I know I just got back recently from the Used Car Week up in Canada, and we even cross the border with a lot of these topics. But the Summer Roundtable is our premier event. It’s the main conference for IARA members, and a place where we get a lot of the internal business done.

Who Attends the IARA Summer Roundtable?

Jeremy: That’s great. You had mentioned, at the onset, the diversity of members that are included with the IARA, and you’ve highlighted some great speakers and really the focus around the consignor. What type of folks attend this IARA Summer Roundtable? Is it a similar group?

Tony: Yeah, it is. Of course, we’re an open door society, and understandably there, and for whatever reasons, there are a lot of different, good associations out there, that it may be restricted to just new car dealers or used car dealers, or auctions or whatever. And, those have their place. Obviously, the idea of sellers trying to get cars to all these different venues, is maybe not be quite so competitive in nature, and allows us to bring anybody and everybody that’s a part of the business into a larger discussion. So we have online venues. Yes, we have the brick and mortar auctions that are so valuable to us. And we have the service providers, whether it be condition reports, inspections, logistics companies, just any number of suppliers that help us do our jobs. We welcome everybody to the meeting.

That’s one of the things that we try to do with our car certification, and you probably were going there, and I don’t mean to get ahead of you. But the car certification program that we have brought to be the gold standard for the industry in remarketing, gives a 30,000 foot view of all these different jobs that are being done out there to make it happen. If you’re in the title department and you don’t understand what’s happening at the grounding dealer, or maybe at the auction, or anything in between, we touch on all of that. There’s actually some new logistics pieces that are being added to that as we speak.

So, we try to include and allow everyone to see the other guys’ pain points. What that lady in the titling department might be doing, or what she might be doing as a GM at an auction. Or, if we have some fellow driving the truck down the road, we want to address and educate all of our members, so that they’ll have a better understanding of who they’re dealing with, when they’re trying to transact business. So, the car certification is one of those things.

Something we’ll be announcing at this particular meeting is a new training initiative, called ACT, or Audit and Compliance Training, which with our banks we have…of course, most of the major banks interact with IARA. So, with the new KY3P audits, the Know Your Third Party audits, there’s a lot of requirements to that, to not only do your own employees receive annual training, but the service providers, the third parties that you use, must also provide their employees annual training on these compliance issues. So, it’s something we’re digging into and will continue to monitor, and keep an eye on the regulatory environment.

Jeremy: Well, that’s great. I picked up on a point that I discussed recently with the folks at Auto Transport Intel, which I believe actually both of us will be on their show this week as well. So, I’ll see you there.

Tony: Yeah. Tomorrow night, actually.

What Are You Most Looking Forward to at the Event?

Jeremy: Yes. Tomorrow night. And, so that actually might come out before this is released. To anyone listening along, this would be Tuesday, the 9th of August. But when I was on the show recently, we were talking about just the importance of though we’re a niche part of the industry doing logistics, that it’s so important to understand all those other pieces. And so for anyone considering that car certification, it just seems to be such a valuable piece to the puzzle for just everybody. Anyone who’s connected to the ecosystem. So, Tony, as someone who is no stranger to this event, what are you most looking forward to at the Summer Roundtable?

Tony: Well, we had such a shutdown over COVID and we were one of the fortunate groups, that we had a record breaking virtual conference that kind of set the pace, and opened the door for a lot of other people to do some similar ventures. Just an astounding success. But, there’s nothing like that face-to-face interaction in the hallways, reacquainting yourself with old friends, forging those relationships. There’s no telling how many business relationships and partnerships are formed at these meetings. And, you have the right people there to do that.

I was at another conference, where I first met with Penny Wanna and the Auction Academy. And we became part of the curriculum, the car certification courses, for the Auction Academy. All their people graduate now. They come out of there CAR certified. So, you see the little brass lapel pins that everybody wears at the conferences, that says CAR and everybody wants one, but it takes some work to do it. We have formed, even as an association, we’ve come up with new ideas and formed partnerships just by having lunch with somebody or running into to them in the hallways. Just being with one another and the exchange of ideas, the open banter, that sometimes moves a lot faster than email. We’re able to get things moving in a quicker direction.

What Advice Do You Have for IARA Summer Roundtable Attendees?

Jeremy: That’s great. And, lastly here, Tony, what advice would you give to attendees, looking to get the most out of this experience?

Tony: Oh, one thing is that our committee meetings are open to everyone. So when you see membership committee, or a technology committee, don’t yawn real big and think, “Oh, that doesn’t involve me. There’s nothing in there.” We have gone to each of our committees and instructed them to choose a topic of interest that they would deal with in their committee structure. So you’re not only going to be able to take a look at who’s on the committee, see if that’s somewhere you want to plug in, but you can also hear them discuss something like what they would be dealing with through the years. So, a lot of these committees meet once a month. Some of them meet as often as once a week. We have very active committees, and that’s the best way to get really involved in the association, and forge some of those relationships that will prove valuable to you down the road.

How to Connect

Jeremy: That’s awesome. This has been great, Tony. Thank you so much for bringing us through this. For those looking to connect with you or the IARA Summer Roundtable, how best might they do that?

Tony: Absolutely. First thing, come to Nashville, August 16th through the 18th. Be part of the Summer Roundtable, with all the excitement and the people that are going to be there. We’ve already got more people registered than have ever attended any IARA Summer Roundtable. So, we’re very happy about that, but also go to iara.biz. At iara.biz, soon we’re going to be unveiling a brand new website redesign. We’re excited about that. It will be in conjunction with the unveiling of the ACT training program. Obviously, CAR certification can still be found on the site, and all the convention information. So, visit iara.biz. If you have any questions, my phone number is 865-805-[five nine five four]. You can call and speak to the executive director. If I don’t know the answer, I’ll put you with somebody who does.

Jeremy: You cannot do any better than that. Thank you so much, Tony. It’s been a real pleasure. I really appreciate you taking the time.

And you can catch the PAL Team next week at the IARA Summer Roundtable in beautiful downtown Nashville, and at any time at preownedautologistics.com. Thanks for listening.

What to Expect from Digital Dealer Tampa 2022

Jeremy Louisos, Senior VP of Preowned Auto Logistics, talks with Jennifer Allen, Marketing Manager of Digital Dealer, about the Tampa 2022 automotive industry conference to find out more about the conference, what attendees can expect, and how they can get the most out of their experience.

Jeremy Louisos:     Hi, my name is Jeremy Louisos and I’m here today with Jennifer Allen, Marketing Manager at Digital Dealer. Our topic today is Digital Dealer Tampa 2022, an event where thousands of professionals from leading dealerships in all facets of the automotive industry come together to learn and grow. Welcome, Jennifer.

Jennifer Allen:       Hey, thank you so much.

What Is Digital Dealer All About?

Jeremy:       Great. For those new to Digital Dealer, what is this event all about?

Jennifer:      So, as you mentioned, we bring together dealerships, automotive dealers, OEMs, thought leaders, auto retail solution providers from all over the nation, to come together, share knowledge, help each other grow. We’ve got really great keynote speakers. The event’s also known for networking, top digital experts in the industry. So really just coming together, trying to educate each other, and help each other grow in the industry.

What’s Difference From Previous Years?

Jeremy:       Well, that’s awesome. For those returning, what may be different this year than in previous years?

Jennifer:      We have a new app this year. It’s an AI-powered matchmaking app. So you open up that app, you answer a couple questions, you kind of say what you’re looking for. If you’re an exhibitor, what type of clients you’re looking for. And if you’re going there as an attendee, you put what you’re looking to achieve when you get to the event and it’ll match you with people who are within your interest. So it will help you make those matches a little bit easier for your networking to help your business. That will be new.

For people that have been before, also we have keynote speakers from Google, Amazon. We have a panel of dealers, that’s “Ask the Dealer”. They’re just going to fire away and ask them a bunch of questions, get their knowledge. And then we also have speakers from NetApp and from Pinterest, and also from TikTok as well. So getting some of those different perspectives. And then sessions are always up-to-date, they’re always different. They’re the latest technology in the industry. So it’s always something new that you can learn in that space.

Jeremy:       That’s awesome. I’ve had the opportunity to use some of these apps recently at other conferences and they’re hugely helpful. How would folks find this app or what would be the best way to prepare themselves as far as the app goes heading into the conference?

Jennifer:      Once they register for the event, they will receive an email with information on how to log into their platform, which they can do from their desktop, from their laptop or their computer. Set up their profile and then there will also be a link and you’ll get an email on how to download or where to find that app in your App Store.

It is “Digital Dealer Conference” is what you would search for. That is not currently ready yet, but it’ll be rolled out very soon. But you can get your platform ready right away and you’ll get an email about that as soon as you register for the event.

Who Attends Digital Dealer?

Jeremy:       Wow. That’s awesome. And the guest list sounds very exciting. What type of folks typically attend Digital Dealer?

Jennifer:      We have dealerships from all over the nation. I was looking at the list, every dealership you can imagine. We have owners from dealerships. We’ve got a lot of marketing people from different dealerships that come to help their marketing departments, sales departments, operations, we have OEMs. Those are the typical attendees that come to our events. And then sometimes we have exhibitors as well that come to network with the attendees. So everybody comes together to meet and help each other out.

Jeremy:       And from your perspective, what would you say you’re looking forward to the most?

Jennifer:      As a marketer, starting from the very beginning of this event and strategizing how to get people to it and what we want them to get out of it, and marketing that to the people and getting in front of our dealers and OEMs that we want to help flourish from coming to this event, seeing all of them come and walking through an expo hall full of people, full of buzz and talking. Seeing expo halls full of people there for the keynote speakers, seeing people network and smiling and just having a great time. That’s what I look forward to is seeing all of my hard work from the very beginning, coming to flourish, to bring all these people together in the industry.

Jeremy:       That is awesome. And how many folks typically would attend an event like this?

Jennifer:      Typically, we have about a thousand attendees.

Advice for Digital Dealer Attendees

Jeremy:       Yeah. Wow. That’s awesome. And with so much going on and so much look forward to, what advice would you give attendees looking to get the most out of this experience?

Jennifer:      So, the first thing I would tell them to do is look through the sessions. They are set up by different pillars. So we have a sales track, we have a marketing track, and then we have a leadership track. So find out which one you want to be part of, look at what sessions we have to offer in those areas. Of course, you can go to other ones if you want to cross over.

But look through the sessions, read the descriptions, make your schedule, figure out which ones you want to go to. I would also recommend visiting all the exhibitors, explore all the different innovative solutions that we’ve brought together. And ask questions, learn from your peers and network. That’s the biggest thing I can recommend. Build solid connections that you can reach out to when you go back to your dealership.

I know I was reading through the testimonials and one person said, “I couldn’t get enough. I just was asking all these questions in different rooms, different panels, and just hearing people in the audience asking questions or giving answers.” There’s some roundtable discussions where the person that’s running it will ask questions and they’re trying to get answers back from the attendees in the room so that they can share knowledge and experience with each other.

So I would recommend if somebody says something you really like, go up to them afterwards and introduce yourself, talk to them, network, get their information and then keep in touch and reach out to them when you get back to your dealership.

Jeremy:       That’s awesome. That’s great advice. We’ll be sure to ask lots of questions when we’re at Digital Dealer Tampa. But for right now, I just have one more question for you, Jennifer, if I may. This has really been great and thank you so much for bringing us through all this. How can people connect with you and Digital Dealer?

Jennifer:      So, you can register on DigitalDealer.com. There’s a registration button on there. And we do have a special promo code for this audience. You can get $200 off your registration by using promo code EM200WEB. Again, that’s EM200WEB. So use that promo code EM200WEB and you can get $200 off your registration. Again, go to DigitalDealer.com.

Jeremy:       That is awesome. We’ll be sure to include that in our notes. And you can catch the PAL team at Digital Dealer Tampa 2022 booth 533 and anytime at PreownedAutoLogistics.com. Thanks for listening.

 

What To Expect from the NADA Show 2022

Jeremy Louisos of Preowned Auto Logistics speaks with Scott Dube, NADA Show 2022 committee chairman, about the NADA Show 2022 in Las Vegas, and what attendees and exhibitors can expect from the show.

Jeremy Louisos:

Hi, my name is Jeremy Louisos and I’m here today with Scott Dube, NADA Show 2022 committee chairman, and NADA director for Massachusetts. Our topic today is the NADA Show 2022, an event beginning March 10th in Las Vegas, Nevada, described as the automotive industry event of the year. Attendees can learn about the latest strategies and emerging trends. There are more than 100 workshops in education sessions for more than 550 companies at the expo. Welcome Scott.

Scott Dube:

Hey Jeremy, thanks so much for having me this afternoon.

Jeremy:

Thanks for joining us. I really appreciate the time. For those organizations like Preowned Auto Logistics who are sort of new to NADA — it’s their first time going to the event — what’s this event all about?

Scott:

Well, first I want to say, Jeremy, you guys could not have picked a better year to jump on board and start exhibiting at NADA Show. This year is going to be unbelievable. There’s so much pent up demand for this get together, and there’s so much excitement and buzz that I think that it is going to be absolutely fantastic. I predict you’re going to have the time of your life.

Jeremy:

We’re really looking forward to it. For those returning to the show though, what might be different this year than in previous years?

Scott:

Well, this year is going to be… I’d like to say it’s going to be all different. We’re doing a lot of things differently. We’re starting with the first night is different. We’re going to host a welcome kickoff, or welcome back kickoff event, at the all new Allegiant Stadium, home of professional football there in Las Vegas. We have the whole building and we have Train as our headline act. We have a video DJ from the Las Vegas area. We’re going to have on-field entertainment, excitement, activities, things to do. It’s just going to be unbelievable opportunities for networking. We have all the clubs in the building rented out, we have a bunch of different sponsors that are participating in that, it’s going to be really a networking event like most of us haven’t seen in a really long time.

Jeremy:

We’re really excited and more excited now after that preview. Thank you for that. For those who don’t know, what type of folks attend NADA?

Scott:

Well, it’s interesting Jeremy, it used to be, when I was a kid, and my father and mother were going, it was 18,000 dealer principles from across the country. It was mostly just dealer principles that went and over the years it’s become dealers and managers, and we’re seeing deeper and deeper in the organization. People are coming — so I would say from the dealerships, you’ve got that whole part of the world, and then you’ve got the exhibitor/vendor side of the world that’s very well represented. The OEMs have people there. I mean, anybody that has anything to do with our industry is typically there and from around the world, not just from around our country.

Jeremy:

You bring to mind…so there’s going to be an International presence there as well.

Scott:

Yeah, typically we have as many as 2000 people from around the world. This year our International attendance will be a little bit lighter just because of travel restrictions and all that kind of thing. But for the most part, it’s become…in fact, we have a hospitality suite that’s just for our international visitors. That’s pretty big onsite in the exhibit hall, so it’s a very well attended, from an international point of view, event.

Jeremy:

So with so much going on there, and this might be a little unique for you with your role in this event, but I have to ask, what are you most looking forward to personally?

Scott:

I tell you, I can’t…it’s so hard to pick which thing to be most excited about. I mean, Allegiant I’m really excited about, and you asked me earlier — I want to go back to it because I got so excited talking about Allegiant that I didn’t get on the rest of the things that are different — but we’ve got an EV pavilion that we’ve set up this year. We’ve got a large booth space that we’re dedicating to EV questions and answers.

We’re bringing in experts from charging companies, our own 20 group moderators, academy instructors and other industry experts to answer dealers’ questions about how this is going to impact them, and how to get involved, and how to do this right, and how to be profitable at it, and take care of the customer.

We’ve got, as I said, that event on the opening night, but we’ve also got a thing called Dealer Learning Lab, which will be different this year. We have TED-style talks that are different this year. There are just a whole bunch of different things that people can participate in that are just so much different than previous years and we’re really adapting as we get feedback from our dealers, and managers, and exhibitors. We’re trying to adapt the show to modernize it and make it more exciting for a wider audience and a bigger group of people.

Jeremy:

What were some considerations in that vein of trying to modernize the event? What were some of the big considerations going into that? What looks different? What are some of the new features that an event like this would need?

Scott:

Well, obviously the EVs are the thing this year, right? We’ve never really spent a lot of time just highlighting the vehicles that we sell because we’re all around these vehicles all the time. It didn’t seem really necessary. There’s a lot of people that criticize the franchise dealer network for their commitment to EV and what we’re working on is continuously making sure that we are showing the world that we’re fully committed. We’re all in on EVs and that our dealer network is the only way to promote the number of cars sales that they want to have occur so you can’t do it in a one off. You can’t do it at the way some of the smaller companies have done it. The dealer franchise network is the only way to get the kind of market penetration that the government and the OEMs are looking for.

We feel like those kinds of things are adaptations that if you look at our NADA Show event app, we continue to refine that and work on that. We listen to what people tell us about what our surveys say about the way we do our educational offerings. I mean, as you said at the beginning, over a hundred educational offerings, hundreds of hours of content.

Our general sessions, the speaker selection is just unbelievable this year. We have Dana Perino, of course, most people are familiar with her work. Michael Strahan — I mean, who doesn’t know who Michael Strahan is — and this retired army staff Sergeant Travis Mills who’s a recalibrated warrior. I get choked up just talking about Travis. If you go online and look at any of his content, the guy is just so incredibly inspirational that if you can’t take something away from any of these three people, I mean, you probably should check yourself into the Clark County Medical Center because there’s something really wrong with you.

I think we’ve got some distinguished speakers in our distinguished speaker series that are also just incredibly inspiring, experienced, and people that you can just say, wow, I can take so much away from that.

So all of those things are sort of responsive to what our survey of our attendees are telling us about what kind of content they want to see. When I say the changes that we’re making, they’re around that.

Jeremy:

That sounds awesome. Again, us being new to the event and for folks like us, what advice would you give to attendees looking to get the most out of this experience?

Scott:

I have two words for you, “plan ahead”.

Jeremy:

Okay.

Scott:

That applies to everybody that’s going, whether you’re going as a dealer, manager attendee, or you’re going as an exhibitor, or you’re going as an OEM partner, you have to plan your schedule ahead of time. There’s just so much to see, and so much to do, and on top of it so many distractions, that if you don’t make sure that you have a good solid game plan going in, you’ll be really overwhelmed and surprised at the end that you didn’t get nearly what you thought you’d get done, done.

As I said earlier, we have an app that people should download, plan their schedule, talk to the vendors and their exhibitors that they’re interested in ahead of time, but it goes two ways. The exhibitors can also reach out to attendees that way, which I encourage everybody to use that whether they’re a vendor or an attendee. They need to use that to try and set up their time ahead of time, know what you want to see when you get there.

If you’re a dealer or dealer manager, if you’re an exhibitor, know who you want to talk to, who are the top 20 that you want to make sure you connect with while you’re at the show and make that happen. Take no excuses from your people about why it didn’t get done. It has to get done.

Planning ahead is the key to a successful conference of this size. We spent a year planning this show. We started planning this show before the last one was over. I would just encourage everybody if it takes us a year plus to put it on, it takes you a couple of days to get ready for it, so just make sure you do your homework before you get out there and you’ll have an incredible show. You’ll go home with notebooks full, or notes on your iPhone, or your Android full of people that you need to follow up with. If you’re a vendor and if you’re a dealer attendee, then you will have learned things that you did not know before you got there I guarantee it.

Jeremy:

That’s sage advice, we’ll be sure to plan ahead for our trip. This has really been great. Thank you so much for bringing us through this Scott. People that are looking to connect with NADA, the NADA Show 2022, or you, how could they best connect with this event?

Scott:

show.nada.org is the number one place for all the information. Go look at the distinguished speaker series that we have, go look at the other speakers that we have, look at the educational content, download the app, do all those things. We’d love to hear from people, we’d love to hear what they’re thinking about the show. I’m very active on LinkedIn and always interested in hearing from people that have questions about the Show.

Jeremy:

Awesome. Well, once again, thank you, Scott. I really appreciate you taking the time.

Scott:

My pleasure. Thanks for having me, Jeremy. I really appreciate the opportunity.

Jeremy:

And you can capture the PAL team at the NADA Show 2022, booth 6812N, or at any time at preownedautologistics.com. Thank you for listening.

Used Car Week 2021 Preview (with Joe Overby of Auto Remarketing)

Jeremy Louisos from Preowned Auto Logistics talks with Joe Overby from Auto Remarketing about Used Car Week 2021. They explain how this week combines five conferences in one. Then, they talk about the benefits of attending and the upcoming highlights of Used Car Week.

Jeremy Louisos: Hi, my name is Jeremy Louisos, and I’m here today with Joe Overby, senior editor at Auto Remarketing, the news media for the preowned auto industry. Our topic today is Used Car Week 2021, an event beginning November 15th in Las Vegas, Nevada, combining five different conferences, uniting all corners of the used car industry. Welcome Joe.

Joe Overby: Jeremy, thank you so much for having me. It’s great to be here.

What Is Used Car Week?

Jeremy: Yeah. We’re excited to get going. So we’ll jump right in. For those new to Used Car Week, what is this event all about?

Joe: Yeah, absolutely. It’s a look at the used car industry from a holistic standpoint, and each of the five conferences within Used Car Week represents a different piece of the used car industry.

If you look at our logo, you’ll see it’s a concentric circle where each little piece connects to the next one, and that really is the whole mission of Used Car Week, is that the preowned retail side is very much connected to the auto finance side, which is very much connected to the remarketing and the repo and recovery side, and vice versa.

So they all feed one another and they’re all connected. And we just explore the trends throughout, how they’re each unique, but then again how each one connects to the other as part of one big used car ecosystem.

Pre-Owned Conference at Used Car Week

Jeremy: Yeah. And so what are those pieces?

Joe: It’s divided into two blocks. The first block is our Pre-Owned Con, which looks at the auto retail side. You’re looking at the mainly dealer-focused content, used cars specifically, certified pre-owned. We have a bit of dealer training in there as well and additionally, as part of that first block, we have the Auto Fin Con, which looks at auto finance and not just the financing of vehicles, but a little bit of the FinTech side of that.

We also have our Repo Con, which is connected to auto finance, but it’s more of the repossession and recovery piece of automotive. That’s going to run Monday afternoon through Wednesday morning.

National Marketing Conference and NAVICON

Joe: Wednesday afternoon begins our second block of Used Car Week and this year it’s two conferences that are part of that. It’s the National Marketing Conference, which is our flagship conference of Used Car Week. It deals with the wholesale side of the business, auctions, consignors, remarketing, the B2B selling of vehicles, essentially.

And then this year we’ve actually added a new conference to it. We worked with Steve Greenfield at Automotive Ventures to launch a new conference called NAVICON, and that stands for the National Auto Ventures and Investors Conference. Steve has curated that agenda. He’s a brilliant guy and really knows the ins and outs of that space. That’s going to be on Thursday, November 18th of Used Car Week.

And it’s going to look at a bit of the automotive tech, a lot of the startups, a lot of the space, new companies that have come into this space to tackle pain points in automotive, but also just the investment and capital side of it. You know, why is there so much investment now in automotive, specifically used cars, looking at the mergers and acquisitions, all of that behind-the-scene, follow-the-money piece of it. We’re really excited about that. That’s going to run concurrently with NRC on that Thursday. But it’s a new conference for us and we’re excited. So now we have five conferences as part of Used Car Week.

What’s New at Used Car Week 2021?

Jeremy: Yeah, that sounds awesome. I know my team’s very excited to be a part of the event this year. We’re kind of new and kind of our second time around. So last year the event was done virtually. That was our first experience, but I’m sure many folks that are part of this event have been going for years. So I guess for those returning, what may be different this year than in previous years?

Joe: I think the biggest piece is going to be that new NAVICON content, but I think one thing that really has generated a lot of focus for us this year, particularly and I would even say somewhat surprisingly, in that second half of the week is a big focus on electric cars.

And that’s never really been a piece of Used Car Week in the past, simply because it was such a small side of the market and mostly focused on the new car side and production, and even that was still in its infancy. But now a lot of the used electric vehicles are coming back into the market and auction companies and people who work on the wholesale side are having to prepare for that. And then also dealers are just having a lot more used car inventory that’s just becoming a bigger piece of the market.

So specifically, our Pre-Owned Con and our national market conference are going to have new this year electric vehicle panel discussions and that sort of thing, which is a new thing for us. And of course the NAVICON conference, which that’s a very seamless place for electric vehicles to fit. But that’s a new wrinkle this year. I think there’s a lot of new companies, I think as part of the NAVICON content, not just the fact that it’s a new conference. But the fact that there’s going to be the focus on the investment side of the business, we haven’t really had a whole lot of that in the past. I think that’s where we’re going to see the most change in the agenda this year.

Who Attends Used Car Week?

Jeremy: Yeah. So with so many topics being covered, five conferences into one and all different types of expertise, there’s a lot going on for lots of different folks. So I guess my question would be who usually attends, or who do we expect this year to be attending Used Car Week?

Joe: It’s really all across the board. I think the first half of the week, the first block you’ll see a lot of dealers, finance companies, and then vendors to those companies that work with those two groups of people. The repo space, you have all kinds of different companies within that, forwarders, repossession companies, a lot of analyst types, dealers.

Like I said, I think that is probably the primary target of Pre-Owned Con, so you’ll see a lot of that. Second half of the week is largely auctions, consignors, companies that are … You might have, for example, a lending company where the origination side might be there the first half of the week, while the remarketing side of that lending institution might be there the second half of the week.

And then you have companies that really might touch every aspect of that. A good example of that is someone like Black Book, which has pieces of auto retail, remarketing, and auto finance. They may have different people there, that makes sense for them to be there the whole week. So you have a lot of companies that sort of have a presence in all three of those spaces, so it makes sense for them to be there the whole week. That’s the unique thing about used car work too, ist the fact that it does unite so many disparate pieces of the used car industry. You’ll have some people that choose to attend the entire week.

Used Car Week Offers a Lot of Options for Different People in the Industry

Jeremy: So this week is more than just a little something for everyone in the industry, maybe a lot of somethings for a number of different folks.

Joe: Yeah, no doubt. I think somebody who is primarily going to Used Car Week for Pre-Owned Con, let’s say…. they might find something interesting at Fin Con and meet a new company that they hadn’t worked with before. The beauty of say the second block this year is the fact that the NAVICON, which is, as I mentioned, primarily investment-focused, but attendees may also be able to attend a NRC National Marketing Conference session and learn more about a segment of the business that they may be interested in investing in or a company they’re interested in partnering with. So there’s a lot of cross pollination between the different conferences and attendees and that sort of thing.

Used Car Week Leads to New Opportunities

Jeremy: It sounds like those might be opportunities to do something outside of your initial goals for attending. You might find yourself at this event and as you’re passing a speaker or you get into a conversation, you might be led towards a totally new opportunity.

Joe: Yeah. And people may be wondering what advice you might give for their first time at this event. I think that right there, step outside of your comfort zone or your area of the business and maybe challenge yourself. If you’re a dealer or you’re a finance company, go to a session or two of the conference you didn’t come for, just to be able to meet somebody new or learn about a topic that may have a trickle down impact and affect your segment of the business.

Jeremy: Have you had an experience like that attending these events?

Joe: Yes. I think it’s been a while since I’ve been going to events regularly, but that is one of the beauties that I maybe take away from going to conferences outside of ours … I may go with a certain agenda of, okay, I want to interview these people or I want to go to these sessions, but inevitably I’ll walk into a session I wasn’t planning on participating in, or meet a company at the last minute at a networking reception and learn something new.

That’s what I’ve always enjoyed about going to live conferences is that you go in there with a plan, but you’re open-minded to be able to shift your plan a little bit and meet someone or attend a session you didn’t really intend on attending and learn something new.

Why Is Used Car Week at Red Rock in Las Vegas?

Jeremy: Now the location, Las Vegas, Nevada, but specifically at Red Rock, was there any significance or thought behind that as the venue?

Joe: We’ve been having Used Car Week there every other year, essentially for many years. And it makes sense from a space perspective. It is such a large facility and it fits right in a warehouse based on the attendees and all the inside basics of what it takes to run a conference. But it’s also a nice atmosphere.

It’s in Las Vegas, but it’s not on the strip. It’s several miles off of the strip and you almost feel like you are in the middle of the mountain range. You’re right at the foothills of the Red Rock Mountains, and you can look out one side of your window and think, am I in Arizona, or am I in Las Vegas?

And then on the other side, you might go to another window and you see the Las Vegas strip. And so if you do want to do the whole Las Vegas, go see the lights and glamor and glitz, you can do that. It’s a short Uber ride away, but at the same time, if you want to take a step back, enjoy the wild west and the beautiful mountains and some quiet enjoyment, there’s that too. So it’s just the best of both worlds really.

Upcoming Highlights of Used Car Week

Jeremy: Really sounds like just a ton going on for this event. You have five different conferences in one, you have dealerships, you have vendors, you have a number of different partners, all combining in this one week. You have Las Vegas, you have the Strip, you have the great outdoors. I’m sure there’ll be opportunities for folks to maybe connect on some of the hiking trails that are legendary in the area. So with all that, what are you most looking forward to?

Joe: I think for me, after a year or two years of not being able to connect with folks in person, I went to a conference a couple months back and it was the first time I’d been to an in-person conference in almost two years. I think just to be able to see people in person, it makes such a difference. This will be our company’s first in-person conference in two years.

And that’s what I’m most looking forward to, just all these people that I’ve talked to on Zoom or interviewed on the phone for the past two years… it will be nice to be able to see them and bump fists with them and see them in person. The content is great, the atmosphere, the networking, everything is great, but I think really I’m a people person, I’m an expert. I get my energy from being around other folks. And I think that’s what I’m most looking forward to.

Jeremy: Same with the PAL team. We’re excited to get back out there and to see everybody over there. Joe, this has really been great. Thank you so much for bringing us through all this. How can people connect with you, Auto Remarketing and Used Car Week?

How to Learn More About Used Car Week

Joe: Sure. Well, first of all, I appreciate coming on. I always love talking about our events. To learn more about Used Car Week, you can go to usedcarweek.biz. So it’s Used Car Week dot B-I-Z. And that’ll pull up everything you need to know, from, agenda, speakers, how to register, just everything else going around the event, the hotel. That is all in one place, usedcarweek.biz.

And then autoremarketing.com, you can register for all of our e-newsletters, all of our magazines, and there’s a lot of links on there to our podcast, webinars and conferences, and really kind of a one stop shop. You can view our digital magazines there.

So that’s usedcarweek.biz, dot B-I-Z, and autoremarketing.com. And then I’m on all the social networks, LinkedIn and Twitter. I post a lot of stories and stuff there. And so just search Joe Overby on there and hear my ramblings and nonsense. But mainly usedcarweek.biz and autoremarketing.com.

Preowned Auto Logistics at Used Car Week

Jeremy: We’ll be following you there and across social media. And for all those listening, you can catch the PAL team at Used Car Week, booth 315, at any time at preownedautologistics.com. Thanks everyone for listening.

5 Trends to Watch in the Automotive Industry

If you work in the automotive industry, chances are you’ve tried to predict the future at least once. Dealerships have been forced to react to rapid changes over the last decade, including a recession and a boom in internet use. It’s no wonder that dealerships feel they need to prepare themselves for what’s coming down the pipe.  

We’ve been following trends, and we can give you an overview of what’s happened over the last year or two, and what might be coming your way.

2016-2019 Saw Big Changes in the Auto Industry

Vehicle sales hit a high point in 2016, when Americans bought almost 18 million vehicles. Unfortunately, sales have been levelling out since. Interest rates are not trending favorably, and car lots are gradually changing from a new car to a used car focus. Owners are holding onto their vehicles longer, and they expect their dealers to service and care for older cars over the long term. Dealerships who don’t focus on service and quality will have a harder time keeping up with the competition. That’s just one trend we see going into 2019 …

5 Trends We’re Watching This Year  

(1) Light Trucks Continue to Beat Out Cars in Popularity

Consumers continue to prefer utility vehicles and light pickup trucks. It appears that this trend will last throughout 2019 and into 202, especially with vehicles like the Chevy Silverado, GMC Sierra, and Chevy Blazer SUV on the market.

Since used vehicles continue to grow in popularity as well, expect to see late-model used trucks in demand. Plus, now that most vehicles include the kind of technology consumers want, like blind-spot detection and lane departure warning, there’s no reason not to go with a late-model used SUV if you’re hunting for a capable bargain.

(2) More Technology and Capabilities Across the Board

Speaking of technology, some auto industry experts are seeing what they call a democratization of these technologies across the industry. Driver-assisted technology is in demand. And, honestly, once you experience blind-spot detection, why would you want to drive without it?

More and more cars, Toyota and Nissan models in particular, are offering these technologies. There’s simply no turning back from the smart vehicle revolution.

(3) Customers Do Their Research; You’d Better, Too

Many customers now shop online before they ever step foot on a car lot. And if they’re doing their research, dealers must be prepared. The more hard questions you can answer, and the more you can maximize your online presence, the better.

When customers do come to your lot, you need to make the most of each customer interaction. Shoppers are smarter. They make decisions quickly, and they expect you to make the purchase as smooth as possible.

(4) Private Party Sales are on the Rise

Private party and used vehicle sales continue to grow in popularity, as we mentioned above. As incentives stagnate and interest rates go up, consumers will be more likely to go with a late model used vehicle than buy new. Remember, however, that used cars depreciate quickly; you should always be able to give customers a quick list of the pros and cons if you want to provide the quality the public seeks.

(5) Ride-Sharing Services? Don’t Worry Quite Yet

Many car dealerships are wringing their hands over the growth of ride-sharing services like Uber or Lyft. However, experts caution that it’s not yet time to panic. These services are not as dominant as they might seem. Ride-sharing works in dense urban areas, but they’ve yet to make much of a difference in suburban or rural areas. In fact, the majority of adults in America don’t use them.

Is Your Dealership Positioned to Make Gains in 2019?

Is your dealership prepared to make the most of 2019’s challenges. How are you positioning your brand to take advantage of the spring season?

We recommend that dealers embrace the power of the internet, be prepared for customer interactions, and make data-driven decisions.

Do you need a reliable company to bring quality used cars to your lot? If you’re looking for a partner with dealership experience, contact the experts at PreOwned Auto Logistics.

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Fax: (978) 744-9077

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