By John Chauvin, General Manager
As I walk around the new construction, I am in awe of the space the new facility will have. While I don’t have the actual square footage of the buildings before and after memorized, it looks like the showroom, service department, service write-up area and service drive lanes all have doubled in size. Not only is it much larger, it looks totally different both inside and outside. Seriously, if you walk into the front door, about the only thing recognizable is the half spiral staircase that was in the showroom. Everything else has expanded, moved, and taken on an entirely new look.
Windows are in, sheetrock is up (taped and floated), floor tile is starting to be installed and the air conditioner is on. The original restrooms have taken on a major overhaul and are much larger now. We’ve added additional restrooms to the service write-up area and have expanded the waiting room. This place is amazing, and I cannot wait to see the finish-out work as it gets completed.
As for the parking lot, we have carved a driveway between our VW store and our Collision Center. The first few rows in front of the Collision Center will be turned into added display areas for new vehicles adding multiple parking spaces for us to stock even more inventory than years past.
As for current business: I’ll admit, we were a little concerned about how moving into a temporary location (just 2 doors down) would affect normal business. To my delight, I’m excited to say, business increased. Yes, our old Hummer building has tons of parking for inventory which allows us to stock more cars, but one never knows how things will go when you “move their cheese” so to speak. We’ve added staff to accommodate for this growth, which also helps shorten the time spent when purchasing a new or pre-owned vehicle from us.
I’m also proud to say, with added staff, more inventory, great deals and shorter wait times, we’ve moved into the Top 15 largest volume Volkswagen dealers in the entire nation. And we did it from a temporary location! Our next goal is to move into the top 10 which I’m extremely confident we’ll accomplish when we move into this new facility in just a few short months.
Stay tuned for the GRAND OPENING celebration event. We’re planning a big one and you’re invited!
Thank you very much for your business!
John Chauvin – General Manager
Hewlett Volkswagen, LP
