There are tons of folks out there selling business advice. Why in the world should you take business advice from me? I don’t have a degree in business or any degree for that matter. What I do have is a familiarity with the situations and stresses you deal with every day. Not in a theoretical academic manner, but in the “have to make payroll,” “fill in for the team member that called in sick twenty minutes,” “the toilet just overflowed, and I’m the only one here,” and the other ways you know all too well. I have had serious successes, but I may have learned as much from my mistakes, and there have been quite a few over the years.
I was born in a small town 30 miles outside of Atlanta, GA., with a population of 3,800. I was a smart kid, but as the years passed in school, my attention began to waiver, and I went from a promising student to being a problem child.
Before we get into my business story, I want to let you know that the people I encountered along the way are due the lion’s share of credit for the successes I have been involved with. There were plenty of eighty-hour work weeks, no doubt, but without the impact of mentors Pete Cardiges and Neil Huffman, they could have been in vain. The tools I gained from their willingness to take me under their wings, along with the work ethic my mother and grandmother instilled in me, have been the largest influences in my life.
I squeaked by in high school but never entered college. Instead, I took a job driving a truck, and delivering sod. A desire to do better for me led to a job selling cars, the only “you don’t have to get dirty“ job I could get hired for. There, I found my niche.
My record of success kicked into gear at age 20 when, as the youngest salesperson on the staff, I became number one on a thirty-person team at Atlanta's largest volume Chrysler Plymouth dealer.
A contact there led to my first management job. At age 23, I was hired as a sales manager to try to save a struggling Ford dealership whose low retail volume had threatened its franchise. Even though I was new to the city and 400 miles from home, we quickly built a team and increased the monthly volume from 25 new units to over 150 new units in only sixty days. Despite the successes, being new in management also came with a roster of mistakes.
My next stop was as General Manager at a struggling Chevrolet dealership, requiring another 400-mile move. The store was ninth out of nine dealers in a mid-sized metro market. With an abundance of time not being an option, we got to work. Of these sixty-plus employees, I was the youngest.
A stellar team of pros was assembled, including my friend Blane McCowan from Mississippi. Not only did we become the largest sales volume dealer in the metro, but we also became number 10 in the entire US in truck sales. The service and parts departments doubled in revenue as well.
High net profits led to the purchase of an additional dealership, quadrupling the previous owner's volume and net profit in only ninety days. All of this was in a town experiencing almost 35% unemployment due to a shuttered nuclear power plant.
After that chapter, I provided short-term rescues and turnarounds for a Dodge and then a GM dealership in Atlanta.
My next destination accomplishments involved the challenge of turning another Chrysler Dodge dealership into the metro volume leader and a profit leader. That introduced me to Neil Huffman, the smartest people man I’ve ever known. Taking me under his wing, I eventually became the managing partner of our multiple franchise dealership group.
In 2006, my partners and I bought a Chrysler Jeep Dodge dealership in Atlanta. The shuttered showroom's previous owner had been in the news for embezzlement and fraud. Over the previous ten years, four different owners had averaged losing over a half million dollars each year. Starting from scratch with no salespeople, sales managers, or business or office managers, starting with fewer than thirty new units in stock and zero used inventory, the dealership made a profit of over $125,000 in its first month. It became one of the top-performing dealerships out of the 25 in the Atlanta metro.
Later, toward the end of my automotive career, I was able to provide turnarounds for struggling BMW, Acura, and Nissan dealerships by quickly building incredible, high-performing teams, installing processes, and instilling a “get it done’ philosophy.
In 2014, after retiring from the auto industry, my wife Marian and I started a personal training business in our garage. In less than two years, it had become a mid-six-figure business with just us two.
Not only were we very successful from a financial standpoint, but our successes in helping clients with major physical challenges made it onto numerous magazines and newspapers, even the United States Congressional Record.
We expanded into multiple rooftops. We had a chance to pay it forward by mentoring a brilliant young man, Jose Barcenas. When the pandemic hit, we decided to pass the torch to Jose. We retired and moved to SC.
In 2021, I began writing for publications across the Southeast. In the first year, I had nearly 100 articles published in a dozen different magazines and newspapers across the Southeast.
In 2022, wanting to cover stories with a larger scope, I started a Southern-themed blog, The Southern Voice. In less than eighteen months, along with some incredible team members, we had built the reach to ten million people.
In 2023, I turned my love of classic rock into a podcast, Rock Stars Talk. In our first season, it became number three out of hundreds of thousands of music-themed podcasts in the US. Interviewing my rock heroes from back in the day was a blast. I was blessed to interview members of Lynyrd Skynyrd, Deep Purple, .38 Special, Grand Funk Railroad, Marshall Tucker Band, Heart, Whitesnake, Montrose, Ted Nugent, Bad Company, and more.
These successes have provided some valuable lessons in business, but many of the most valuable have come from failures, seemingly insurmountable challenges, and the lessons they taught me along the way.
Tidbits of Trivia-
I was cast in the lead role as Big Louie in the 2002 Louisville AdFed video for their annual awards ceremony.
I am a former holder of two cross-country ski training world records and was number three in the world in my age group in indoor rowing.
I wrote a fitness column jointly with Dr. Michael Smith, then the Chief Medical Officer for WebMD.
I contributed to Men's Health Magazine.
I have made dozens of TV appearances, commercials, and voiceovers.
I appeared in an episode of the E! Networks show Wild On.
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