Driving the family dealership: President Mark O’Connor in 1994 took the helm of O’Connor Chevrolet, started by his dad

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Mark O’Connor knew early on that he wanted to run a car dealership. And he also knew he did not want to be a stereotypical in-your-face dealer.
Though O’Connor, president of O’Connor Chevrolet Inc., runs one of the area’s top dealerships, he downplays his achievements and says little when asked about his strengths. But colleagues and friends use words such as “loyal,” “ethical” and “fair” to describe him.
“There’s right and there’s wrong,” says Gregg Tregea, O’Connor’s used-vehicle sales manager. “And if it’s wrong, we’re not going to do it that way.
“He learned those values from his dad,” the 23-year veteran of the dealership adds.
O’Connor Chevrolet was started by O’Connor’s father, Thomas, when he bought Brown Chevrolet on West Main Street in 1966. The elder O’Connor previously had worked as a general sales manager for Valley Cadillac for nearly two decades. O’Connor Chevrolet moved to its current location on West Henrietta Road in 1969.
Mark O’Connor’s first job was washing cars at his father’s dealership when he was 16.
“What it taught me was to respect everybody in the dealership, from the ground level up,” O’Connor says. “That your employees are your key. That’s what gets it done.
“It didn’t teach me that at the time, but as I look back it did,” he adds with a laugh.
O’Connor worked his way through the body shop, service department, parts department and leasing, and in 1980 joined the company full time as sales manager.
“I’ve just about done everything here,” he says. “I haven’t managed them all, but I’ve worked in each department.”
That experience prepared O’Connor to fulfill his dream. He took the reins as dealer-operator in 1994.
“I’ve always wanted to do this. I enjoy it and I knew at a young age that I wanted to take over for my father,” he says. “It was a pretty good transition for me.”
O’Connor Chevrolet has some 76 employees and in 2006-a year in which vehicle sales in Monroe County reached a 15-year low-posted revenues of $26 million. That was down slightly from $29 million in 2005. O’Connor expects slight growth this year.
“We’ve been in a little bit of a downturn,” he says of the lackluster market. But with Chevy’s renewed focus on cars rather than gas-guzzling trucks, and its new product offerings-including a revamped Malibu-business should rebound, he adds.
“We’re looking for an increase in ’08,” O’Connor says.
Long-term goals mirror the company’s short-term goals, he says.
“It’s really just keeping our customer base satisfied,” he notes. “We’ve got a line of diverse products, from trucks to economy cars to full-sized family cars to big people-movers. Just keep your customer base happy and keep them coming back to you for all their different needs.”
In a time when many dealers have stepped up their service, parts and body shop operations to supplement car sales and preserve customer relationships, O’Connor Chevrolet is no exception, he says.
“We constantly work on retaining customers, and the service and parts department carries the major load of our expense structure,” he says.
As in many industries, competition can be a challenge, O’Connor says.
“I think we’re over-dealered, and I think we’ve seen a correction to that in the past,” he says of the number of domestic dealers in the area. “I think as time goes on that’s going to somewhat take care of itself. The stronger dealers, the more established dealers, will still be around, and I think some of the other smaller, maybe outlying, dealers won’t be able to hang in there.”
Though the automotive industry has had its share of problems in recent years, O’Connor says the rough patch that stands out for him was when he served as leasing manager in 1980.
“I think the prime rate was over 20 percent. Think about that. Today a conventional loan is maybe 6.25 percent,” he recalls. “It was tough, and we had to pull back on employee count, suck it up a little bit.”
The biggest challenge O’Connor has faced in his nearly three decades with the dealership is all the new products and manufacturers that have entered the market, he says.
“When I first started it was really the Big Three and maybe Toyota,” he explains. “Now we’ve got everybody coming in. It’s just being able to compete among all of these new competitors that are being introduced … being almost considered a foreign car in your own country. That makes me want to pull my hair out.”
What keeps him grounded, though, is knowing that Chevy products are getting stronger.
“We’re competing on more of a level playing field,” he says. “People don’t know how good our cars are today, and they are. But the perception has to catch up with the reality. That keeps me going.”

Relaxed culture

Despite the cyclic nature of the automotive industry, O’Connor says his company is a survivor for several reasons.
“I think it’s our people. It’s taking care of the customer. It’s having them come in and see the same faces and know that they can trust the dealership,” he explains. “Especially in this business, that’s the biggest obstacle that we have to overcome. That for years in the business it was looked at as somewhat of a group of horse traders, for lack of a better term, and we were just here to take your money.”
Differentiating the dealership from the throng of competitors in town takes a leader who is involved in the business on a daily basis, O’Connor says. It also takes a management team with longevity.
“I’ve got my sales manager with me in the same position for over 20 years. My used-car manager’s been (here) over 20 years. My controller has been with me 40 years. My parts manager’s been with me going on 40 years,” O’Connor notes. “So I’ve got a solid base of management that’s been here a long time. It’s not a new face every time you walk into the dealership.”
The longevity of O’Connor Chevrolet’s employees reflects well on its leader, used vehicle sales manager Tregea says.
“Here’s a guy that has seven or eight people that have worked for him for decades,” Tregea explains. “They’ve dedicated their careers to him. That speaks volumes.”
That dedication could be due in part to O’Connor’s ability to relate to his people, Tregea adds.
“His father, when Mark was in school, had him driving the parts truck; he had him rust proofing cars in the body shop; he had him be a service writer; he had him be the oil change guy; he had him work at the parts counter,” he says. “So Mark has empathy for all the different positions in the dealership.”
Employees describe the culture at O’Connor Chevrolet as a relaxed, family atmosphere and one in which managers are allowed and encouraged to make their own decisions and run their departments as they see fit.
“He lets us do our thing,” says Jerry Gadomski, fleet manager. “If you want advice from him, he’ll give it to you. He also takes advice too. He’s open to suggestions.
“He’s devoted to us, really,” he adds.
O’Connor says he has goals he wants his managers to accomplish, but aside from that he lets them run things as they see fit.
“I pretty much let my managers control their own destiny,” he says.
Of his strengths, O’Connor says he is a people person and he enjoys learning all he can about his product.
“I like dealing with the public and I’m not one to screen my calls,” he says. “I know the product well. I think I’m hands on in that respect. If people come in and want to deal with me, I don’t have any problem going out and selling them a car.”
That also can be a weakness, he says, in that dealing directly with customers can be time consuming and take away from other issues.
“I could walk away from it and have a manager do it. It does take up a lot of my time, but I enjoy that,” he says.
And if O’Connor did not deal with the customers he would miss out on the best part of his job, he says: seeing customers taking delivery of their new vehicle.
Gadomski points to O’Connor’s hands-on approach to customer relations as a competitive edge. It is that approach that wins and keeps customers, he says.
“He’s not like a lot of these companies that have to be on television every time you turn around. A lot of it is word of mouth,” Gadomski says. “So when he has a customer he wants to take care of that customer and keep that customer.”
Doing what is right and what is fair for the customer also is important for the company, Tregea says.
“And that’s done regardless of the cost to the dealership. We’re told if a customer’s got something coming, they get it,” Tregea says. “It doesn’t matter if it’s X amount of dollars.”
O’Connor says his greatest achievement is staying in a tough business for 42 years and being successful at it.
“Not just eking by,” he says. “You look around at dealerships in town and you can count them on one hand the people who have been in business for that long. There’s a lot of turnover and we haven’t had to deal with that. That’s our biggest accomplishment.”
Much of that success began with O’Connor’s mentor, his now-retired father.
“He taught me what to do in the business and how to go about it,” O’Connor says.

At home

O’Connor, 49, was born and raised in the Rochester area and now lives in Pittsford with his wife, Lia, and three children: Maggie, 20; Kristine, 17; and John, 15.
O’Connor met his wife at a neighborhood party while they were both in high school, says long-time friend James Ryan Jr. O’Connor and Ryan, who also lived in the neighborhood, were in each others’ weddings in 1983.
In his spare time O’Connor enjoys spending time with family and friends and plays golf, hunts and skis. He drives a Chevy Tahoe in the winter and a Corvette in the summer.
Ryan describes his friend as a consistently top choice to play golf with.
“And mainly because he’s just got a very good sense of humor and he doesn’t take himself too seriously,” he explains. “Even if we’re all having lousy rounds, we still get a lot of good laughs.”
Despite the laughs, certain stereotypes bother O’Connor, Ryan says.
“The last thing in the world he wants to be known as is a pushy car salesman,” he says. “I maintain that when he sells you a car, he basically tries to talk you out of buying the car from him. He puts no pressure on you. But I think that’s why people like buying a car from him.”
O’Connor is consistent and loyal to his friends, Ryan adds.
“That’s what makes it fun (to be around him), because you know what you’re getting,” he says.
As far as his accomplishments, O’Connor refuses to tout them, Ryan says.
“When he’s around people he’s not going to tell you what he did or what he didn’t do,” he adds. “His style is definitely not to dwell on what he’s done.”
O’Connor says he’s pretty satisfied with the way everything has gone. He has no regrets. “I could say I wish I’d taken on some hot franchises back in the day,” he says. “But looking back over my shoulder, I’m happy being a Chevrolet dealer.”
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12/07/07 (C) Rochester Business Journal