December 11, 2025 • 36 mins
On this week’s episode of At Home With Roby, Chad Martin of Martin Management Group shares how he stepped into the family business during a recession and carried his family’s 40-year automotive dream forward—right when the industry was at its toughest.
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Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:00):
Welcome to that home with Roby.
Speaker 2 (00:01):
I'm Patrick mc isaac from Roby Commercialing Services lone with
Trent Haston from the Roby Family of Companies. We are
your host, Trent coming off the Thanksgiving holiday?
Speaker 1 (00:11):
Yeah, man, how'd you do on eating? Yeah? Uh, I
well me too. It's uh. I was I was a
couple of pounds heavier this morning in my morning skill there. Yeah,
so uh I stayed flat somehow, I don't I don't
know how.
Speaker 2 (00:29):
We definitely took advantage of of some good old Southern
Indiana cooking and say we do. Typically that kind of
stuff throws an extra pound or two at you.
Speaker 1 (00:38):
But we had a good time though. Man. The weather
cooled down, we went and uh we a tradition I
used to lead, uh and be part of selling Christmas
trees with the church. Did that for about ten years,
which was a lot of fun and a lot of
great memories. COVID kind of shut that down and uh,
I mean some things running a cool horse, but uh
(01:01):
it was great fellowship. But since then we've been going
to the mountains on Friday after Thanksgiving nice as a
family and uh with with my in lass Tom and
Poppy and Gigi and uh we go cut a tree
down and and we got us a nice one. I
think it's gonna live. Did you do you bring your
(01:23):
own saw?
Speaker 3 (01:23):
There?
Speaker 2 (01:24):
Do they provide this all? I haven't done this in
so long. It is fun to do. We did when
Carlo was really little bit only one time.
Speaker 1 (01:30):
Now you hike up this big hill we go to
it's uh Limville. Linville Vineyards and Winery has a Christmas
tree lot outside. It's really nice.
Speaker 4 (01:40):
Uh.
Speaker 1 (01:40):
So Poppy and Gig have a glass of wine while
me and the Hasten crews stomp up the hill. It's
this a pretty big hill. But when you go up
a big hill, you got good uh scenery for pictures,
so that's always good. And uh and we pick out
a tree. You walk around, you see all these trees
and uh and then a hold up your pole and
(02:02):
a guy comes and tags it, gives you the tag,
he cuts it down with the saw, and then about
an hour later you give go pay for it, and
they matched the tag up and they put it in
your car. Pretty good deal like it. So last year
we thought we had a big enough tree. It was
a real pretty tree and uh we got it home
(02:25):
and number one Reagan was disappointed that it wasn't that big.
And Number two, my next door neighbor, Michael Cox was
giving me a hard time because he had a Humongoey's tree,
and I don't know, man, I think he has like
Napoleon syndrome or something they called that was trying to
flex on me. Uh but uh, anyway, this year, I
(02:48):
don't know if it's as big as Michael's tree was
last year. I have not seen his tree this year,
but it is nice and and luptious, luptious, luptious, I
guess Reagan. All he says, I say the wrong word
for the wrong meaning. She's like, that doesn't mean what
you think it means. I'm falling. I'm fallowing. I'm like, well,
obviously you understood what I was trying to mean, because
(03:10):
you're correcting me against what I thought it meant. Because
she can read your mind. At this point, I would
think I don't know about all that reading my mind.
Speaker 2 (03:19):
So you, you and Michael Cox have a Christmas tree, a
war going on on who's gonna have another inch on top?
Speaker 1 (03:30):
And we're going for thickness. We like, we like voluptuous, okay,
and we got to keep it watered. You know, you
used to think when when pine needles were falling off
the trees or the needles, uh, it was because they
cut it a month or two early and it was
already suffering. But when you cut your own, you can't
(03:50):
use that excuse. And now that we put it in
the stand and last night Reagan had adjusted four times
and it's a bigger tree, so it's a little more tedious.
I'm like, come on, baby, it can be a little crooked,
but like other things in life. But uh, but pine
needles were falling off like crazy or Fraser Ferm needles. Anyway,
(04:15):
it's good our house. Our kids say the house smells good.
I can't really smell.
Speaker 2 (04:20):
That's the best part about a live tree is the smell.
I I Trent was about to go down the fake
tree path and my wife Cole slapped me. I mean,
she said, have you lost your mind? You have never
wanted we love Christmas. Tree's like, what are you doing?
It just looks so easy.
Speaker 1 (04:36):
You gotta walk lightly in in the fake tree world.
Because some people have their reasons, and I understand, and
everybody has opinions. But you can't burn, well you could,
but you can't really burn a fake tree in the
hastened bonfire party for my father that it will be
January tonight.
Speaker 2 (04:57):
Well, dude, these fake Christmas trees aren't cheap, and I
don't one think you'd really want to burn one down.
Speaker 1 (05:02):
But I had Scarlet convinced.
Speaker 2 (05:03):
She was like Dad, and if we buy a four
hundred dollars fact tree, after we buy three trees, uh
from our we'll have it paid off.
Speaker 1 (05:10):
Star, you're buying trees and cottswallow Patrick, we buy them
from our church. Yet my part methodist always makes you
feel better about overspending on trees. Definitely the right thing
to do. It's good. Well they're good so so anyway,
they so we're recording the show on Monday. So yesterday
(05:31):
last night, the the uh, the kids and Reagan decorated
the tree, decorated the house. I mean I didn't know.
We got bed spreads and shower curtains and wind we
got more Christmas stuff is crazy.
Speaker 2 (05:48):
It feels good though. It's a good time of year, yeah,
I mean, especially with the kids running around.
Speaker 1 (05:52):
But you know, I had I had a pimpkin, you know,
I get I try to get a pimpkin every year.
From from my trips to the mountains. Tatum named it
the pimpkin, uh pimlking away this weekend. Man, it was
an eighty dollars eighty dollars pumpkin. Well, what are you
gonna do with it? I was gonna let us sit
there until a rotot of rots out. That is the worst.
Speaker 2 (06:13):
I just pumped mine into the bushes and hopefully it
disintegrates by the time spring comes around.
Speaker 1 (06:17):
If you punting this into the bushes can break your foot.
Yeah right, I've seen, I've seen.
Speaker 2 (06:22):
I have helped you bring one of those back from
the mountains one time, and it took both of us
to carry the sucker.
Speaker 1 (06:27):
It was so big. Yeah, I think you have to
put I had to put this one in a sheet,
a blanket or something. Three people. I hear you, I
hear you.
Speaker 2 (06:36):
Well, I have my uh my annual rabbit hunt over
over the Thanksgiving break, uh, and my record is still
I have I have gotten a rabbit, but trying to
have like the money shot that was running through the field,
I saw him bouncing and I missed.
Speaker 1 (06:51):
Well, you said it on the last show miss leading
up to your trip up to Indiana that you're not
that good at the when you shoot and clays right.
Rabbits are tough.
Speaker 2 (07:05):
But usually I'm better at this because I've got a
little bit of an experience. But uh uh, one of
the guys bj that lived on the farm we were
we were uh hunting at he he cleaned them up
for me.
Speaker 1 (07:17):
I went pow.
Speaker 2 (07:17):
He kept running and then about two seconds later another
pow and no more.
Speaker 1 (07:21):
Rabbit said you eat some rabbit over the week. We did.
Speaker 2 (07:25):
And but that is their rule that somebody has to clean,
clean them and eat and and eat them or they
won't release the dogs. And so it's pretty cool man
to watch these you know, uh, these dogs at work.
I mean, once they hit a scent, you know, the
rabbit stays several hundred yards in front of the smell.
You know, they're they're in, they're following, and the goals
(07:46):
to try to get kind of in their general path.
These rabbits are smart, man. They'll they'll double back on you.
They'll they'll turn quick one way when you think they're
going the other way.
Speaker 4 (07:55):
Uh.
Speaker 1 (07:55):
And these dogs are just having the time of their life.
Pretty cool. What in bugs Bunny? I mean, he's like
gotta be besides Fred Funstone. He's got to be one
of the smartest cartoon characters I've ever witnessed. I mean,
I agree road Runner.
Speaker 2 (08:10):
The road Runner was pretty sharp too, while he Coyote
had a tough time.
Speaker 1 (08:13):
I'm getting after him. What was the jetson? What was
his name? George? George? He was smart goods futuristic, I mean,
doing high tech stuff.
Speaker 2 (08:24):
His boy Elroy all the time, we can tell it was.
Speaker 1 (08:29):
It was during my period as well, so it must
have overlapped a couple of years down down to the
younger jin.
Speaker 3 (08:36):
Uh.
Speaker 1 (08:36):
We have our guests today. I've been, I've been. I
kept sending him things to get on my q R code,
and he was he was slow playing me, so I
stiff armed him about coming on. Uh straight off of vacation.
But uh, he's in my family business form, generational family
(08:58):
business form. He hills his business hills from Boiling Green, Kentucky,
and and he he lives out west I think in California.
Actually I do know that. Uh, I'm gonna make fun
of him before he can say anything on here. He's
calling in. The Panthers took down a number one La
Rams yesterday.
Speaker 2 (09:18):
Whoop hit the bank. It looked good Man at the bank.
Is that what they say they're calling it now? I
like it, man, it felt like twenty fifteen. Honestly, he's
over here shaking his head. I know you're very involved.
Speaker 5 (09:28):
With the Panthers, brother. It was a beautiful time, but
it was felt so good. It was a monsoon out
there too.
Speaker 1 (09:32):
It's terrible.
Speaker 5 (09:33):
It could not have been worse. But it was a
great result, man, Absolutely incredible game.
Speaker 2 (09:38):
You know it was cool is the stadium kind of
looked the squars because of the rain. But you go
into the concourse and everybody's piled around the TV's trying
to watch it and stay dry.
Speaker 5 (09:46):
Yeah, man, I mean the echoes through the arena as
you're leaving. Yeah, and keep pounding.
Speaker 3 (09:50):
Man.
Speaker 5 (09:50):
There they are stoked there hoping for the playoffs, man,
which they controlled. Their destiny can happen.
Speaker 1 (09:56):
It can happen.
Speaker 2 (09:57):
And you are the host of the pregame show. Yeah,
I do the tail game Tailgate shit Fox.
Speaker 1 (10:01):
Yeah, man, that's a good time. You know, I think
they ought to fire Bryce Young, get rid of it.
He's not gonna make it. It's back and forth all season, man.
Speaker 5 (10:09):
One game It's like he looks he looks like he
could be the MVP the next game.
Speaker 1 (10:13):
I'm like third string you all the way down. You know,
I'm a big fan to get a lot of debates
and and lighthearted arguments about about Bryce. Bryce. I'm here
for you, man. If you ever want to be on
the At Home with Roby Show, we can replace Patrick.
Uh heard, I'm out of here. You're gonna get all
(10:35):
right well, Chad Martin, Uh when we return, gonna talk shop,
gonna laugh. He's a one of the most serious guys
I've ever met on the At Home with Roby Show.
And don't forget.
Speaker 2 (10:47):
Ruby Services is your one stop source for all your
electrical heating, cooling, plumbing and handyman needs. Keep it easy
and get it all done by one. Ruby servicesnow dot com.
That's Roby Services now dot com.
Speaker 1 (10:59):
Welcome back to At Home with Roby.
Speaker 2 (11:01):
Patrick mccauseik from Roby Commercial on Services along with Trent
Hasten from the Roby family of companies.
Speaker 1 (11:06):
We're back.
Speaker 2 (11:07):
We've got Chad Martin, who I think we just found out.
He didn't really say, but I think the way he
implied that he is a Los Angeles Rams fan.
Speaker 1 (11:15):
Chad, am I right, I.
Speaker 4 (11:18):
Am I just the character the way that it was
characterized by Trent. I feel like, you know, a win
is a win. I get it, Trent, but he was
you know, thirty one to twenty eight. You made it
sound like it was Ohio State game this weekend and
it wasn't. So I just want to I just want
to clarify that, just for the record, thank you.
Speaker 3 (11:36):
Well.
Speaker 2 (11:36):
High State did some business on Michigan had been a
minute too. Are you an Ohio State fan also then?
Speaker 1 (11:40):
Or is that why you?
Speaker 4 (11:43):
My father in law is a graduate from there, originally
from Ohio. So I try to keep up. I try
to keep up with everything. I honestly thought that I
was going to hear some more commentary. I'm I'm sure
when you guys air, but you know, I thought there
was more more chatter on the SEC about Lane Kippen
from this weekend.
Speaker 6 (12:01):
There's a lot of.
Speaker 4 (12:03):
Lessons there, Trent, and I feel like we can all
pick up one and uh so we can also dive
in a dive as well. But that's my uh, that's
my trip around the world from this weekend's sports.
Speaker 1 (12:15):
I've been reading about, uh some various things about Lane Kiffin.
Uh A number one I have a from being in
the Southern seven of YPO. We're in YPO together, Uh
my chapter, our chapters of Southern seven. I have a
lot of Mississippi folks and some old miss guys have
pain been on, been on the show, and the and
the likes. So I don't know. I still don't understand.
(12:40):
Maybe you can help me with this, Chad. It is
LSU or Florida that much bigger of a catch than
old Miss number one and then number two. I think
mister Kiffin went and talked to the A D And said, hey,
let me finish the season, and he said, no, get
out now. Uh. There seemed like some hard feeling kind
(13:00):
of reminds me. I'm me and honest with you of
me running our business twenty years ago and you got
an employee you love and they turn in their notice
and you say, nope, this is it. Get out. And
now these days you're like, hey, man, can I have
a couple of weeks? And you helped me out What
you got to say about that that theory, Chad.
Speaker 3 (13:24):
Yeah, I definitely.
Speaker 4 (13:26):
Well, let me start by saying that I think that
in terms of size and prestige, I mean LSU clearly
has a lot of money that they're.
Speaker 3 (13:35):
Throwing at him.
Speaker 4 (13:36):
I mean the rumored contracts, you know, are upwards of
one hundred million dollars contracts for these I mean, it's
the numbers are insane. So it seemed to be I mean,
I know that he said it was based on prayer,
but it seemed to be very heavily based on well, judge,
(13:57):
you want the private plan that he flew out on
that was being blue and then what he flew back
into LSU one, it seemed to be a money play.
But you're right, I mean, he says that he's ask
the team if he could stay.
Speaker 3 (14:09):
They said no. I mean, you're right. I mean that
doesn't seem to be.
Speaker 4 (14:14):
Kind of how you want to finish up the season
from all missus perspective. But I think that they were
pretty upset that he did along. You know, he first
when he first went there, he did a big tr
tour about how this time is different and how this
is home and how this is his family and this
is you know, the nomenslature that we use around kind
(14:35):
of talking about things like that. People were really really
hurt and probably you know, rightfully so, and the timing
wasn't good and they're having a good season, so you know,
it just seemed to be.
Speaker 3 (14:46):
Bad all around.
Speaker 4 (14:46):
But Trent, you're right, I mean, you're just gonna say,
never mind, we don't want you to stay and such
up the season until even though he says that he
said he wanted to, but we don't really know what
he wanted to.
Speaker 1 (14:55):
My next question is why couldn't he awaited several more
weeks to tell him month touch more.
Speaker 2 (15:01):
To tell him and Trent real quick, but to touch
on your first question, I mean, the difference between you know,
twenty years ago you saying, I employee comes in and
breaks your heart, you can just tell him to pound
or them sticking around. Is the fear of him sticking
around is convincing these players to come with him over
this next three or four weeks, which there's really nothing
in place in college football like we would have in
(15:22):
a business that can stop him from doing that. And
I think that was one of their overarching concerns, was that, hey,
if he sticks around, these guys love him and look
up to him, then there's there's further opportunity for them
to leave with it, go with Lane. So the whole
atmosphere of college football is a hot mess right now,
and this is just the result of it.
Speaker 1 (15:43):
Well, it's popular as turning a lot of dough. You're right, sorry,
I was gonna he said, you had another question. No,
I just didn't know why he couldn't have waited a
month to break the news, to know, miss Staff. Yeah,
that is sort of strange.
Speaker 3 (15:59):
I'm sure that.
Speaker 4 (16:00):
I think there was some contractual items there that they
were working through, and also obviously that you know from
both sides. And also I think that his other big
item was that there were already been so much rumors.
I mean, they just would have dogged him for the
next several weeks because there's just so many rumors about
him leading. Yeah, obvious the wall.
Speaker 1 (16:19):
Didn't he do this to Tennessee too when he went
to USC kind of similar similar this.
Speaker 4 (16:26):
Is that's why he did it pr for because he
said this time is different to everyone.
Speaker 3 (16:30):
Well, you did this time at home.
Speaker 2 (16:32):
That's another kind of business lesson Trent. You know, you
talk about somebody that comes to apply for a job
and they've been at ten different places in the last
ten years. It's sort of a red flag that goes up.
So I wonder how long he stays at L s U.
Speaker 1 (16:45):
And then't always.
Speaker 4 (16:48):
From his perspective, this is also a business decision from
this perspective, and he keeps getting more money every time
he goes someplace too. But no one there, there's some
there's some lesson there about hey, when you're talented, certain
rules don't apply to you.
Speaker 3 (17:02):
That that's what it appears to kind of indicate.
Speaker 1 (17:07):
Well, it indicates that that is not my belief. I
don't think he gets a free pass on this, but
good luck to him. My hope is his prayers work,
and good luck to amen.
Speaker 3 (17:17):
I'm rooting.
Speaker 1 (17:17):
I'm I've become through my buddies, an old Miss fan.
I'm rooting for him. Hopefully they they do well in
the playoffs and uh and and make him eat a
little crow on this dale.
Speaker 4 (17:29):
I don't know, have you been to Old Miss before?
Speaker 3 (17:31):
I have? I have?
Speaker 6 (17:33):
You know?
Speaker 4 (17:34):
Okay, trip, I mean you know I care a lot
about your health, as you know. But I'll tell you,
if you had an Old Miss, you've never eaten at
soo many gas stations in your entire life to have
the best food sitting out of a gas station as
they have an Old Miss, that's just that's just a
side note, a plug for all the old miss gas stations.
I was quite a.
Speaker 1 (17:53):
Fan of I hear you well, uh, Chad, let's talk
a little bit about you. Where where were you? Where'd
you grow up? Bud?
Speaker 4 (18:04):
I grew up in Bowling Green, Kentucky, Bowling.
Speaker 1 (18:06):
Green, Kentucky. And you went to school I think at Pepperdine,
Am I right about that?
Speaker 3 (18:11):
Correct? Yeah?
Speaker 4 (18:12):
I went to school at Pepperdine University, and I that's
where I met my wife at And I went to
law school at Southwestern before I came back. And I
moved back for a little bit of time after law
school to start running the business for my family back
in oh eighth nine, I came back excuse me, two
(18:36):
the nine, and now I was actually at the time
living in Nashville at that time for several years.
Speaker 6 (18:41):
While we were running.
Speaker 4 (18:42):
While I was running the business, and just right after
I had finished law school, my dad had passed unexpectedly
into you know, two thousand and six, so we had
somebody kind of running the business in the interim where
we started. He started with the business in eighty five
with my mom, and then we just had our fortieth
anniversary actually last year, we had a big celebration in
(19:04):
Bowling Green.
Speaker 1 (19:05):
Wow, forty years. Congratulations dog, that's awesome.
Speaker 3 (19:09):
Forty years.
Speaker 6 (19:10):
Yes, we had.
Speaker 3 (19:11):
We had a great, big celebration.
Speaker 4 (19:12):
We had a bunch of our long time tenured employees there,
people who'd been with us for ten, fifteen, twenty, thirty, five,
thirty at least the top thirty seven years. Some of
our employees there for Bowling Green, and we had a
great time. The mayor was there, We had several nice
messages from some of our state state government officials. And
(19:36):
then we kind of capped it off was we had
a performance in Bowling Green by Robin Thick came and performed.
Speaker 1 (19:42):
Really, no way, that's pretty cool. That's awesome. Man, is
he of Hio ate of himself Kentucky?
Speaker 6 (19:53):
I'm sorry, I don't know where he's from.
Speaker 4 (19:55):
I don't know, actually have no idea where he's from originally.
Speaker 1 (20:00):
To go, Patrick, you threw me on that throu's random
question every Sorry. So the business we're talking about ismartin
management group.
Speaker 4 (20:13):
Uh.
Speaker 1 (20:13):
And you guys do own some various consumer uh consumer
and retail goods uh stores, some car dealerships and such.
And you you actually own a car dealership where my
my father in law is from. We've talked about this
in Bennettsville, North Carolina. Right South Carolina. Dang, dude, weird,
(20:34):
I threw you off. Well you're on the border there.
You're pretty close to the border bordering.
Speaker 4 (20:39):
Yeah, go ahead, a little bit about an hour inside
of Myrtle Beach.
Speaker 3 (20:45):
Yeah, but minute South Carolina.
Speaker 4 (20:46):
Yeah, we have Honda, the Honda and the Foro dealership
there in Minuteville, South Carolina.
Speaker 3 (20:52):
If anyone's driving through wants to say.
Speaker 1 (20:54):
Hi, we go through there to go to the beach often.
Speaker 4 (20:58):
Uh, kind of have you bought a car from us
on your way in and in or out of it?
Speaker 1 (21:03):
We haven't yet, but yeah, but I sure would like
to renovate that dealership. Yeah, there were some ziggers at
each other. How did your family get in in the
in the car business?
Speaker 4 (21:20):
Yeah, well, so my dad had a dream of owning
a mechanic shop. He wanted to own his own shop.
At one point he was from Greenville, Kentucky, and he
had moved up to Springfield.
Speaker 3 (21:31):
Uh.
Speaker 4 (21:32):
Uh, Springstale, Ohio.
Speaker 3 (21:35):
Uh.
Speaker 4 (21:35):
And when he was in springt Ohio, you got a job.
Speaker 3 (21:38):
At a dealership.
Speaker 4 (21:39):
And he is a mechanic there. Uh, in our business,
you had to bring your own tools with you, and
it's kind of been that way for decades.
Speaker 3 (21:48):
And he didn't have any tools.
Speaker 4 (21:49):
He didn't own any tools, but he told the owner
that he did have some tools, and his cousin who
was living with at the time, he said, oh, he said, well,
you don't have any tools, familiars, And then he said,
I will buy Monday, and sure enough he was able
to get some tools together.
Speaker 3 (22:03):
By Monday.
Speaker 4 (22:04):
Wentz started at the dealership. The owner took a license
to him. He sponsored him to get a dealership about
maybe eight or ten years later or something like that.
That's how he was able to get his first dealership
was for the General Motors program at the time.
Speaker 3 (22:18):
He bought a Cadillac.
Speaker 4 (22:20):
Olgena bull store in Bowling Gringentucky. And then short there
after they had already had my sister. I had an
older sister who did a great job putting together our
fortieth event, and then they had me when I was
in Bowling Green. Then my brother were on Bowling Green.
So he really grew the business quite a bit through
the late eighties and early nineties all the way into
(22:41):
the early two thousands.
Speaker 3 (22:43):
He grew a lot with Saturn, with the.
Speaker 4 (22:45):
General Motors brands, and really had saw a lot of
change in the industry before. You know, he was kind
of coming through a time where a lot of people
didn't own a lot of dealerships. Most dealers owned one too,
maybe three stores. He was kind of one of the
first ones to really start, you know, adding a bunch
of stores. And then of course from there you saw
(23:05):
the big people come in, like automation and Penske things
like that, kind of owning dozens and dozens and dozens
of stores. But he was kind of in before that
was really in vogue. As the kids say, or by kids,
I mean Trent in vogue.
Speaker 1 (23:19):
Strike a pose. But man, that's so cool. I mean
telling them about working your way up. Uh yeah, wanted
to be a mechanic, did a great job, got sponsored.
That is awesome. So, uh, how'd you get into the business.
Speaker 4 (23:39):
Well, I got into the business largely because obviously it's
a family business and you grew up in and trying
to relate to this, you grew up, you grew up
in a family business and uh, you know, everybody said, oh, well,
you're gonna be in this business. And you get older,
you can't wait to get in this business.
Speaker 3 (23:53):
What are you gonna do?
Speaker 4 (23:53):
And you know, I had parents that really weren't trying
to steer us one way or the other, and so
I kind of said, you know what, well, maybe maybe
I'll go back to it. Maybe I'll work in that business,
maybe I won't. I don't really know.
Speaker 3 (24:04):
Uh.
Speaker 4 (24:05):
And it ended up turning out that obviously my dad
had had passed them effectedly and we were it was
right before the financial recession, kind of at the beginnings
of the of the Great Recession, uh, and so things
were really going south in the automotive business and the
real estate business. Everyone listening knows this, uh. And so
(24:26):
my family said, hey, maybe it's time that you come
back into the business. And this is what we want
to do if we want to have this business and
kind of prosper uh.
Speaker 3 (24:32):
And so that's what I did.
Speaker 4 (24:33):
I mean, we had lost several dealerships because at the
time we were the largest Saturn retail in the country,
with like seven or eight dealerships that were Saturn only
if he will remember, at that time, GM said, you
know what, we're going to get rid of the Saturn brands.
So those are tens of millions.
Speaker 3 (24:47):
Dollars of buildings that we had to fill at that time.
Speaker 4 (24:50):
Similarly, we had issues with Chevrolet, issues with obviously there
were several brands that had been consolidated under that under
that time frame. So I really that's kind of how
I was kind of pushed into the business. Was just
a just a really crazy time in our nation's history,
our company's history, of just trying to navigate through a
(25:13):
really difficult period of the Great Recession. And that's kind
of how I ended up in the business. And I've
stayed for the past fifteen years doing that.
Speaker 1 (25:22):
Isn't it crazy that that was fifteen years ago? We lived, man,
we fought through that. What What a way to get
indoctrinated and full throttle in the business. What a crazy time.
My father in law was talking about what year did did?
We were talking we were behind the Saturn coming back
from the mountains, and he was talking about how the
(25:45):
frame of the cars made out of composite. It was
I guess breaking it wasn't metal? Is that right? And
in GM and then he said Penske wanted to buy it.
I don't know if he's right about that. Can you
explain a little bit, you know anything about that.
Speaker 4 (26:03):
Yeah, I know about I forget the materials that they
called with Saturns that they were made out of. But
i'll tell you you know, when when we were when
I was a kid and we had a Saturn store,
we had Saturn stores up in Dayton, up in Ohio,
and they used to have a sledge hammer on uh
uh on the showroom floor and they used to give
you like a half paneled vehicle to display and you're
(26:25):
supposed to take the You're supposed to take the mal
basically and throw it against there. It was the fun
It was the most fun thing to do.
Speaker 6 (26:32):
When you were like, oh yeah.
Speaker 4 (26:34):
And because it was supposed to be you know, so
it was to demonstrate how it wasn't breakable and how
it wasn't going to den how I was going to
do that.
Speaker 3 (26:40):
And that was a big thing with Saturn.
Speaker 4 (26:43):
That and they also started the know, the no habile
pricing that was the original Saturn had a one price strategy.
And this was in you know, the late nineties, that's
way before one price became as prevalent as it is today.
They had they actually had that model originally as far
as Pinske in eight of nine, when GM was going
(27:03):
up to Congress and saying, Hey, here's our plan to
become profitable.
Speaker 3 (27:06):
We're gonna shed these brands.
Speaker 4 (27:08):
Penske said, Oh, well, I'd like to be in a manufacturer,
you know, I'd like to be an automotive manufacturing. I can
be an OEM And he had offered himself up at
the time to be an OEM manufacturer. I don't know
where that really went. I mean, I think that some
of it was pr spin. Who knows if it was
from the factory or from the dealer or you know whatever,
(27:29):
because I mean the amount of capital and the capital
was so tight at that time that you need to run,
you know, an automotive manufacturer.
Speaker 3 (27:37):
We see a lot of that today.
Speaker 4 (27:38):
You can see kind of how difficult it is to
get into the space because you see the ribbeans. You
see all the electric car companies kind of popping up,
and you see how a lot of them kind of
go by the wayside. People are always saying, oh, what's
the electric car company? Should I should I try to,
you know, should I buy? I want something different? And I
always say, we'll try to buy the one that's gonna
be in business in five years. You want to deal
(28:01):
with a manufacturer that's no longer in business and you
have items that need to be serviced.
Speaker 1 (28:05):
Wow, well two quick things.
Speaker 2 (28:07):
Too bad they don't have they don't make you know,
f one fifties out of that same material Saturn or
Ram trucks, as Trent, I could definitely use some help
not getting dents in our car. One and two, you
talk about the electric car brands, Trent, you talked about
in the last show. With Scout announcing their headquarters here
in Charlotte. It's like twelve hundred jobs that they're bringing
with pretty high, high high salaries. So it's kind of
(28:29):
kind of funny how to tie that in.
Speaker 1 (28:32):
You think that's going the last five years?
Speaker 7 (28:34):
Chad, Oh, never mind, Like thanks, Trent, Yeah, I'm kidding.
Speaker 4 (28:45):
No, I think their Scout has its own, its own.
Speaker 6 (28:51):
Alleged business model.
Speaker 4 (28:52):
They're really because of the without boring everyone too much,
size laws and dealer laws as it relates to the
way that OEMs can compete against car dealerships, and there's
a lot of agreements in place for that, and they're
trying to separate Scout Out to be a very different
car company than Volkswagen, who technically owns Scout, and they're
(29:13):
going to great lengths to try to make them solve
this separate brand. So we will see if that is successful,
if they can make themselves a separate brand, Goo fights
back against being a separate brand, or if they're going
to end up just folding it back into Volkswagen sometime
in the near future so well, or in the foreseeable future,
I should say, we'll see where that kind of goes.
Speaker 1 (29:32):
Got it, Man, that's very enlightening. So I got a
question for you. So you come into business the GMS,
y'all are Saturn dealer primarily or solely, and GM says,
we're not making Saturns anymore. I mean, what are you
doing at this moment besides crying?
Speaker 4 (29:51):
Yeah, I mean it's one of those ideas, you know,
you look back fifteen years later and you say, hey,
well you just put one foot in front of the
other and set what's our next step. And you can
sit there and you can cry, you can be upset
about it, and you can think of all these things.
Speaker 3 (30:03):
At the end of the day. You have.
Speaker 4 (30:07):
Debt to service, you have employees to employ, you have
buildings that need to be filled. You have to come
up with a plan of action. And so at the time,
the team worked really diligently with several manufacturers and there
were some There's always opportunity, and that's really isn't the
big lesson from that. We started teaming up with some
(30:27):
of the growing manufacturers at the time that are now
really popular and grown a lot, like Subaru and Kia.
Those types of brands were really trying to get their
foot in the market and they wanted to be a
lot of the places there were Saturn dealerships. They said, Hey,
there's a good Saturn retailer here. Saturn's going away. How
can we go into this marketplace?
Speaker 3 (30:47):
And so they were.
Speaker 4 (30:48):
Teaming up with the dealers and we teamed up with
a lot of our stores with those two manufacturers to
try and that really helped to fill some of the
holes that we had and it served as a great
not just for us, but for all those brands way
for there to be brand distribution for those brands that
they didn't have previously. So they saw a big opportunity
and that's why you see some really big growth numbers.
(31:08):
So the lesson and all of that for me is
that anytime that there's uh, there's always an equal and
opposite reaction. So yeah, Saturn went away, but it was
replaced with somebody else that was eager to go to
the market.
Speaker 1 (31:20):
Man. I mean that was that was pivot before COVID
made pivot. I mean they shot.
Speaker 2 (31:25):
They put a shot in the armor of the competitors
on by accident. Really, I'm sure they had to have
expected some of that, but probably not the extent that
you're talking about.
Speaker 3 (31:34):
Chad.
Speaker 4 (31:36):
Yeah, I think that if you watched a lot of
the executives, I think that they were quite shocked at
how much market share they ended up giving up to competitors.
But I'll give it to General Motors. On the other
side of it, they also did streamline their business quite
a bit, and they were able to return to profitability
and have some really huge, huge years even with the
(31:59):
minute market share. So there's also some lessons and that
as well as you know, how do you pivot out
of being a volume leader and making less per vehicle
as a manufacturer into really focusing on streamlining their activities
And Mari Dara did a really great job of navigating
them through a lot of that, which is why she's
one CEO of the year, like multiple times.
Speaker 1 (32:19):
Man, that is this is good education here, Chad. You
were so worried I was just gonna quiz you to death.
Speaker 4 (32:28):
No what I was worried about, Trent as you said, Hey,
come to the studio, We'll do it on camera. And
then suddenly you pivoted and said, actually, I'll just we'll
just do it on the phone. And I wasn't sure
if I have a face for radio or if you
were worried that I was going to dwarf you in
my presence. And I couldn't figure out which one was
going to be.
Speaker 3 (32:48):
So that was my biggest internal was.
Speaker 1 (32:52):
Well, I always love spending time with you, Chad, even
if it's over over the phone on the podcast. Uh,
Martin Management Group, is your firm a true American success story,
family business. Give yourself a plug. Tell us how people
(33:13):
can look you up. You you did say the one
way to shut me up was to get me on
my podcast. And and and I also ask a question,
and I'll go away for a little while. That's because
I got to go to the restroom. Uh. But secondly, Uh,
you've listened to some shows, you know, I like to
put people on the spot. What is one philosophy that
(33:34):
you got a lot of philosophy, what's one that you
live by that ties your business together with with your
family and and and how Chad Martin lives his life.
Speaker 4 (33:48):
Yeah, the biggest, I mean, the biggest guiding line, the
biggest prints of I try to really rely on is
just try to be fair. Fairness I think a business
is very important. I think that's kind of the equilibrium.
So we don't guess always try to be perfection is
difficult to get that. You can always be fair. You
can be fair to you know, your family, your shareholders,
the investors, to the employees. Just always just trying to
(34:10):
strike that balance of fairness and what is that? And
I think that that sometimes means fairness means giving everybody
a fair opportunity and equal shape, not trying to tilt
the scales one way or the other to get an
outcome that's you just it's just favorable to you.
Speaker 3 (34:23):
It's just about being fair.
Speaker 4 (34:25):
And I think that that is a pretty basic fundamental
guiding principle that I try to utilize.
Speaker 1 (34:32):
Amen, love it well. How can people look you up?
And how can people find out where you have dealerships
and other other retail locations.
Speaker 3 (34:41):
Yeah, they can go.
Speaker 4 (34:41):
To Martin GT dot com. That's martingp dot com.
Speaker 1 (34:46):
Got it. H Well, I I love being in your
forum together with you. We we talk about all all
the fun and the tribulations of working in a family business,
which is awesome what it is. I want to come
to Bulling Green, Kentucky sometime and hang out and come
to a party. You did invite me to your company's party,
(35:09):
and I couldn't do it this time, but please keep
the invitations coming, Chad.
Speaker 6 (35:15):
Absolutely.
Speaker 8 (35:16):
You know when we do our eighties, you know, you
and I will be white Bear and it'll be a party, spriend,
it will be a party, and I'm sure I'll still
find you at the bar with some kind of whiskey
meter or something like that.
Speaker 1 (35:32):
Yeah, I will be eighty seven years old, just so
you know, Chad, thanks for being here, man, Thank you
for your time, and God bless you and your family
and your business during this holiday season.
Speaker 3 (35:43):
Appreciate it.
Speaker 4 (35:43):
Everybody had a great holiday and then God bless you all.
Speaker 1 (35:46):
Thank you, ched and we want to thank Chad Martin
for being here again today and we hope you had
a good time. Didn't catch enough grief, go do the
Gold rule today. Treat others the way you want to
be treated, even us. Not easy. Carry a smile around
on your face. You'd never know who is gonna help,
who needs that smile. Thanks for listening to a Home
(36:07):
with Ruby.
Welcome to that home with Roby.
Speaker 2 (00:01):
I'm Patrick mc isaac from Roby Commercialing Services lone with
Trent Haston from the Roby Family of Companies. We are
your host, Trent coming off the Thanksgiving holiday?
Speaker 1 (00:11):
Yeah, man, how'd you do on eating? Yeah? Uh, I
well me too. It's uh. I was I was a
couple of pounds heavier this morning in my morning skill there. Yeah,
so uh I stayed flat somehow, I don't I don't
know how.
Speaker 2 (00:29):
We definitely took advantage of of some good old Southern
Indiana cooking and say we do. Typically that kind of
stuff throws an extra pound or two at you.
Speaker 1 (00:38):
But we had a good time though. Man. The weather
cooled down, we went and uh we a tradition I
used to lead, uh and be part of selling Christmas
trees with the church. Did that for about ten years,
which was a lot of fun and a lot of
great memories. COVID kind of shut that down and uh,
I mean some things running a cool horse, but uh
(01:01):
it was great fellowship. But since then we've been going
to the mountains on Friday after Thanksgiving nice as a
family and uh with with my in lass Tom and
Poppy and Gigi and uh we go cut a tree
down and and we got us a nice one. I
think it's gonna live. Did you do you bring your
(01:23):
own saw?
Speaker 3 (01:23):
There?
Speaker 2 (01:24):
Do they provide this all? I haven't done this in
so long. It is fun to do. We did when
Carlo was really little bit only one time.
Speaker 1 (01:30):
Now you hike up this big hill we go to
it's uh Limville. Linville Vineyards and Winery has a Christmas
tree lot outside. It's really nice.
Speaker 4 (01:40):
Uh.
Speaker 1 (01:40):
So Poppy and Gig have a glass of wine while
me and the Hasten crews stomp up the hill. It's
this a pretty big hill. But when you go up
a big hill, you got good uh scenery for pictures,
so that's always good. And uh and we pick out
a tree. You walk around, you see all these trees
and uh and then a hold up your pole and
(02:02):
a guy comes and tags it, gives you the tag,
he cuts it down with the saw, and then about
an hour later you give go pay for it, and
they matched the tag up and they put it in
your car. Pretty good deal like it. So last year
we thought we had a big enough tree. It was
a real pretty tree and uh we got it home
(02:25):
and number one Reagan was disappointed that it wasn't that big.
And Number two, my next door neighbor, Michael Cox was
giving me a hard time because he had a Humongoey's tree,
and I don't know, man, I think he has like
Napoleon syndrome or something they called that was trying to
flex on me. Uh but uh, anyway, this year, I
(02:48):
don't know if it's as big as Michael's tree was
last year. I have not seen his tree this year,
but it is nice and and luptious, luptious, luptious, I
guess Reagan. All he says, I say the wrong word
for the wrong meaning. She's like, that doesn't mean what
you think it means. I'm falling. I'm fallowing. I'm like, well,
obviously you understood what I was trying to mean, because
(03:10):
you're correcting me against what I thought it meant. Because
she can read your mind. At this point, I would
think I don't know about all that reading my mind.
Speaker 2 (03:19):
So you, you and Michael Cox have a Christmas tree, a
war going on on who's gonna have another inch on top?
Speaker 1 (03:30):
And we're going for thickness. We like, we like voluptuous, okay,
and we got to keep it watered. You know, you
used to think when when pine needles were falling off
the trees or the needles, uh, it was because they
cut it a month or two early and it was
already suffering. But when you cut your own, you can't
(03:50):
use that excuse. And now that we put it in
the stand and last night Reagan had adjusted four times
and it's a bigger tree, so it's a little more tedious.
I'm like, come on, baby, it can be a little crooked,
but like other things in life. But uh, but pine
needles were falling off like crazy or Fraser Ferm needles. Anyway,
(04:15):
it's good our house. Our kids say the house smells good.
I can't really smell.
Speaker 2 (04:20):
That's the best part about a live tree is the smell.
I I Trent was about to go down the fake
tree path and my wife Cole slapped me. I mean,
she said, have you lost your mind? You have never
wanted we love Christmas. Tree's like, what are you doing?
It just looks so easy.
Speaker 1 (04:36):
You gotta walk lightly in in the fake tree world.
Because some people have their reasons, and I understand, and
everybody has opinions. But you can't burn, well you could,
but you can't really burn a fake tree in the
hastened bonfire party for my father that it will be
January tonight.
Speaker 2 (04:57):
Well, dude, these fake Christmas trees aren't cheap, and I
don't one think you'd really want to burn one down.
Speaker 1 (05:02):
But I had Scarlet convinced.
Speaker 2 (05:03):
She was like Dad, and if we buy a four
hundred dollars fact tree, after we buy three trees, uh
from our we'll have it paid off.
Speaker 1 (05:10):
Star, you're buying trees and cottswallow Patrick, we buy them
from our church. Yet my part methodist always makes you
feel better about overspending on trees. Definitely the right thing
to do. It's good. Well they're good so so anyway,
they so we're recording the show on Monday. So yesterday
(05:31):
last night, the the uh, the kids and Reagan decorated
the tree, decorated the house. I mean I didn't know.
We got bed spreads and shower curtains and wind we
got more Christmas stuff is crazy.
Speaker 2 (05:48):
It feels good though. It's a good time of year, yeah,
I mean, especially with the kids running around.
Speaker 1 (05:52):
But you know, I had I had a pimpkin, you know,
I get I try to get a pimpkin every year.
From from my trips to the mountains. Tatum named it
the pimpkin, uh pimlking away this weekend. Man, it was
an eighty dollars eighty dollars pumpkin. Well, what are you
gonna do with it? I was gonna let us sit
there until a rotot of rots out. That is the worst.
Speaker 2 (06:13):
I just pumped mine into the bushes and hopefully it
disintegrates by the time spring comes around.
Speaker 1 (06:17):
If you punting this into the bushes can break your foot.
Yeah right, I've seen, I've seen.
Speaker 2 (06:22):
I have helped you bring one of those back from
the mountains one time, and it took both of us
to carry the sucker.
Speaker 1 (06:27):
It was so big. Yeah, I think you have to
put I had to put this one in a sheet,
a blanket or something. Three people. I hear you, I
hear you.
Speaker 2 (06:36):
Well, I have my uh my annual rabbit hunt over
over the Thanksgiving break, uh, and my record is still
I have I have gotten a rabbit, but trying to
have like the money shot that was running through the field,
I saw him bouncing and I missed.
Speaker 1 (06:51):
Well, you said it on the last show miss leading
up to your trip up to Indiana that you're not
that good at the when you shoot and clays right.
Rabbits are tough.
Speaker 2 (07:05):
But usually I'm better at this because I've got a
little bit of an experience. But uh uh, one of
the guys bj that lived on the farm we were
we were uh hunting at he he cleaned them up
for me.
Speaker 1 (07:17):
I went pow.
Speaker 2 (07:17):
He kept running and then about two seconds later another
pow and no more.
Speaker 1 (07:21):
Rabbit said you eat some rabbit over the week. We did.
Speaker 2 (07:25):
And but that is their rule that somebody has to clean,
clean them and eat and and eat them or they
won't release the dogs. And so it's pretty cool man
to watch these you know, uh, these dogs at work.
I mean, once they hit a scent, you know, the
rabbit stays several hundred yards in front of the smell.
You know, they're they're in, they're following, and the goals
(07:46):
to try to get kind of in their general path.
These rabbits are smart, man. They'll they'll double back on you.
They'll they'll turn quick one way when you think they're
going the other way.
Speaker 4 (07:55):
Uh.
Speaker 1 (07:55):
And these dogs are just having the time of their life.
Pretty cool. What in bugs Bunny? I mean, he's like
gotta be besides Fred Funstone. He's got to be one
of the smartest cartoon characters I've ever witnessed. I mean,
I agree road Runner.
Speaker 2 (08:10):
The road Runner was pretty sharp too, while he Coyote
had a tough time.
Speaker 1 (08:13):
I'm getting after him. What was the jetson? What was
his name? George? George? He was smart goods futuristic, I mean,
doing high tech stuff.
Speaker 2 (08:24):
His boy Elroy all the time, we can tell it was.
Speaker 1 (08:29):
It was during my period as well, so it must
have overlapped a couple of years down down to the
younger jin.
Speaker 3 (08:36):
Uh.
Speaker 1 (08:36):
We have our guests today. I've been, I've been. I
kept sending him things to get on my q R code,
and he was he was slow playing me, so I
stiff armed him about coming on. Uh straight off of vacation.
But uh, he's in my family business form, generational family
(08:58):
business form. He hills his business hills from Boiling Green, Kentucky,
and and he he lives out west I think in California.
Actually I do know that. Uh, I'm gonna make fun
of him before he can say anything on here. He's
calling in. The Panthers took down a number one La
Rams yesterday.
Speaker 2 (09:18):
Whoop hit the bank. It looked good Man at the bank.
Is that what they say they're calling it now? I
like it, man, it felt like twenty fifteen. Honestly, he's
over here shaking his head. I know you're very involved.
Speaker 5 (09:28):
With the Panthers, brother. It was a beautiful time, but
it was felt so good. It was a monsoon out
there too.
Speaker 1 (09:32):
It's terrible.
Speaker 5 (09:33):
It could not have been worse. But it was a
great result, man, Absolutely incredible game.
Speaker 2 (09:38):
You know it was cool is the stadium kind of
looked the squars because of the rain. But you go
into the concourse and everybody's piled around the TV's trying
to watch it and stay dry.
Speaker 5 (09:46):
Yeah, man, I mean the echoes through the arena as
you're leaving. Yeah, and keep pounding.
Speaker 3 (09:50):
Man.
Speaker 5 (09:50):
There they are stoked there hoping for the playoffs, man,
which they controlled. Their destiny can happen.
Speaker 1 (09:56):
It can happen.
Speaker 2 (09:57):
And you are the host of the pregame show. Yeah,
I do the tail game Tailgate shit Fox.
Speaker 1 (10:01):
Yeah, man, that's a good time. You know, I think
they ought to fire Bryce Young, get rid of it.
He's not gonna make it. It's back and forth all season, man.
Speaker 5 (10:09):
One game It's like he looks he looks like he
could be the MVP the next game.
Speaker 1 (10:13):
I'm like third string you all the way down. You know,
I'm a big fan to get a lot of debates
and and lighthearted arguments about about Bryce. Bryce. I'm here
for you, man. If you ever want to be on
the At Home with Roby Show, we can replace Patrick.
Uh heard, I'm out of here. You're gonna get all
(10:35):
right well, Chad Martin, Uh when we return, gonna talk shop,
gonna laugh. He's a one of the most serious guys
I've ever met on the At Home with Roby Show.
And don't forget.
Speaker 2 (10:47):
Ruby Services is your one stop source for all your
electrical heating, cooling, plumbing and handyman needs. Keep it easy
and get it all done by one. Ruby servicesnow dot com.
That's Roby Services now dot com.
Speaker 1 (10:59):
Welcome back to At Home with Roby.
Speaker 2 (11:01):
Patrick mccauseik from Roby Commercial on Services along with Trent
Hasten from the Roby family of companies.
Speaker 1 (11:06):
We're back.
Speaker 2 (11:07):
We've got Chad Martin, who I think we just found out.
He didn't really say, but I think the way he
implied that he is a Los Angeles Rams fan.
Speaker 1 (11:15):
Chad, am I right, I.
Speaker 4 (11:18):
Am I just the character the way that it was
characterized by Trent. I feel like, you know, a win
is a win. I get it, Trent, but he was
you know, thirty one to twenty eight. You made it
sound like it was Ohio State game this weekend and
it wasn't. So I just want to I just want
to clarify that, just for the record, thank you.
Speaker 3 (11:36):
Well.
Speaker 2 (11:36):
High State did some business on Michigan had been a
minute too. Are you an Ohio State fan also then?
Speaker 1 (11:40):
Or is that why you?
Speaker 4 (11:43):
My father in law is a graduate from there, originally
from Ohio. So I try to keep up. I try
to keep up with everything. I honestly thought that I
was going to hear some more commentary. I'm I'm sure
when you guys air, but you know, I thought there
was more more chatter on the SEC about Lane Kippen
from this weekend.
Speaker 6 (12:01):
There's a lot of.
Speaker 4 (12:03):
Lessons there, Trent, and I feel like we can all
pick up one and uh so we can also dive
in a dive as well. But that's my uh, that's
my trip around the world from this weekend's sports.
Speaker 1 (12:15):
I've been reading about, uh some various things about Lane Kiffin.
Uh A number one I have a from being in
the Southern seven of YPO. We're in YPO together, Uh
my chapter, our chapters of Southern seven. I have a
lot of Mississippi folks and some old miss guys have
pain been on, been on the show, and the and
the likes. So I don't know. I still don't understand.
(12:40):
Maybe you can help me with this, Chad. It is
LSU or Florida that much bigger of a catch than
old Miss number one and then number two. I think
mister Kiffin went and talked to the A D And said, hey,
let me finish the season, and he said, no, get
out now. Uh. There seemed like some hard feeling kind
(13:00):
of reminds me. I'm me and honest with you of
me running our business twenty years ago and you got
an employee you love and they turn in their notice
and you say, nope, this is it. Get out. And
now these days you're like, hey, man, can I have
a couple of weeks? And you helped me out What
you got to say about that that theory, Chad.
Speaker 3 (13:24):
Yeah, I definitely.
Speaker 4 (13:26):
Well, let me start by saying that I think that
in terms of size and prestige, I mean LSU clearly
has a lot of money that they're.
Speaker 3 (13:35):
Throwing at him.
Speaker 4 (13:36):
I mean the rumored contracts, you know, are upwards of
one hundred million dollars contracts for these I mean, it's
the numbers are insane. So it seemed to be I mean,
I know that he said it was based on prayer,
but it seemed to be very heavily based on well, judge,
(13:57):
you want the private plan that he flew out on
that was being blue and then what he flew back
into LSU one, it seemed to be a money play.
But you're right, I mean, he says that he's ask
the team if he could stay.
Speaker 3 (14:09):
They said no. I mean, you're right. I mean that
doesn't seem to be.
Speaker 4 (14:14):
Kind of how you want to finish up the season
from all missus perspective. But I think that they were
pretty upset that he did along. You know, he first
when he first went there, he did a big tr
tour about how this time is different and how this
is home and how this is his family and this
is you know, the nomenslature that we use around kind
(14:35):
of talking about things like that. People were really really
hurt and probably you know, rightfully so, and the timing
wasn't good and they're having a good season, so you know,
it just seemed to be.
Speaker 3 (14:46):
Bad all around.
Speaker 4 (14:46):
But Trent, you're right, I mean, you're just gonna say,
never mind, we don't want you to stay and such
up the season until even though he says that he
said he wanted to, but we don't really know what
he wanted to.
Speaker 1 (14:55):
My next question is why couldn't he awaited several more
weeks to tell him month touch more.
Speaker 2 (15:01):
To tell him and Trent real quick, but to touch
on your first question, I mean, the difference between you know,
twenty years ago you saying, I employee comes in and
breaks your heart, you can just tell him to pound
or them sticking around. Is the fear of him sticking
around is convincing these players to come with him over
this next three or four weeks, which there's really nothing
in place in college football like we would have in
(15:22):
a business that can stop him from doing that. And
I think that was one of their overarching concerns, was that, hey,
if he sticks around, these guys love him and look
up to him, then there's there's further opportunity for them
to leave with it, go with Lane. So the whole
atmosphere of college football is a hot mess right now,
and this is just the result of it.
Speaker 1 (15:43):
Well, it's popular as turning a lot of dough. You're right, sorry,
I was gonna he said, you had another question. No,
I just didn't know why he couldn't have waited a
month to break the news, to know, miss Staff. Yeah,
that is sort of strange.
Speaker 3 (15:59):
I'm sure that.
Speaker 4 (16:00):
I think there was some contractual items there that they
were working through, and also obviously that you know from
both sides. And also I think that his other big
item was that there were already been so much rumors.
I mean, they just would have dogged him for the
next several weeks because there's just so many rumors about
him leading. Yeah, obvious the wall.
Speaker 1 (16:19):
Didn't he do this to Tennessee too when he went
to USC kind of similar similar this.
Speaker 4 (16:26):
Is that's why he did it pr for because he
said this time is different to everyone.
Speaker 3 (16:30):
Well, you did this time at home.
Speaker 2 (16:32):
That's another kind of business lesson Trent. You know, you
talk about somebody that comes to apply for a job
and they've been at ten different places in the last
ten years. It's sort of a red flag that goes up.
So I wonder how long he stays at L s U.
Speaker 1 (16:45):
And then't always.
Speaker 4 (16:48):
From his perspective, this is also a business decision from
this perspective, and he keeps getting more money every time
he goes someplace too. But no one there, there's some
there's some lesson there about hey, when you're talented, certain
rules don't apply to you.
Speaker 3 (17:02):
That that's what it appears to kind of indicate.
Speaker 1 (17:07):
Well, it indicates that that is not my belief. I
don't think he gets a free pass on this, but
good luck to him. My hope is his prayers work,
and good luck to amen.
Speaker 3 (17:17):
I'm rooting.
Speaker 1 (17:17):
I'm I've become through my buddies, an old Miss fan.
I'm rooting for him. Hopefully they they do well in
the playoffs and uh and and make him eat a
little crow on this dale.
Speaker 4 (17:29):
I don't know, have you been to Old Miss before?
Speaker 3 (17:31):
I have? I have?
Speaker 6 (17:33):
You know?
Speaker 4 (17:34):
Okay, trip, I mean you know I care a lot
about your health, as you know. But I'll tell you,
if you had an Old Miss, you've never eaten at
soo many gas stations in your entire life to have
the best food sitting out of a gas station as
they have an Old Miss, that's just that's just a
side note, a plug for all the old miss gas stations.
I was quite a.
Speaker 1 (17:53):
Fan of I hear you well, uh, Chad, let's talk
a little bit about you. Where where were you? Where'd
you grow up? Bud?
Speaker 4 (18:04):
I grew up in Bowling Green, Kentucky, Bowling.
Speaker 1 (18:06):
Green, Kentucky. And you went to school I think at Pepperdine,
Am I right about that?
Speaker 3 (18:11):
Correct? Yeah?
Speaker 4 (18:12):
I went to school at Pepperdine University, and I that's
where I met my wife at And I went to
law school at Southwestern before I came back. And I
moved back for a little bit of time after law
school to start running the business for my family back
in oh eighth nine, I came back excuse me, two
(18:36):
the nine, and now I was actually at the time
living in Nashville at that time for several years.
Speaker 6 (18:41):
While we were running.
Speaker 4 (18:42):
While I was running the business, and just right after
I had finished law school, my dad had passed unexpectedly
into you know, two thousand and six, so we had
somebody kind of running the business in the interim where
we started. He started with the business in eighty five
with my mom, and then we just had our fortieth
anniversary actually last year, we had a big celebration in
(19:04):
Bowling Green.
Speaker 1 (19:05):
Wow, forty years. Congratulations dog, that's awesome.
Speaker 3 (19:09):
Forty years.
Speaker 6 (19:10):
Yes, we had.
Speaker 3 (19:11):
We had a great, big celebration.
Speaker 4 (19:12):
We had a bunch of our long time tenured employees there,
people who'd been with us for ten, fifteen, twenty, thirty, five,
thirty at least the top thirty seven years. Some of
our employees there for Bowling Green, and we had a
great time. The mayor was there, We had several nice
messages from some of our state state government officials. And
(19:36):
then we kind of capped it off was we had
a performance in Bowling Green by Robin Thick came and performed.
Speaker 1 (19:42):
Really, no way, that's pretty cool. That's awesome. Man, is
he of Hio ate of himself Kentucky?
Speaker 6 (19:53):
I'm sorry, I don't know where he's from.
Speaker 4 (19:55):
I don't know, actually have no idea where he's from originally.
Speaker 1 (20:00):
To go, Patrick, you threw me on that throu's random
question every Sorry. So the business we're talking about ismartin
management group.
Speaker 4 (20:13):
Uh.
Speaker 1 (20:13):
And you guys do own some various consumer uh consumer
and retail goods uh stores, some car dealerships and such.
And you you actually own a car dealership where my
my father in law is from. We've talked about this
in Bennettsville, North Carolina. Right South Carolina. Dang, dude, weird,
(20:34):
I threw you off. Well you're on the border there.
You're pretty close to the border bordering.
Speaker 4 (20:39):
Yeah, go ahead, a little bit about an hour inside
of Myrtle Beach.
Speaker 3 (20:45):
Yeah, but minute South Carolina.
Speaker 4 (20:46):
Yeah, we have Honda, the Honda and the Foro dealership
there in Minuteville, South Carolina.
Speaker 3 (20:52):
If anyone's driving through wants to say.
Speaker 1 (20:54):
Hi, we go through there to go to the beach often.
Speaker 4 (20:58):
Uh, kind of have you bought a car from us
on your way in and in or out of it?
Speaker 1 (21:03):
We haven't yet, but yeah, but I sure would like
to renovate that dealership. Yeah, there were some ziggers at
each other. How did your family get in in the
in the car business?
Speaker 4 (21:20):
Yeah, well, so my dad had a dream of owning
a mechanic shop. He wanted to own his own shop.
At one point he was from Greenville, Kentucky, and he
had moved up to Springfield.
Speaker 3 (21:31):
Uh.
Speaker 4 (21:32):
Uh, Springstale, Ohio.
Speaker 3 (21:35):
Uh.
Speaker 4 (21:35):
And when he was in springt Ohio, you got a job.
Speaker 3 (21:38):
At a dealership.
Speaker 4 (21:39):
And he is a mechanic there. Uh, in our business,
you had to bring your own tools with you, and
it's kind of been that way for decades.
Speaker 3 (21:48):
And he didn't have any tools.
Speaker 4 (21:49):
He didn't own any tools, but he told the owner
that he did have some tools, and his cousin who
was living with at the time, he said, oh, he said, well,
you don't have any tools, familiars, And then he said,
I will buy Monday, and sure enough he was able
to get some tools together.
Speaker 3 (22:03):
By Monday.
Speaker 4 (22:04):
Wentz started at the dealership. The owner took a license
to him. He sponsored him to get a dealership about
maybe eight or ten years later or something like that.
That's how he was able to get his first dealership
was for the General Motors program at the time.
Speaker 3 (22:18):
He bought a Cadillac.
Speaker 4 (22:20):
Olgena bull store in Bowling Gringentucky. And then short there
after they had already had my sister. I had an
older sister who did a great job putting together our
fortieth event, and then they had me when I was
in Bowling Green. Then my brother were on Bowling Green.
So he really grew the business quite a bit through
the late eighties and early nineties all the way into
(22:41):
the early two thousands.
Speaker 3 (22:43):
He grew a lot with Saturn, with the.
Speaker 4 (22:45):
General Motors brands, and really had saw a lot of
change in the industry before. You know, he was kind
of coming through a time where a lot of people
didn't own a lot of dealerships. Most dealers owned one too,
maybe three stores. He was kind of one of the
first ones to really start, you know, adding a bunch
of stores. And then of course from there you saw
(23:05):
the big people come in, like automation and Penske things
like that, kind of owning dozens and dozens and dozens
of stores. But he was kind of in before that
was really in vogue. As the kids say, or by kids,
I mean Trent in vogue.
Speaker 1 (23:19):
Strike a pose. But man, that's so cool. I mean
telling them about working your way up. Uh yeah, wanted
to be a mechanic, did a great job, got sponsored.
That is awesome. So, uh, how'd you get into the business.
Speaker 4 (23:39):
Well, I got into the business largely because obviously it's
a family business and you grew up in and trying
to relate to this, you grew up, you grew up
in a family business and uh, you know, everybody said, oh, well,
you're gonna be in this business. And you get older,
you can't wait to get in this business.
Speaker 3 (23:53):
What are you gonna do?
Speaker 4 (23:53):
And you know, I had parents that really weren't trying
to steer us one way or the other, and so
I kind of said, you know what, well, maybe maybe
I'll go back to it. Maybe I'll work in that business,
maybe I won't. I don't really know.
Speaker 3 (24:04):
Uh.
Speaker 4 (24:05):
And it ended up turning out that obviously my dad
had had passed them effectedly and we were it was
right before the financial recession, kind of at the beginnings
of the of the Great Recession, uh, and so things
were really going south in the automotive business and the
real estate business. Everyone listening knows this, uh. And so
(24:26):
my family said, hey, maybe it's time that you come
back into the business. And this is what we want
to do if we want to have this business and
kind of prosper uh.
Speaker 3 (24:32):
And so that's what I did.
Speaker 4 (24:33):
I mean, we had lost several dealerships because at the
time we were the largest Saturn retail in the country,
with like seven or eight dealerships that were Saturn only
if he will remember, at that time, GM said, you
know what, we're going to get rid of the Saturn brands.
So those are tens of millions.
Speaker 3 (24:47):
Dollars of buildings that we had to fill at that time.
Speaker 4 (24:50):
Similarly, we had issues with Chevrolet, issues with obviously there
were several brands that had been consolidated under that under
that time frame. So I really that's kind of how
I was kind of pushed into the business. Was just
a just a really crazy time in our nation's history,
our company's history, of just trying to navigate through a
(25:13):
really difficult period of the Great Recession. And that's kind
of how I ended up in the business. And I've
stayed for the past fifteen years doing that.
Speaker 1 (25:22):
Isn't it crazy that that was fifteen years ago? We lived, man,
we fought through that. What What a way to get
indoctrinated and full throttle in the business. What a crazy time.
My father in law was talking about what year did did?
We were talking we were behind the Saturn coming back
from the mountains, and he was talking about how the
(25:45):
frame of the cars made out of composite. It was
I guess breaking it wasn't metal? Is that right? And
in GM and then he said Penske wanted to buy it.
I don't know if he's right about that. Can you
explain a little bit, you know anything about that.
Speaker 4 (26:03):
Yeah, I know about I forget the materials that they
called with Saturns that they were made out of. But
i'll tell you you know, when when we were when
I was a kid and we had a Saturn store,
we had Saturn stores up in Dayton, up in Ohio,
and they used to have a sledge hammer on uh
uh on the showroom floor and they used to give
you like a half paneled vehicle to display and you're
(26:25):
supposed to take the You're supposed to take the mal
basically and throw it against there. It was the fun
It was the most fun thing to do.
Speaker 6 (26:32):
When you were like, oh yeah.
Speaker 4 (26:34):
And because it was supposed to be you know, so
it was to demonstrate how it wasn't breakable and how
it wasn't going to den how I was going to
do that.
Speaker 3 (26:40):
And that was a big thing with Saturn.
Speaker 4 (26:43):
That and they also started the know, the no habile
pricing that was the original Saturn had a one price strategy.
And this was in you know, the late nineties, that's
way before one price became as prevalent as it is today.
They had they actually had that model originally as far
as Pinske in eight of nine, when GM was going
(27:03):
up to Congress and saying, Hey, here's our plan to
become profitable.
Speaker 3 (27:06):
We're gonna shed these brands.
Speaker 4 (27:08):
Penske said, Oh, well, I'd like to be in a manufacturer,
you know, I'd like to be an automotive manufacturing. I can
be an OEM And he had offered himself up at
the time to be an OEM manufacturer. I don't know
where that really went. I mean, I think that some
of it was pr spin. Who knows if it was
from the factory or from the dealer or you know whatever,
(27:29):
because I mean the amount of capital and the capital
was so tight at that time that you need to run,
you know, an automotive manufacturer.
Speaker 3 (27:37):
We see a lot of that today.
Speaker 4 (27:38):
You can see kind of how difficult it is to
get into the space because you see the ribbeans. You
see all the electric car companies kind of popping up,
and you see how a lot of them kind of
go by the wayside. People are always saying, oh, what's
the electric car company? Should I should I try to,
you know, should I buy? I want something different? And I
always say, we'll try to buy the one that's gonna
be in business in five years. You want to deal
(28:01):
with a manufacturer that's no longer in business and you
have items that need to be serviced.
Speaker 1 (28:05):
Wow, well two quick things.
Speaker 2 (28:07):
Too bad they don't have they don't make you know,
f one fifties out of that same material Saturn or
Ram trucks, as Trent, I could definitely use some help
not getting dents in our car. One and two, you
talk about the electric car brands, Trent, you talked about
in the last show. With Scout announcing their headquarters here
in Charlotte. It's like twelve hundred jobs that they're bringing
with pretty high, high high salaries. So it's kind of
(28:29):
kind of funny how to tie that in.
Speaker 1 (28:32):
You think that's going the last five years?
Speaker 7 (28:34):
Chad, Oh, never mind, Like thanks, Trent, Yeah, I'm kidding.
Speaker 4 (28:45):
No, I think their Scout has its own, its own.
Speaker 6 (28:51):
Alleged business model.
Speaker 4 (28:52):
They're really because of the without boring everyone too much,
size laws and dealer laws as it relates to the
way that OEMs can compete against car dealerships, and there's
a lot of agreements in place for that, and they're
trying to separate Scout Out to be a very different
car company than Volkswagen, who technically owns Scout, and they're
(29:13):
going to great lengths to try to make them solve
this separate brand. So we will see if that is successful,
if they can make themselves a separate brand, Goo fights
back against being a separate brand, or if they're going
to end up just folding it back into Volkswagen sometime
in the near future so well, or in the foreseeable future,
I should say, we'll see where that kind of goes.
Speaker 1 (29:32):
Got it, Man, that's very enlightening. So I got a
question for you. So you come into business the GMS,
y'all are Saturn dealer primarily or solely, and GM says,
we're not making Saturns anymore. I mean, what are you
doing at this moment besides crying?
Speaker 4 (29:51):
Yeah, I mean it's one of those ideas, you know,
you look back fifteen years later and you say, hey,
well you just put one foot in front of the
other and set what's our next step. And you can
sit there and you can cry, you can be upset
about it, and you can think of all these things.
Speaker 3 (30:03):
At the end of the day. You have.
Speaker 4 (30:07):
Debt to service, you have employees to employ, you have
buildings that need to be filled. You have to come
up with a plan of action. And so at the time,
the team worked really diligently with several manufacturers and there
were some There's always opportunity, and that's really isn't the
big lesson from that. We started teaming up with some
(30:27):
of the growing manufacturers at the time that are now
really popular and grown a lot, like Subaru and Kia.
Those types of brands were really trying to get their
foot in the market and they wanted to be a
lot of the places there were Saturn dealerships. They said, Hey,
there's a good Saturn retailer here. Saturn's going away. How
can we go into this marketplace?
Speaker 3 (30:47):
And so they were.
Speaker 4 (30:48):
Teaming up with the dealers and we teamed up with
a lot of our stores with those two manufacturers to
try and that really helped to fill some of the
holes that we had and it served as a great
not just for us, but for all those brands way
for there to be brand distribution for those brands that
they didn't have previously. So they saw a big opportunity
and that's why you see some really big growth numbers.
(31:08):
So the lesson and all of that for me is
that anytime that there's uh, there's always an equal and
opposite reaction. So yeah, Saturn went away, but it was
replaced with somebody else that was eager to go to
the market.
Speaker 1 (31:20):
Man. I mean that was that was pivot before COVID
made pivot. I mean they shot.
Speaker 2 (31:25):
They put a shot in the armor of the competitors
on by accident. Really, I'm sure they had to have
expected some of that, but probably not the extent that
you're talking about.
Speaker 3 (31:34):
Chad.
Speaker 4 (31:36):
Yeah, I think that if you watched a lot of
the executives, I think that they were quite shocked at
how much market share they ended up giving up to competitors.
But I'll give it to General Motors. On the other
side of it, they also did streamline their business quite
a bit, and they were able to return to profitability
and have some really huge, huge years even with the
(31:59):
minute market share. So there's also some lessons and that
as well as you know, how do you pivot out
of being a volume leader and making less per vehicle
as a manufacturer into really focusing on streamlining their activities
And Mari Dara did a really great job of navigating
them through a lot of that, which is why she's
one CEO of the year, like multiple times.
Speaker 1 (32:19):
Man, that is this is good education here, Chad. You
were so worried I was just gonna quiz you to death.
Speaker 4 (32:28):
No what I was worried about, Trent as you said, Hey,
come to the studio, We'll do it on camera. And
then suddenly you pivoted and said, actually, I'll just we'll
just do it on the phone. And I wasn't sure
if I have a face for radio or if you
were worried that I was going to dwarf you in
my presence. And I couldn't figure out which one was
going to be.
Speaker 3 (32:48):
So that was my biggest internal was.
Speaker 1 (32:52):
Well, I always love spending time with you, Chad, even
if it's over over the phone on the podcast. Uh,
Martin Management Group, is your firm a true American success story,
family business. Give yourself a plug. Tell us how people
(33:13):
can look you up. You you did say the one
way to shut me up was to get me on
my podcast. And and and I also ask a question,
and I'll go away for a little while. That's because
I got to go to the restroom. Uh. But secondly, Uh,
you've listened to some shows, you know, I like to
put people on the spot. What is one philosophy that
(33:34):
you got a lot of philosophy, what's one that you
live by that ties your business together with with your
family and and and how Chad Martin lives his life.
Speaker 4 (33:48):
Yeah, the biggest, I mean, the biggest guiding line, the
biggest prints of I try to really rely on is
just try to be fair. Fairness I think a business
is very important. I think that's kind of the equilibrium.
So we don't guess always try to be perfection is
difficult to get that. You can always be fair. You
can be fair to you know, your family, your shareholders,
the investors, to the employees. Just always just trying to
(34:10):
strike that balance of fairness and what is that? And
I think that that sometimes means fairness means giving everybody
a fair opportunity and equal shape, not trying to tilt
the scales one way or the other to get an
outcome that's you just it's just favorable to you.
Speaker 3 (34:23):
It's just about being fair.
Speaker 4 (34:25):
And I think that that is a pretty basic fundamental
guiding principle that I try to utilize.
Speaker 1 (34:32):
Amen, love it well. How can people look you up?
And how can people find out where you have dealerships
and other other retail locations.
Speaker 3 (34:41):
Yeah, they can go.
Speaker 4 (34:41):
To Martin GT dot com. That's martingp dot com.
Speaker 1 (34:46):
Got it. H Well, I I love being in your
forum together with you. We we talk about all all
the fun and the tribulations of working in a family business,
which is awesome what it is. I want to come
to Bulling Green, Kentucky sometime and hang out and come
to a party. You did invite me to your company's party,
(35:09):
and I couldn't do it this time, but please keep
the invitations coming, Chad.
Speaker 6 (35:15):
Absolutely.
Speaker 8 (35:16):
You know when we do our eighties, you know, you
and I will be white Bear and it'll be a party, spriend,
it will be a party, and I'm sure I'll still
find you at the bar with some kind of whiskey
meter or something like that.
Speaker 1 (35:32):
Yeah, I will be eighty seven years old, just so
you know, Chad, thanks for being here, man, Thank you
for your time, and God bless you and your family
and your business during this holiday season.
Speaker 3 (35:43):
Appreciate it.
Speaker 4 (35:43):
Everybody had a great holiday and then God bless you all.
Speaker 1 (35:46):
Thank you, ched and we want to thank Chad Martin
for being here again today and we hope you had
a good time. Didn't catch enough grief, go do the
Gold rule today. Treat others the way you want to
be treated, even us. Not easy. Carry a smile around
on your face. You'd never know who is gonna help,
who needs that smile. Thanks for listening to a Home
(36:07):
with Ruby.
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The Brothers Ortiz
The Brothers Ortiz is the story of two brothers–both successful, but in very different ways. Gabe Ortiz becomes a third-highest ranking officer in all of Texas while his younger brother Larry climbs the ranks in Puro Tango Blast, a notorious Texas Prison gang. Gabe doesn’t know all the details of his brother’s nefarious dealings, and he’s made a point not to ask, to protect their relationship. But when Larry is murdered during a home invasion in a rented beach house, Gabe has no choice but to look into what happened that night. To solve Larry’s murder, Gabe, and the whole Ortiz family, must ask each other tough questions.