November 27, 2025 • 46 mins
In this special Q&A edition of Crossroad Conversations, the Lewis Brothers hand the mic to their audience and employees for a candid session of Unfiltered Leadership Questions. From favorite hobbies to leadership lessons, time management, and running a family business, this episode is all about real answers to real questions.
They dive into how patience, trust, and communication shape leadership; how staying humble and surrounding yourself with smarter people creates growth; and why balancing family and business comes down to respect and long-term perspective. The brothers also share stories about racing each other, building their dream dealership, supporting the local running community, and how showing up matters more than any check you write.
Takeaways
- Seek advice from people already at the level you want to reach.
- Great leaders listen first and act only after gathering all sides.
- Patience and clarity prevent unnecessary conflict.
- Hobbies evolve with life—balance creates longevity.
- In family business, define boundaries between “family” and “work.”
- Respect outweighs hierarchy in leadership.
- Preparation and discipline are key to showing up on time and ready.
- Community impact comes from participation, not just sponsorship.
- Growth happens when you delegate and trust others to lead.
- Humility, communication, and shared goals keep a family business thriving.
Chapters
00:00 Surround Yourself with Smarter People
00:20 Welcome to Unfiltered Leadership Questions
01:05 Favorite Hobbies Outside the Dealership
03:45 Leadership Lessons from Experience
06:00 The Power of Listening Before Reacting
07:10 Managing People and Building Respect
08:00 Future Growth and Expansion Plans
09:20 The Key to Being on Time
10:40 Preparation, Planning, and Accountability
12:30 Work–Life Balance and Communication
13:00 Competition, Teamwork, and Brotherhood
16:40 Why the Dealership Moved Locations
18:20 How to Earn Leadership the Right Way
21:00 Favorite Cars and Automotive Memories
25:50 Challenges of Running a Family Business
27:30 Respect, Authority, and Communication Among Brothers
30:00 Maintaining Trust and Shared Goals
34:00 Transitioning from Traditional to Social Media
36:50 The Decision that Changed Everything
38:30 Growth, Vision, and Accountability
40:00 Community Involvement and the Running Culture
44:00 Why Showing Up Matters More Than Sponsorship
46:30 Closing Thoughts
Feel the dynamic energy of the Lewis Brothers as they deliver real stories and lessons that keep local businesses on their toes, and share how experiences in the community inspire them to keep on driving.
Check out all our great episodes at CrossroadConversationsPodcast.com!
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
SPEAKER_00 (00:00):
And then you need to make sure that the people you're
getting advice from are at thelevels that you're trying to go
to.
I love being in a room where Iknow I don't need to talk
because I'm not the smartestperson in the room.
Because that means I'm in theright room and I'm shutting up
and I'm listening.
Hey everyone.
(00:20):
Welcome to CrossroadConversations with the Lewis
Brothers, where we aim to sharereal stories about running a
successful family business,working through adversity, and
pouring back into the communitythat keeps our door open.
We're your host, Matt Shelby,and Taylor, and we bring you
relevant local business adviceand automotive insights that are
sure to change the way you lookat running a business.
(00:40):
And maybe even throw in a plugfor you to do business with us.
All right, welcome to CrossroadConversations with the Lewis
brothers today.
Hey guys, we got a littledifferent one.
This is Unfiltered LeadershipQuestions.
Unfiltered Leadership Questions.
Okay.
We put it out there, and today'sepisode will be a little bit
different because of that.
We're going to turn the tablesand you get to ask the
(01:02):
questions, the audience.
We've collected these up.
We're in the hot seat today.
We've asked several of our staffand we posted on social media to
get questions.
So I'm not sure what all theseare, but let's dive into it.
SPEAKER_01 (01:16):
Go deep in some, and some you might just hit the
edge.
All right, question number one.
What is your favorite hobbiesoutside of the dealership?
Contestant number one.
Huh.
And it looks like that one ofthe employees asked.
One of the employees asked that.
SPEAKER_00 (01:31):
Yeah.
SPEAKER_03 (01:31):
I love cooking, obviously, going into putting
different things together.
SPEAKER_01 (01:35):
What do you like about cooking?
SPEAKER_03 (01:37):
Just a different aspect.
Yeah, are you baking things?
No, it's it's gotta be more I'mnot inside baking, do anything
else.
It's gotta be outside of grillsmoker.
And the part I love most aboutit, probably would shock, and a
lot of people are this way, iscooking for others and just
taking it to them or doinganything.
SPEAKER_00 (01:56):
And it's like Okay, but if you're cooking for
yourself this weekend, we gottaget granular here.
Yeah, yeah.
Where are you where are yougoing?
30 minutes or less.
I know.
Where are you going to buy it?
How thick is it gonna be, andhow are you cooking it?
SPEAKER_03 (02:07):
How do you order your steaks?
Walk them through this.
Oh, yeah.
This is a secret tip if you'rewanting to get a good value of
the city.
Where we're going, we're gonnago to Sam's Club.
Okay, and you're gonna go inthere, and there's three
different choices.
You knock on the window.
Yeah, knock on the window or hitthe buzzer back by the meat
counter.
They'll come out, and you canhit them with three different
things.
These are your only options: either strip, ribeye, or tender (02:24):
undefined
loin.
Loin.
Keyword loin.
I've been ribeye loin, striploin, or tender loin.
So what are you getting?
Choice.
Do not be tricked by the prime.
It's not any better.
Trust me, I've tried both ofthem.
You're gonna get the wholething.
It's gonna range from 14 to 17to maybe 20 pounds if you get
(02:46):
the bigger one.
20 pounds.
20 pounds of meat.
All right.
You can cut.
It's a large chunk here.
It's a large chunk.
We're talking about an 18-poundribite, and you're gonna cut it.
And the great part about it isyou get to cut all the uh two
inch, one and a half, one,twenty.
It's about a blade length ofwhatever your fillet knife is.
It's real quick and look at it.
It's not a inch and a half.
(03:08):
That point there.
Inch and a half.
Cut up, you seal it, you can putthem in the freezer if you want
to learn.
You're not sealing them.
What are you doing?
I put them in the fridge so youcan cook them every single day
or go through.
But the biggest thing aboutcooking is it's just me being
able to provide stuff for othersand go through there.
So that's a sense of enjoymentthat I get.
Whether it's cooking out here,it's cooking on the trails and
(03:29):
bringing light to people'slives, that's the enjoyment I
get out of it.
That's solid.
SPEAKER_00 (03:35):
You know, I would say uh mine on the favorite
hobbies.
Um if I I love hanging out withmy family, my boys, you know,
just being outside and doingthings.
Uh, but if I got to narrow itdown to if it's just me going to
do something uh or with a groupof friends, it is getting on the
trail and and running somewhere.
Uh I love the trails because itmakes you feel a little
disconnected from the road andthe cars and everything else.
(03:56):
Um and then you get your yourmind has to focus on all the
technical around there, whichthen breaks up whatever junk's
going on in your mind and givesyou some clarity plus stresses
your body.
SPEAKER_01 (04:06):
Love that.
I like uh eating Taylor's food.
Uh I definitely love nature.
Um so it it we're so plugged in,it's a good opportunity to
unplug, you know.
So whether that's uh running thetrails or my kids dictate a lot
of my things.
SPEAKER_00 (04:25):
Well, I think that's important, important, and I know
this is a quick episode, butthat your hobbies change based
upon what's going on in yourlife.
And ours has always kind of beenoutdoors.
Yeah.
But it went from like multipledays used to be competing
off-road, doing off-roadchallenges, traveling, doing
this and that.
Um sand dunes.
(04:45):
All of it.
Birds, campground, little sky.
All of that.
But then you gotta look and seewhat pockets of time you have.
And as we had kids, it's like,okay, I'll still be outside, but
you can go on an hour ortwo-hour run, still be in
nature.
Yeah.
SPEAKER_01 (05:00):
So that that's a good feeling there.
Uh so uh some of my kids like tofish, so I don't love to fish,
but I love hanging out with mykids and it's in nature.
So I'll do that.
I just catch perch because it'seasy.
Um doing a little hunting, uhhow trying to figure out how to
sit still for that long, youknow, but having fun with that.
(05:20):
Um, so just pretty much anythingin nature.
So yeah, that's what we dooutside dealership.
SPEAKER_00 (05:25):
Uh call out to the employee, you know.
Yeah.
Um hopefully we answered yourquestion.
SPEAKER_01 (05:30):
Yeah.
All right, question number two.
What's the biggest leadershiplesson you've learned running a
dealership business?
That one came in from Miguel.
Miguel, that is a largequestion.
What's the biggest leadershiplesson you've learned running a
dealership business?
SPEAKER_00 (05:45):
All right, so here it is.
Right in your focus.
I gotta try to narrow this downis not to react until I gather
all the information from boththe customer and the employee.
SPEAKER_03 (05:59):
That's big, especially since we've grown so
much that there's so manydifferent hands and different
people that could have touchedit because our reaction is like
I told them they know how to dothis.
We went over this, but you haveto sit.
SPEAKER_00 (06:14):
And my bigger, and I'll tell you what I've learned
from that, Miguel.
So hopefully this helps you, isearly on in my career, when I
heard when a customer would callin and complain about something,
I would take it 100% for facevalue.
Yeah.
I my hair would get on fire andI would go address that person
immediately, not even allowingthem to set their their side of
the story.
(06:35):
And more times than not, thecustomer had some truth in
there, but they had stretched ita whole lot.
I took it 100% for face value,reacted on that, and you know
where that went.
SPEAKER_01 (06:47):
Yeah.
Yeah.
I would definitely say uh youdon't really realize, you know
it's important, but you don'trealize how much people have to
do with your business.
Like of all the systems and allthe AIs and all the processes,
people, and I mean people inyour business and people that
you're selling to or servicing,people, you have to figure out
(07:09):
how to properly operate in andthrough with people.
You know, if you can't do that,you're gonna drop the ball in
one fashion or another, and itwill make or break you in every
different fashion of the way.
So figure out how to properlynavigate through people, give
kudos when necessary, uh coach,teach, and preach at different
levels, and um sit down andlisten to people, whether it be
(07:32):
customers or employees, moreoften than you think.
SPEAKER_03 (07:35):
Yeah, I love this from a a a quote I'd saw in a
notebook the other day.
But that the customer,especially in the retail side of
business, the customer doesn'towe you anything.
And we owe everything to thecustomer because they're the
ones provide obviously theopportunity for us to do
business and that provide theincome for us to be able to
start everything.
So make sure you always takecare of the customer.
(07:57):
That's good.
SPEAKER_01 (07:57):
Question number three, what do you got?
SPEAKER_00 (07:59):
All right, what is one growing area or industry
that you guys are looking toexpand to, if any?
SPEAKER_01 (08:06):
I got this.
SPEAKER_00 (08:07):
And this comes from Colton first.
So, Colton, thanks for puttingthat question out there.
What is the one growing areathat you're gonna get into?
SPEAKER_01 (08:14):
Yeah, I need things that have less people.
SPEAKER_00 (08:17):
Okay.
SPEAKER_01 (08:19):
Because that means less things to manage.
Storage facilities.
Okay, quarter car washes.
Still need a couple people.
Yeah.
Um unmanned operations.
Yes.
Um this is fully involved whatwe're currently doing.
Yeah, a triple net commercialreal estate.
Right?
Just a few things.
SPEAKER_00 (08:40):
So a couple things, Shelby went over there.
Let me hit another one.
Um we want to get deeper intoaftermarket and accessories on
vehicles.
We know that the average truckowner spends over$2,000 in
accessories like within 30 daysof purchasing their vehicle.
So why not us do it, perform it?
Uh, we've dabbled in it in thepast, but honestly, not done an
(09:03):
awesome job at it.
Uh so look for that maybe tocome in 2026.
SPEAKER_01 (09:08):
Yeah, somewhere in there.
SPEAKER_00 (09:10):
Absolutely.
SPEAKER_03 (09:11):
I've grown in there.
Anything you'd add?
No, you'll hit on both of them.
SPEAKER_01 (09:15):
Okay, not going through there.
If you get that business, reachout to us.
Yes.
SPEAKER_03 (09:19):
Uh, jumping on this next one here.
What is the key to being at workon time?
Ah.
SPEAKER_01 (09:25):
Tell them who it came from first.
Lingling?
Winston Churchill.
This is from Lingling.
From Ling Lang.
Anonymously.
What's the key to being at workon time?
Wake up early whether you feellike it or not.
Yep.
SPEAKER_00 (09:36):
Yeah, but tell them the other key.
Like, what'd you do with yourphone?
SPEAKER_01 (09:39):
So my phone is in my kitchen.
Yep.
Uh one, going to bed, I'm notgoofing off on my phone, right?
It goes on, do not disturb at 930, whether I like it or not.
It just does it on its own, sothen I don't have distractions.
It's in my uh kitchen.
And so then it goes off at 4 15or whatever time you think it
should be before it's time toget to work, and you need more
(10:01):
time than you think.
Traffic's gonna be bad, you'regonna have a kid sick, you're
gonna have a flat tire, you'regonna forget your phone.
Plan for all that.
You have to plan for that, andum that'll get you to work on
time.
And to be on time is to beearly.
That's right.
SPEAKER_00 (10:17):
Uh, a couple things to add into there, you know,
plan for whatever you need inthe morning if you're gonna go
work out, if you're gonna dothis, if you're gonna do that,
if I need to take my computer towork, whatever it is, I do the
night before.
Always.
The night before.
So if I've got a whatever it,whatever I need, it's going in
my truck.
So really all I gotta do is grabmy cup of coffee and get in my
vehicle.
SPEAKER_01 (10:36):
And here's the thing procrastination is the killer of
all things, right?
But if you don't feel like itwhen you still have some energy,
tomorrow morning when the alarmgoes off at any time, you will
not feel like it.
Your head's gonna be cloudy, thelights are gonna be off, kids
are running around, streaming.
It's not gonna be gonnaremember.
Pack your stuff.
(10:56):
And I like on some days when wehave events and then you're
flying out, yeah, like I'll haveto pack like six bags.
Like no joke.
I'm like, okay, all right, I'mgonna wear my gym clothes, and
then here's my work clothes, andthen we gotta wear a suit that
day, like a pink suit orsomething.
And then, hey, we've got abiking event here, gotta have
(11:17):
this here.
Oh yeah.
And then, hey, we're leaving togo to dealer meetings.
But do it the night before.
SPEAKER_00 (11:23):
It's all in there.
I mean, you know, in my truckright now is the is the
different change stuff.
I got workout stuff in there.
Then I've got stuff for the galafor the shop of the cop tonight.
You know, that's got all thewesternware stuff in the sport
coat, my boots, all that's inthe pack it this morning.
No, I didn't pack it thismorning.
I would have picked twodifferent boots.
Ling ling.
Uh, so make sure you do that.
Shelby brought up a great dealon, you know, putting your phone
(11:45):
on do not disturb.
Hey, here, here's the deal.
Like, if somebody calls at 11o'clock at night, what are you
gonna do?
You know what I mean?
And so you're like, well, yeah,but what if a family member gets
a hold of me?
Hey, here's a news flash foryou.
When you put you set up yourphone on Do Not Disturb Times,
(12:06):
you can allow your top yourfavorite contacts.
So my favorite contacts I stillhave in there if they need to
get a hold of me becausesomething's really going on.
Because I know that they're notgonna call me at 1115 to tell me
some BS.
SPEAKER_01 (12:19):
That's for the overrun of the Dodgers?
Yeah.
SPEAKER_03 (12:21):
You're just not gonna do something.
Like when I called you the othernight at 3:40 in the morning,
whenever I was running throughthe woods, you probably thought
for a second maybe I'd had astroke and fell down a thing.
But then I was like, hey, how doyou start this?
Or what's your passcode?
Yeah.
It's like son of a guy.
I'm sorry.
SPEAKER_00 (12:38):
I'm delirious.
SPEAKER_03 (12:39):
Nine.
SPEAKER_00 (12:40):
It's all good.
That's a good question.
Oh, all good for sure.
These are good.
Yeah, so let's just keep rockingand rolling on these.
SPEAKER_03 (12:46):
Okay, I got one here that this has come to you from
From Garfield?
Yeah, Garfield himself.
Shelby, if you and Matt ran arace, who quits first if there's
no time limit, and both youpromised your family you would
win.
SPEAKER_01 (13:00):
So he asked that question because he knows, like,
he knows the story.
So that that's an unansweredquestion, right?
But I'll tell you, it's gonna beon that day whoever's body has
the ability to last the longest,right?
Yeah, I've seen that many times.
SPEAKER_00 (13:19):
We have, and I read this question.
I happened to read this questiona couple days ago.
Okay, so I've thought about thisone.
All right, so I've got to giveyou my answer.
All right, so Anthony, here yougo.
You ready for this one?
All right, so here's the deal.
There are races that Shelby hasbeat me in.
There are races that I've beathim in.
(13:40):
We're both highly competitivepeople.
Highly competitive.
But the most successful raceswe've had, and this isn't a
political answer, the mostsuccessful races we've had, is
when we take our competitivenessand join forces and bury the
rest of the field.
No doubt.
And that's the same.
I I I just relate that over intobusiness when you can take the
(14:04):
three of us being highlycompetitive.
And even if we're all deskingdeals and we look in in our
software to see who has thehighest PDR and this and that,
like you use that as acompetitiveness, but not to
cross the line, yeah.
Where then it creates theseboundaries and walls.
Like you use it, but then youuse it together.
SPEAKER_01 (14:24):
It's one of those things if you think about in a
race in an all-out mile or 5Kand you just bury somebody, then
like where did youraccountability partner?
Buried the random dude.
SPEAKER_00 (14:35):
You know, I buried the people that was that's so
good of like because there therehas been times in races that
Shelby has pulled me through toa better finish.
And then there's been times thatI've pulled him through when he
has has been in a low.
Pro bar.
You know what I mean?
SPEAKER_01 (14:52):
I mean, like that, there's highs and lows, and
that's life, and that's inbusiness.
Yeah.
Uh, because there are you gothrough them at different times.
And so it's been one of thosethings like, hey, here's some
headphones, turn some music on,follow me.
Like, yeah, don't ask questions,or like, hey, you haven't eaten,
eat this.
Sure.
Right?
And so it's the same thing inbusiness, but so, right?
(15:13):
The I've won races, he's wonraces.
SPEAKER_00 (15:16):
So, what we'd like to do is, Anthony, uh-huh.
We'd like to challenge you andwhoever else you want to be on
your team.
Bingo.
Okay, it's a team race, and youand your partner can race Shelby
and I, and we'll see who laststhe longest.
SPEAKER_03 (15:33):
I love it.
Oh, coming in there.
It's a good question.
All right, you got the next one?
Yeah.
What made you guys realize youneeded to move locations?
SPEAKER_01 (15:42):
Cars parked on top of cars.
That's the easy part.
Our building was from 1969.
Yeah.
Um, we kept it so fresh with thefreshest paint and many
renovations, uh, but it was timeto modernize.
SPEAKER_03 (15:56):
Yeah, and it was probably really a which you know
of go and listen to our podcast,it was definitely a long-term
move.
It wasn't that we have done aspur of the moment, oh no,
anything else.
It was a well thought out.
SPEAKER_01 (16:08):
We didn't put lipstick on a pig.
It wasn't the first placeavailable.
So there's a lot of real like weneeded uh interstate.
Yeah, we needed more space, uh,parking lot, and in our
buildings.
You know, we quadrupled in size,maybe more, and inside parking
spaces grew from nine acres totwenty six acres.
(16:30):
It was time to do it, right?
And it wasn't on a snap, it was10 years worth of research.
SPEAKER_00 (16:34):
So you guys have heard the stories about the 10
years.
I won't walk you down throughthat again.
Uh, we hired outside companieslike CBRE and then companies
that both the manufacturers hadto do all the data to see if we
should move or not.
We knew it was guaranteed thatwe needed to modernize, we
needed new facilities.
Did we do it at the old locationor the new location?
But let me tell you, and thisstands out in my brain over
everything else.
(16:55):
Everything else.
Let me tell you what really putthe nail in.
When we were out and about, andespecially as we would go up
north and and we'd run a halfmarathon or a marathon, you talk
to people during the first 90%of it, okay?
And same story.
Hey, who are you?
Where do you work?
Blah, blah, blah, blah, blah.
And time after time we hadpeople say, Lewis, where's that
(17:18):
located?
Yeah.
And this is a perfect example ofif you're in the middle of the
forest, you can't see what'sgoing on.
Because we are advertisingeverywhere, we were at every
kid's event, we had been therefor 70 plus years.
Yeah.
And we said, okay, thevisibility, the old real estate
(17:39):
business saying of location,location, location, became
evident that the new people thatwere moving into northwest
Arkansas were not driving up anddown college anymore to see us.
We needed to move.
SPEAKER_01 (17:51):
That's so funny because we thought we had it
handled, and from someone else'sperspective, it's like, uh, you
know what?
We don't.
SPEAKER_00 (17:56):
Well, and even our customers, if you took somebody
that grew up from here and youask them, they're like, you guys
are everywhere.
You're on billboards, you're onmy kids' t-shirt, you're not
going to be able to do that.
SPEAKER_01 (18:04):
They were in the trees with us.
They were.
Yeah, all right.
That's so good.
All right, next question.
If I told you I want to besitting in your chair one day,
what's the roadmap you suggest Ifollow to earn that opportunity
the right way?
SPEAKER_00 (18:21):
Okay, I'll jump in there.
Um depending upon uh which seatyou're in right now, that is you
need to be willing to work indifferent positions within the
dealership, even if some of themare just lateral moves to gain
the experience, not only theexperience, but two to figure
(18:42):
out where are your strengthsactually at.
You might think you're doinggreat, and you may be doing
great exactly where you areright now.
But what if that's not reallyyour strength and in services
and you're in sales or financesand you're in sales?
So, so number two, do that.
Or number one, whatever number Iwas on.
Uh the next part, no, is it it'sa long-term game.
(19:04):
It's not an overnight.
And that's why we have people inmanager positions that have been
with us 20 plus years.
Okay, it's because we make surethey're in the right fit.
And then you need to make surethat the people you're getting
advice from are at the levelsthat you're trying to go to.
I love being in a room where Iknow I don't need to talk
because I'm not the smartestperson in the room.
(19:25):
Because that means I'm in theright room and I'm shutting up
and I'm listening.
SPEAKER_01 (19:28):
Yep.
You know, I think it's reallygood to realize, and we hear it
sometimes and get re-reminded ofit from podcasts and whatever
else, but you don't have to bein this seat, you don't have to
like not today, but tomorrow buyin to your seat.
Sure.
Right?
So you don't have to go buy astore to sit in a seat you want.
(19:51):
You also don't have to be anheir, like a family member to
get there.
More often than not, that whatwe see, like the last time we
talked about a dealer group andwe were listening to a podcast
as sales managers.
Uh, this was a guy that had beenraised in the car business in
not his later days, but hewasn't like through it
(20:11):
completely like we were, and hadjust come on as an employee and
then had done really good,listened correctly, operated
very efficiently, and had beenwildly successful.
Then he saw opportunity, he wentand worked here.
He saw opportunity, he went andworked here within his group,
and he kept growing, and nowhe's the CEO over a very, very
(20:32):
large group.
So don't ever handicap yourselfand say, Well, I don't have that
opportunity.
Everybody's got that opportunitysomewhere, someplace, but you're
gonna have to put some skin intothe game of some sweat equity.
SPEAKER_00 (20:46):
Yeah, that's good.
Absolutely going there.
All right, next up here it says,This is automotive, would you
rather?
How many cars do each of y'allown?
And which one is y'all'sfavorite?
SPEAKER_03 (21:01):
This guy's a thousand plus for sale out
front.
And my favorite one, and I lovethis because it's always our
they're like, What's yourfavorite?
The one that's in your driveway.
And they're like, no, Taylor,really, what you know.
SPEAKER_00 (21:14):
This kind of goes back to the seasons of life.
Yeah, no, it it does.
It does, you know, and it it itall goes back when we talked
about our first car, we can talkabout you know the car, whatever
car we're we're at.
Um, but it does go back toseasons of life for sure.
SPEAKER_03 (21:28):
Yeah, and it's so funny because it's wherever you
because if it's your first car,if it's your car that you got
that uh when you were growingup, what was fun and you
remember, and um of course welove fox body my stains, and
that was that era of growing up,and then you know, Broncos and
(21:48):
all right, so we gotta saysomething here.
SPEAKER_00 (21:50):
So here we go.
Yeah.
All right, so if I gotta say oneof my favorite ones, I'll say a
favorite.
Uh unfortunately I don't have toever drive it.
Uh I have a 93 Till Cobra.
unknown (22:01):
Okay.
SPEAKER_00 (22:03):
My wife's never ridden in it.
But uh now Till Cobra that I'vehad for a while.
Yeah.
Um, yeah, I really like that carbecause it's the first year they
came out with a Cobra.
Uh-huh.
Uh they only year they producedit in that color.
Um yeah, it was really cool.
(22:23):
It kind of came to me toobecause the SVT team started
from the SVO team, and my firstcar was at 85 and a half Mustang
SVO.
Yeah.
And then SVO changed to SVTin '93.
Yep.
It's a cool car.
Yeah.
SPEAKER_03 (22:42):
I'd probably say my uh my You gotta tell them about
it.
Oh, absolutely.
My Mustang that I'd boughtwhenever I was 14.
And uh funniest story about, andeveryone's always like, hey,
how'd you and I love tellingthis, but uh, hey, what'd your
dad buy you or anything else?
Whenever it started, it said, hesaid, hey, I'll split with
whatever cost of you forwhatever your car, and your mind
(23:02):
goes way up, like, oh yeah, I'mgoing all out.
And then you're like, wait, Igotta come up with half of this
one.
I gotta find I gotta go cleansome more stalls.
Absolutely.
So bought it whenever I was 14,still have it.
SPEAKER_00 (23:13):
Uh, don't have for drive.
White fox body, what color theinterior?
Red, it's the white and redinterior.
SPEAKER_03 (23:20):
It is uh straight old school.
It's an 88 model.
So I bought it out of Texas, andI remember the only thing I
bought it off eBay, and Imessaged the guy and I said,
Hey, will it make the drive?
It was like that was part ofmessaging through eBay.
Will it make the drive fromTexas to up here?
It had under 100,000 miles atthe time.
And he's like, Oh, yeah.
So we got it, and the first timeI drove it, I had got my permit
(23:42):
and I made mom ride with me.
We went to a baseball game overin Oklahoma and drove it for the
first time.
I was like, Yeah.
SPEAKER_01 (23:50):
She was too pretty used to it by then.
SPEAKER_03 (23:52):
Yeah, absolutely.
She was like, Okay, all right,sounds good.
She asked Dad, okay, are we okayto drive this?
And he's like, Yeah, whatever.
I'm going to work.
SPEAKER_01 (24:04):
Don't call me if it breaks that.
Yeah, so um I've got uh myoriginal Fox body that bought as
well.
Um, I'll tell you this, becauseI was trying to think, okay,
what's I have a 09 Shelby GT500KR.
Now it's not my color schemebecause everything that I own is
red.
(24:24):
Yeah.
Right?
Um, it's become my favoritecolor.
Yeah.
Um, but this one's not.
It's silver with blue stripes.
Um, it's got uh less than athousand miles.
But the funny thing about it, soyes, I bought it.
Yes, I went and registered it,and the lady at DMV gave me a
hard time that I paid too muchfor it.
Uh and I was like, well, yeah,well, I sold it to myself.
(24:48):
Uh but I was getting plates forit, and the lady, they were
like, hey, do you want standardplates?
And I was like, you know what?
I was laughing thinking aboutMarino 911, right?
I was like, I would die for you.
So I got a vanity plate and Iwas like, hey, let me look this
up.
It's like uh I'm not gonna drivethis car, right?
It sits under a cover on a lift.
But uh, so I remember when thevanity plate came in and my wife
(25:09):
saw it, and so it says Shelby, SH B Y or something, and it says
KR, because it's a GT500 KR,very limited production.
It was a car built by Ford andthen sent to Shelby America.
Uh and my wife saw it, she'slike, Oh, that's so cool.
It's Shelby Kara.
It's like Shelby Kara.
(25:29):
I was like, uh huh, we can takethat to launch as long as it's
close.
I'm gonna keep it under athousand miles.
Like, no, it's Shelby KR.
Because I had a Shelby beforethat, and then we started having
kids, and I sold it, and thisone came and I was like, I gotta
buy one back, right?
I can do this now.
So yeah, so now you know aboutsome of our cars.
SPEAKER_00 (25:50):
Thank you, Eric.
Thanks, Eric.
I didn't look up to see whoasked this next question, but if
when y'all see it, you can callthem out.
All right, next question here.
Whew, y'all are really gettinginto it.
What's the most difficult partabout running a family business
together as brothers?
That came from a one writer.
(26:10):
Rider.
Ryder.
Okay, let me break this down foryou, writer.
Um That's very difficult.
Especially if you have notestablished that you need give
and take, and you've notestablished the difference
between personal or family, youcan put that in its own
category, and then business.
(26:31):
And if everybody's establishedthat and they know that you need
to have conversations that arebusiness and you need to have
conversations that are family,then you're gonna make it
through it.
And if everybody understandsthat, hey, we gotta make some
business decisions, and we mightnot all agree on this, and we're
gonna have to take one of ourideas and then support each
(26:53):
other on it, you're gonna beokay.
If you don't ever say that andyou don't ever go through it,
then it gets really messy.
And the farther you let it go ofnot saying, hey, this is
business, we gotta have abusiness conversation, that's
why so many family businessesfail.
And and that's why only threepercent of businesses have made
(27:16):
it to the fourth generation.
Now, I we make it work very welluh because we've seen my dad and
uncle and his cousin worktogether on this.
And we've seen I I think thebiggest takeaway, and then I
want to get y'all's takeawayhere, but the biggest takeaway
I've seen from them is no mattertheir position in the company,
(27:37):
who's over who, that they havegive and take.
And if somebody's reallypassionate about something, as
long as it lines up, they jumpin there and then they help
them.
Uh, but they have theconversation, hey, this is
business and we're gonna have tohave a tough conversation here.
It's not personal.
SPEAKER_01 (27:53):
Yeah, you know, I uh uh to go and build on that, it's
one of those things if it's likean understood respect and
authority.
And it's not by age, it's not byseniority, and it's not by
title.
Right?
It's out of respect because youwould want the same thing,
right?
So I don't think there's everbeen a conversation in the the
(28:15):
20 years that we've all workedtogether, even before that when
we worked with dad and we workedwith dad too, that it was ever
because I'm in charge of you.
Like because I I'm a manager ofyou, you know, and like it might
be like, hey, here's what Ithink we should do, but it was
never, no, I'm in charge of you,I'm superior to you, and you do
(28:39):
this because I tell you to therewas always a respect of like you
you have to give direction.
Sure.
Hey, I'm seeing this because I'mat a different level, and I mean
like you're in the trees, I'mout here, and I hey Taylor, we
need to adjust this, or heyShelby, you need to do this, or
hey Matt, you need to do that.
Or, man, generally it's how youapproach it.
And because we teach and preachthis stuff constantly, and most
(29:01):
of most of it's based off offailure, things we've learned,
then you just figured out to howto have that respect with each
other and say, hey, have welooked at this lately of how we
should do this?
And then one of us would belike, Yeah, I was realizing like
I fell short there.
Like, you know, that's an areathat I kind of had taken over,
and I like give me somefeedback, you know, what's going
(29:25):
on there.
But you know, we wouldn't make agood TV show in this aspect.
We don't have crazy drama.
SPEAKER_02 (29:31):
Yeah.
SPEAKER_01 (29:32):
We're just none of us are that high strong.
We're not MFing each other andslamming the door and peeling
out of the parking lot, youknow.
SPEAKER_00 (29:39):
And I think it's it it's it's too, it's not because
we're not competitive, it's notbecause we're not passionate.
But I think you hit on a greatpart there of just of respecting
that and understanding the longgame.
Now, have we ever come out of ameeting or a discussion
frustrated?
Yeah.
But it never got to the pointwhere we close the door and
we're just yelling and cutting.
(30:00):
Cussing at each other because,like, what was that gonna
accomplish?
And we we've all had discussionsin here with each other.
And we come around, we're like,son of a gun, that that they're
not seeing that, or that's justnot right.
We let those emotions calm down,and sometimes we'll circle back
around and talk about it.
Yeah, you know, because we wecan sense, you know, like, okay,
we weren't all on board there.
(30:21):
I was really passionate here.
We better like let that simmerfor a second, and then we'll
come back around.
Don't just like hope it fixesitself.
No, you know, but uh again,yeah, what what's the long game
here?
And it's for us to continue afamily business, support each
other, help it be wildlysuccessful, and then we're here
for our employees becausethey're the ones that are
(30:42):
generating it all.
You know what I mean?
So I think that's and a greatexample of this, and then
Taylor, we got to get yourthoughts here.
But I was thinking about thisthe other day.
A great example of this is ifyou look at the the name of our
business, it's Lewis Automotiveor Lewis Ford or or Lewis CDJR
or Lewis Farmington.
It's our family name.
(31:03):
We haven't split up in it'sShelby Lewis this, Taylor Lewis
this, Matt Lewis this.
You know, that that that'schecked to the side.
SPEAKER_01 (31:12):
It's funny you say that.
Uh there was a time that it waslike that.
SPEAKER_00 (31:16):
It it was even within our organization.
SPEAKER_01 (31:18):
Yeah, that it was Andy Lewis Springdale Ford.
Yeah, it was Tim Lewis Ford.
Yeah.
Uh I don't know if they everrenamed the CDGR for Tom.
But when I was doing research onold documents and I was going
through old newspapers, I foundthat.
And so I was like, Dad, what'swhat was the theory here, right?
Andy Lewis Springdale Ford stuckaround the longest.
And dad was like, I don't wantmy name up on the building.
(31:42):
This is a team.
Like we're doing this a team,and it's Lewis Automotive.
I'm not talking speaking offamily, Lewis.
I'm speaking of family ofeveryone who works here.
Yeah.
And that I think that's just hasbeen our we don't want the
spotlight.
We want it on all the peoplehere.
SPEAKER_00 (31:56):
We're proud of our family and what our family is,
no doubt.
But like together we're gonnawork on that.
And you see that some, and I'mnot calling anybody out, but you
see that some in some otherbusinesses, and then they got to
w add the word in there andsons.
But if you say, you know, if itwas Tim Lewis Automotive and
sons, like we would still beliving like under that umbrella,
you know?
SPEAKER_01 (32:16):
Yeah.
SPEAKER_00 (32:16):
Um, and and I know they got deeper on this one, but
this is one that, you know, isis very difficult to do.
And if you do it the right way,it's not that difficult, and
it's wildly successful becausejust think about it.
Oh yeah, we have three people inhere that have the same goal,
some some different paths to getthere, and different strengths.
We're all highly competitive.
This goes back just to Anthony'sconversation, too, about running
(32:39):
the race.
And if we can collectively worktogether, holy moly.
SPEAKER_03 (32:44):
Yep.
Absolutely.
Y'all hit all the the nails onthe head there, but what I love
about it, it's not hard at allbecause we've done what you've
talked about from the get-go.
I talked to multiple buddiesthat are outside of our market
area that are different indifferent professions, and they
have that knockdown, drag outfights.
(33:04):
And like, Taylor, what would youdo in this?
I said, Y'all've got to sit downand have the real deal
conversation, and it's just beeningrained in us, not to lay down
and not be competitive, but tosee strength, see weaknesses,
and work together.
It's really pretty easy for usto work as brothers.
There's no one else I wouldrather work with because you
(33:25):
have trust built into them thatyou never have to question
anything.
You know they're always gonna bethere.
And then it's a strength thatcan be able to help you all go
to new heights, but you have tohave the conversation or you
cannot run a family.
SPEAKER_00 (33:40):
I'm gonna this just hit me as you're talking, and
and I know we need to move on,but we don't.
Um I think one of the thingsthat's naturally, and and and I
gotta thank dad for this.
One of the things that naturallydevelops that is all of our
positions were earned, theyweren't given.
Correct.
And I I can tell you time andtime again when I was very
(34:03):
frustrated that I hadn't movedup quicker in positions.
You know, because I'm like, whatother accolades do you want?
What other records do you wantbroken?
And at the time I couldn't seeit.
unknown (34:15):
No.
SPEAKER_00 (34:15):
But if you look at now the positions we're in, it
didn't come overnight.
We didn't come out of college orout of, you know, this
certification and automaticallyget a manager job.
They were all earned.
So we know people are in theposition, and it's not just
like, well, son of a gun, Matt'sin this position because of who
he is, and and Taylor andShelby, and we just gotta figure
(34:37):
out how to deal with that.
SPEAKER_01 (34:38):
Yeah.
You just take that and throw itin the trash and and just you
know, you get what you uhdeserve and what you aren't.
Yeah, right?
That's all.
All right, next question.
What's the biggest hurdle intransitioning from traditional
advertising to social media thatcomes in from Chris?
SPEAKER_00 (34:56):
Okay.
Uh I'll jump here.
I think the biggest hurdle is isthere's a whole lot more
streams.
I think the the concept and andhere's what I try to tell people
that ask me about this, becauseI'm in a unique position.
You gotta remember when Istarted, we were newspaper.
We we we were, you know, insertsin the newspaper and just radio
(35:17):
and TV.
And now I'm in social media aswell.
You know, you guys are even moreversed in social media, but all
of them are just ways to connectwith customers and getting them
to either make a phone call,send a message in, or show up at
the dealership.
That that's all they are.
Now, the the biggest hurdle isin with traditional media, you
(35:39):
just had to cover radio, TV,okay, and newspaper.
Maybe throw a billboard in thereif you want to be complex.
There's four.
When I first started, you couldpretty easy guerrilla market all
of that.
Now with social media, you haveto be very strategic because you
have it coming from all thesedifferent sources and you could
way outspin your ad budget.
SPEAKER_01 (36:01):
And the how and the when changes so often.
Like, how do you, you know, in anewspaper, on radio, on TV, it
was generally the same styleformat.
Yeah.
Right?
It was just insert new copy.
Exactly.
Insert new copy, insert newcopy.
It's pretty easy.
Put the money behind it, knewthe area, knew the times, knew
how to buy the best uh time.
(36:23):
With social, it's like headspinning of like, okay, how do
we not blow the budget?
How do we make sure it'srelevant?
How to make sure it has sometype of ROI with a call to
action.
SPEAKER_00 (36:33):
Yeah.
So I think, you know, sometimesit gets out there, well, it's so
much more trackable, and it'sthis and it's that.
There's some great things aboutit, but it's way more complex.
Way more complex.
So that that that was a good onethere.
Um, what is one decision thatchanged the entire trajectory of
your business?
That's from Dom.
(36:54):
Wow.
SPEAKER_01 (36:56):
You know, I'll I'll take this.
Uh changed one trajectory of ourbusiness, right?
There's many fashions and itmoves constantly.
But I'll say when we s startedthis transition to construction,
because it happened before wemoved here to our new location.
Oh yeah.
You know, a year and a half ago,um, was we were now on a growth
(37:17):
pattern.
We could see farther down thetracks that if we move from nine
acres to twenty six acres, from45,000 square foot to 150,000
square foot, I don't know whatour total parking spaces were,
about 500 parking spaces to 1700parking spaces.
We knew we would have to hiremore to produce more.
(37:39):
And when we produced more, wewould have to sell more to be
able to keep this wheelspinning.
And so we knew it was a go froma business model of take care of
the customers we know, the localhometown, the doors open, come
on in, everybody knows yourname.
(38:00):
To we have to now go gunsblazing, blazing new paths,
finding new areas of people wehave not met.
And it was about vehicles andoperation.
Yep.
Vehicles and operation, and themore vehicles we could get in
operation.
So that like was a machine gun,very precise, sniper-like, but
machine gun of okay, how do wedo that?
(38:20):
Insert Lewis guarantee.
Why buy?
Move to the interstate, vehiclestorage tower out front, the big
car tower.
That was another thing to say,hey, the car display, the whole
way the whole thing lays out,the pickleball courts, the
basketball court, the gym.
So that was for employees andthat was for customers.
That was a trajectory ofchanging our entire business was
(38:43):
growth mode.
SPEAKER_02 (38:44):
Yeah.
SPEAKER_01 (38:44):
Like, okay, now we're gonna transition over and
it needs to look completelydifferent.
It needs to have the same feel,but completely different.
So this was not an okay.
We got to really accelerate.
SPEAKER_00 (38:57):
And I think that the you hit on it's such great, like
we're always gonna be able to goback to that if when we went
construction and we actuallymove, because we always wanted
to grow across town, but we putourselves in a position where we
had to.
And we had these big aspirationsand growth that we wanted to do
into all these buildings, andthen we built them.
(39:17):
Like, no, we we gotta make ithappen.
You have to make it happen.
Um, and and for sure, I'll saythat that decision of like when
that construction came up, youknow, you guys were were helping
in all the areas.
I took it on, and it forced meto give up the reins on some of
(39:38):
the other areas where Imicromanaged for too long
because I found success in itand it had some self-feeling
there.
But and the construction tooklonger than we thought.
So it created new habits on mypart that then really set up for
all these new systems andprocesses to actually be able to
(39:59):
grow the business.
SPEAKER_03 (40:00):
Yes.
SPEAKER_00 (40:01):
Yeah, that was really bad.
Yeah, for sure.
Man, that that's some good ones.
Do y'all see any other oneslisted out there we need to talk
about question-wise?
And if you're listening to this,we'll do it again because we we
love going over information thatyou guys want.
You know, we we really likeanswering questions that, and it
can be about us or it can beabout the business or what
(40:21):
you're struggling with or ideasyou have.
Shoot it over to us on social.
We're looking forward to doingmore episodes like this that are
a shorter format, and we'regetting into exactly what you
guys are looking at.
SPEAKER_01 (40:33):
All right, last question I found from Frankie.
How involved are you guys in therunning community?
I think that was the only one Ihave.
SPEAKER_00 (40:40):
Well, we spent 25 plus hours on Mount Kessler.
SPEAKER_01 (40:44):
Hey, let me tell you, let me give you the best.
Sorry, I didn't mean to cut youoff, but I'm gonna cut you off.
Yeah.
You do run.
Yeah.
Yeah, people don't think I do.
So we've always talked aboutthis.
Our style of advertising is notjust riding chase.
It's local community hands-on.
We just did the hero halfmarathon.
We love doing that because it'san aid station that we get to
(41:06):
see the runners twice.
Yeah.
And so we just bring thecommotion.
I I would argue, and I feel badbecause I've been part of the
board, that our aid station hasmore rally than the Start
Finite.
SPEAKER_00 (41:17):
I think our aid station has more rally than any
other athletic event you'd goto.
SPEAKER_01 (41:22):
It's just because we've been to a lot, we've seen
a lot, and we've learned frombig athletic events.
But we recently had, I laughedabout this.
SPEAKER_00 (41:30):
Okay.
SPEAKER_01 (41:30):
We recently had, because we are involved in the
running and biking community,someone reach out to us from
Beast of Bird and from ORC andwas like, hey, um, we want to
have our year-end event, but ournormal place is booked up and
we've checked a couple more.
And because anyone that comeshere, we say, Hey, have you been
here before?
Let's go on a tour.
We show all the they said thatconference room, is there any
(41:52):
possibility we could use it?
Say, yeah, absolutely.
Let's go.
SPEAKER_02 (41:54):
Yeah.
SPEAKER_01 (41:55):
And so we said, We'll put you on the schedule,
tell us what you need.
We've got audio, video, smoke,30,000 watts.
And they were just like, ohgosh, we just need room for
kids.
And I was like, Yeah, send mesome stuff, I'll make a
slideshow.
And they were just like, uh thefunny thing is, in their
presentation, they had asponsor, a pretty big sponsor
from another automotive dealer.
And so he was going through,hey, this year we've been able
(42:16):
to do this and this.
And one of the parcels, likethere was multiple different
divisions here, we had helpedout, and we're building a new
one.
Yeah.
But the main one, we'd just beenthere for support.
Sure.
It's not even a team that we'rea part of, but they were the one
that reached out to us throughthe grapevine.
And so they were like, hey, wewant to say thank you to Raising
King's Chicken.
(42:37):
We want to say thank you tothis, uh, it wasn't McClung, but
some type of civil engineering.
We want to say thank you toSuperior Automotive Group.
Yeah.
And everyone in there starteddying laughing.
SPEAKER_00 (42:47):
And he knew, like I knew he had to go over it.
And they're a good supporter oftheirs.
SPEAKER_01 (42:51):
Yeah.
But and no shade on superior byany means.
Like we all have our ownpockets, right?
And but he said that andeveryone started laughing.
So the difference of what wealways want to do is to be
hands-on.
Because we know people arewriting checks everywhere,
right?
SPEAKER_00 (43:07):
And it's, you know, there's that old saying of how
do you make somebody feel?
You know, and it's not just thecheck, but what was the
experience and how'd they feel?
And we, I don't know if we had150 or 160.
I don't know how many peoplewere down there last night, but
it was the biggest capacityever.
SPEAKER_01 (43:21):
We're gonna need the carpet machine put on.
SPEAKER_00 (43:22):
I know.
But but they all, and then sothen he circled back around and
he thanked us for doing that.
And it was a rowdy round ofapplause because it was how we
made them feel.
We made their kids feel special,the event, we were there, we
were helping them out.
You know.
SPEAKER_01 (43:37):
Yeah, and so that's that that's something we get to
be involved in.
SPEAKER_03 (43:40):
Well, and that's something you can't buy.
You can't buy.
Doesn't matter how big the checkis you write or anything else.
And we've seen it throughout theyears of us being frugal and
realizing this is what we cando, where we won't write as big
of a check because it doesn'tmake sense.
Yeah, we will make up tenfold inthe energy and the atmosphere
that we bring to an event.
SPEAKER_01 (44:01):
Yeah, at the Beast of Burden you were starting to
talk about, it was it was thewhole thing.
I mean, we had like threetransits full of speakers and
stuff and tents.
And so as many as we can beeffective at.
That's the key word there.
Effective at, we will be a partof locally because we love how
it builds locally.
Because teaming up with a lot ofthose places helped build the
(44:22):
running community, the trails,the divisions that you get to be
a part of, that we get to bepart of I think so.
SPEAKER_00 (44:27):
You know, and I had a lot of people ask me last
weekend, well, why didn't yourun the hero half?
Why didn't you do that?
And I would have loved to runthe hero half.
Yeah, but that's not what it wasabout.
It was about being there.
So you'll see a mix if it's abeast of burden or if it's at
hero half or if it's at hoghour, any of that stuff that
we're there supporting.
And then we'll pick our otherstuff that we go run.
But I'll say too, you know, it'sno different than this is a
(44:49):
season for we help a lot offundraisers in in most of the
cities uh with a shop with acop.
And and how do we make themfeel?
And you know, tonight we'll havethe big gala with with
Fayetteville, and we'll get totalk about that.
And one of the things, I'mfortunate enough, they allow me
to get up there and and talk,but that I'll talk about, we
love being a part of thisbecause not only does it make
(45:10):
sure that kids have presenceunder the tree every year, it
also forms a bond between locallaw enforcement and those kids.
You know, so we we love thosedifferent events.
And I know they were talkingabout running, but all those
events that to your point ofshowing up and being a part and
feeling in there going, man,those guys are a part of the
community.
SPEAKER_01 (45:30):
Yeah, and the cool thing, it allows those other
groups or other, like think of arun club that's just getting
going.
It allows them to have access tostuff that normally they
wouldn't have access to becausewe use it on the regular.
Sure.
Right?
We have all these tents and allthese speakers and all these
lights and all these generatorsand a uh a driving digital
(45:51):
billboard truck and vehicles andall these things that they
wouldn't have access to.
And we always offer for free 99and sometimes give money with
that, right?
And so then it allows them tohave that big event feel, that
big community feel.
Yeah.
Uh, and it makes us feel goodbecause we're able to help
somebody local.
SPEAKER_03 (46:12):
That's really good.
A lot of good questions todaythat we went over there.
Hey, always check us out, LewisSuperstore.com for the freshest
specials and all the contentthat we go over at Crossroads
Conversation Podcast dot com.
If you enjoyed this episode, besure to give it a like, share it
with your friends and family,and visit our website to send us
questions about what you wouldlike to know about the
(46:34):
automotive industry or familybusiness in general.
Who do you want to hear from?
Send them our way, and we'll doour best to answer any questions
that you have.
Thank you again, and we'll seeyou in future shows.
And then you need to make sure that the people you're
getting advice from are at thelevels that you're trying to go
to.
I love being in a room where Iknow I don't need to talk
because I'm not the smartestperson in the room.
Because that means I'm in theright room and I'm shutting up
and I'm listening.
Hey everyone.
(00:20):
Welcome to CrossroadConversations with the Lewis
Brothers, where we aim to sharereal stories about running a
successful family business,working through adversity, and
pouring back into the communitythat keeps our door open.
We're your host, Matt Shelby,and Taylor, and we bring you
relevant local business adviceand automotive insights that are
sure to change the way you lookat running a business.
(00:40):
And maybe even throw in a plugfor you to do business with us.
All right, welcome to CrossroadConversations with the Lewis
brothers today.
Hey guys, we got a littledifferent one.
This is Unfiltered LeadershipQuestions.
Unfiltered Leadership Questions.
Okay.
We put it out there, and today'sepisode will be a little bit
different because of that.
We're going to turn the tablesand you get to ask the
(01:02):
questions, the audience.
We've collected these up.
We're in the hot seat today.
We've asked several of our staffand we posted on social media to
get questions.
So I'm not sure what all theseare, but let's dive into it.
SPEAKER_01 (01:16):
Go deep in some, and some you might just hit the
edge.
All right, question number one.
What is your favorite hobbiesoutside of the dealership?
Contestant number one.
Huh.
And it looks like that one ofthe employees asked.
One of the employees asked that.
SPEAKER_00 (01:31):
Yeah.
SPEAKER_03 (01:31):
I love cooking, obviously, going into putting
different things together.
SPEAKER_01 (01:35):
What do you like about cooking?
SPEAKER_03 (01:37):
Just a different aspect.
Yeah, are you baking things?
No, it's it's gotta be more I'mnot inside baking, do anything
else.
It's gotta be outside of grillsmoker.
And the part I love most aboutit, probably would shock, and a
lot of people are this way, iscooking for others and just
taking it to them or doinganything.
SPEAKER_00 (01:56):
And it's like Okay, but if you're cooking for
yourself this weekend, we gottaget granular here.
Yeah, yeah.
Where are you where are yougoing?
30 minutes or less.
I know.
Where are you going to buy it?
How thick is it gonna be, andhow are you cooking it?
SPEAKER_03 (02:07):
How do you order your steaks?
Walk them through this.
Oh, yeah.
This is a secret tip if you'rewanting to get a good value of
the city.
Where we're going, we're gonnago to Sam's Club.
Okay, and you're gonna go inthere, and there's three
different choices.
You knock on the window.
Yeah, knock on the window or hitthe buzzer back by the meat
counter.
They'll come out, and you canhit them with three different
things.
These are your only options: either strip, ribeye, or tender (02:24):
undefined
loin.
Loin.
Keyword loin.
I've been ribeye loin, striploin, or tender loin.
So what are you getting?
Choice.
Do not be tricked by the prime.
It's not any better.
Trust me, I've tried both ofthem.
You're gonna get the wholething.
It's gonna range from 14 to 17to maybe 20 pounds if you get
(02:46):
the bigger one.
20 pounds.
20 pounds of meat.
All right.
You can cut.
It's a large chunk here.
It's a large chunk.
We're talking about an 18-poundribite, and you're gonna cut it.
And the great part about it isyou get to cut all the uh two
inch, one and a half, one,twenty.
It's about a blade length ofwhatever your fillet knife is.
It's real quick and look at it.
It's not a inch and a half.
(03:08):
That point there.
Inch and a half.
Cut up, you seal it, you can putthem in the freezer if you want
to learn.
You're not sealing them.
What are you doing?
I put them in the fridge so youcan cook them every single day
or go through.
But the biggest thing aboutcooking is it's just me being
able to provide stuff for othersand go through there.
So that's a sense of enjoymentthat I get.
Whether it's cooking out here,it's cooking on the trails and
(03:29):
bringing light to people'slives, that's the enjoyment I
get out of it.
That's solid.
SPEAKER_00 (03:35):
You know, I would say uh mine on the favorite
hobbies.
Um if I I love hanging out withmy family, my boys, you know,
just being outside and doingthings.
Uh, but if I got to narrow itdown to if it's just me going to
do something uh or with a groupof friends, it is getting on the
trail and and running somewhere.
Uh I love the trails because itmakes you feel a little
disconnected from the road andthe cars and everything else.
(03:56):
Um and then you get your yourmind has to focus on all the
technical around there, whichthen breaks up whatever junk's
going on in your mind and givesyou some clarity plus stresses
your body.
SPEAKER_01 (04:06):
Love that.
I like uh eating Taylor's food.
Uh I definitely love nature.
Um so it it we're so plugged in,it's a good opportunity to
unplug, you know.
So whether that's uh running thetrails or my kids dictate a lot
of my things.
SPEAKER_00 (04:25):
Well, I think that's important, important, and I know
this is a quick episode, butthat your hobbies change based
upon what's going on in yourlife.
And ours has always kind of beenoutdoors.
Yeah.
But it went from like multipledays used to be competing
off-road, doing off-roadchallenges, traveling, doing
this and that.
Um sand dunes.
(04:45):
All of it.
Birds, campground, little sky.
All of that.
But then you gotta look and seewhat pockets of time you have.
And as we had kids, it's like,okay, I'll still be outside, but
you can go on an hour ortwo-hour run, still be in
nature.
Yeah.
SPEAKER_01 (05:00):
So that that's a good feeling there.
Uh so uh some of my kids like tofish, so I don't love to fish,
but I love hanging out with mykids and it's in nature.
So I'll do that.
I just catch perch because it'seasy.
Um doing a little hunting, uhhow trying to figure out how to
sit still for that long, youknow, but having fun with that.
(05:20):
Um, so just pretty much anythingin nature.
So yeah, that's what we dooutside dealership.
SPEAKER_00 (05:25):
Uh call out to the employee, you know.
Yeah.
Um hopefully we answered yourquestion.
SPEAKER_01 (05:30):
Yeah.
All right, question number two.
What's the biggest leadershiplesson you've learned running a
dealership business?
That one came in from Miguel.
Miguel, that is a largequestion.
What's the biggest leadershiplesson you've learned running a
dealership business?
SPEAKER_00 (05:45):
All right, so here it is.
Right in your focus.
I gotta try to narrow this downis not to react until I gather
all the information from boththe customer and the employee.
SPEAKER_03 (05:59):
That's big, especially since we've grown so
much that there's so manydifferent hands and different
people that could have touchedit because our reaction is like
I told them they know how to dothis.
We went over this, but you haveto sit.
SPEAKER_00 (06:14):
And my bigger, and I'll tell you what I've learned
from that, Miguel.
So hopefully this helps you, isearly on in my career, when I
heard when a customer would callin and complain about something,
I would take it 100% for facevalue.
Yeah.
I my hair would get on fire andI would go address that person
immediately, not even allowingthem to set their their side of
the story.
(06:35):
And more times than not, thecustomer had some truth in
there, but they had stretched ita whole lot.
I took it 100% for face value,reacted on that, and you know
where that went.
SPEAKER_01 (06:47):
Yeah.
Yeah.
I would definitely say uh youdon't really realize, you know
it's important, but you don'trealize how much people have to
do with your business.
Like of all the systems and allthe AIs and all the processes,
people, and I mean people inyour business and people that
you're selling to or servicing,people, you have to figure out
(07:09):
how to properly operate in andthrough with people.
You know, if you can't do that,you're gonna drop the ball in
one fashion or another, and itwill make or break you in every
different fashion of the way.
So figure out how to properlynavigate through people, give
kudos when necessary, uh coach,teach, and preach at different
levels, and um sit down andlisten to people, whether it be
(07:32):
customers or employees, moreoften than you think.
SPEAKER_03 (07:35):
Yeah, I love this from a a a quote I'd saw in a
notebook the other day.
But that the customer,especially in the retail side of
business, the customer doesn'towe you anything.
And we owe everything to thecustomer because they're the
ones provide obviously theopportunity for us to do
business and that provide theincome for us to be able to
start everything.
So make sure you always takecare of the customer.
(07:57):
That's good.
SPEAKER_01 (07:57):
Question number three, what do you got?
SPEAKER_00 (07:59):
All right, what is one growing area or industry
that you guys are looking toexpand to, if any?
SPEAKER_01 (08:06):
I got this.
SPEAKER_00 (08:07):
And this comes from Colton first.
So, Colton, thanks for puttingthat question out there.
What is the one growing areathat you're gonna get into?
SPEAKER_01 (08:14):
Yeah, I need things that have less people.
SPEAKER_00 (08:17):
Okay.
SPEAKER_01 (08:19):
Because that means less things to manage.
Storage facilities.
Okay, quarter car washes.
Still need a couple people.
Yeah.
Um unmanned operations.
Yes.
Um this is fully involved whatwe're currently doing.
Yeah, a triple net commercialreal estate.
Right?
Just a few things.
SPEAKER_00 (08:40):
So a couple things, Shelby went over there.
Let me hit another one.
Um we want to get deeper intoaftermarket and accessories on
vehicles.
We know that the average truckowner spends over$2,000 in
accessories like within 30 daysof purchasing their vehicle.
So why not us do it, perform it?
Uh, we've dabbled in it in thepast, but honestly, not done an
(09:03):
awesome job at it.
Uh so look for that maybe tocome in 2026.
SPEAKER_01 (09:08):
Yeah, somewhere in there.
SPEAKER_00 (09:10):
Absolutely.
SPEAKER_03 (09:11):
I've grown in there.
Anything you'd add?
No, you'll hit on both of them.
SPEAKER_01 (09:15):
Okay, not going through there.
If you get that business, reachout to us.
Yes.
SPEAKER_03 (09:19):
Uh, jumping on this next one here.
What is the key to being at workon time?
Ah.
SPEAKER_01 (09:25):
Tell them who it came from first.
Lingling?
Winston Churchill.
This is from Lingling.
From Ling Lang.
Anonymously.
What's the key to being at workon time?
Wake up early whether you feellike it or not.
Yep.
SPEAKER_00 (09:36):
Yeah, but tell them the other key.
Like, what'd you do with yourphone?
SPEAKER_01 (09:39):
So my phone is in my kitchen.
Yep.
Uh one, going to bed, I'm notgoofing off on my phone, right?
It goes on, do not disturb at 930, whether I like it or not.
It just does it on its own, sothen I don't have distractions.
It's in my uh kitchen.
And so then it goes off at 4 15or whatever time you think it
should be before it's time toget to work, and you need more
(10:01):
time than you think.
Traffic's gonna be bad, you'regonna have a kid sick, you're
gonna have a flat tire, you'regonna forget your phone.
Plan for all that.
You have to plan for that, andum that'll get you to work on
time.
And to be on time is to beearly.
That's right.
SPEAKER_00 (10:17):
Uh, a couple things to add into there, you know,
plan for whatever you need inthe morning if you're gonna go
work out, if you're gonna dothis, if you're gonna do that,
if I need to take my computer towork, whatever it is, I do the
night before.
Always.
The night before.
So if I've got a whatever it,whatever I need, it's going in
my truck.
So really all I gotta do is grabmy cup of coffee and get in my
vehicle.
SPEAKER_01 (10:36):
And here's the thing procrastination is the killer of
all things, right?
But if you don't feel like itwhen you still have some energy,
tomorrow morning when the alarmgoes off at any time, you will
not feel like it.
Your head's gonna be cloudy, thelights are gonna be off, kids
are running around, streaming.
It's not gonna be gonnaremember.
Pack your stuff.
(10:56):
And I like on some days when wehave events and then you're
flying out, yeah, like I'll haveto pack like six bags.
Like no joke.
I'm like, okay, all right, I'mgonna wear my gym clothes, and
then here's my work clothes, andthen we gotta wear a suit that
day, like a pink suit orsomething.
And then, hey, we've got abiking event here, gotta have
(11:17):
this here.
Oh yeah.
And then, hey, we're leaving togo to dealer meetings.
But do it the night before.
SPEAKER_00 (11:23):
It's all in there.
I mean, you know, in my truckright now is the is the
different change stuff.
I got workout stuff in there.
Then I've got stuff for the galafor the shop of the cop tonight.
You know, that's got all thewesternware stuff in the sport
coat, my boots, all that's inthe pack it this morning.
No, I didn't pack it thismorning.
I would have picked twodifferent boots.
Ling ling.
Uh, so make sure you do that.
Shelby brought up a great dealon, you know, putting your phone
(11:45):
on do not disturb.
Hey, here, here's the deal.
Like, if somebody calls at 11o'clock at night, what are you
gonna do?
You know what I mean?
And so you're like, well, yeah,but what if a family member gets
a hold of me?
Hey, here's a news flash foryou.
When you put you set up yourphone on Do Not Disturb Times,
(12:06):
you can allow your top yourfavorite contacts.
So my favorite contacts I stillhave in there if they need to
get a hold of me becausesomething's really going on.
Because I know that they're notgonna call me at 1115 to tell me
some BS.
SPEAKER_01 (12:19):
That's for the overrun of the Dodgers?
Yeah.
SPEAKER_03 (12:21):
You're just not gonna do something.
Like when I called you the othernight at 3:40 in the morning,
whenever I was running throughthe woods, you probably thought
for a second maybe I'd had astroke and fell down a thing.
But then I was like, hey, how doyou start this?
Or what's your passcode?
Yeah.
It's like son of a guy.
I'm sorry.
SPEAKER_00 (12:38):
I'm delirious.
SPEAKER_03 (12:39):
Nine.
SPEAKER_00 (12:40):
It's all good.
That's a good question.
Oh, all good for sure.
These are good.
Yeah, so let's just keep rockingand rolling on these.
SPEAKER_03 (12:46):
Okay, I got one here that this has come to you from
From Garfield?
Yeah, Garfield himself.
Shelby, if you and Matt ran arace, who quits first if there's
no time limit, and both youpromised your family you would
win.
SPEAKER_01 (13:00):
So he asked that question because he knows, like,
he knows the story.
So that that's an unansweredquestion, right?
But I'll tell you, it's gonna beon that day whoever's body has
the ability to last the longest,right?
Yeah, I've seen that many times.
SPEAKER_00 (13:19):
We have, and I read this question.
I happened to read this questiona couple days ago.
Okay, so I've thought about thisone.
All right, so I've got to giveyou my answer.
All right, so Anthony, here yougo.
You ready for this one?
All right, so here's the deal.
There are races that Shelby hasbeat me in.
There are races that I've beathim in.
(13:40):
We're both highly competitivepeople.
Highly competitive.
But the most successful raceswe've had, and this isn't a
political answer, the mostsuccessful races we've had, is
when we take our competitivenessand join forces and bury the
rest of the field.
No doubt.
And that's the same.
I I I just relate that over intobusiness when you can take the
(14:04):
three of us being highlycompetitive.
And even if we're all deskingdeals and we look in in our
software to see who has thehighest PDR and this and that,
like you use that as acompetitiveness, but not to
cross the line, yeah.
Where then it creates theseboundaries and walls.
Like you use it, but then youuse it together.
SPEAKER_01 (14:24):
It's one of those things if you think about in a
race in an all-out mile or 5Kand you just bury somebody, then
like where did youraccountability partner?
Buried the random dude.
SPEAKER_00 (14:35):
You know, I buried the people that was that's so
good of like because there therehas been times in races that
Shelby has pulled me through toa better finish.
And then there's been times thatI've pulled him through when he
has has been in a low.
Pro bar.
You know what I mean?
SPEAKER_01 (14:52):
I mean, like that, there's highs and lows, and
that's life, and that's inbusiness.
Yeah.
Uh, because there are you gothrough them at different times.
And so it's been one of thosethings like, hey, here's some
headphones, turn some music on,follow me.
Like, yeah, don't ask questions,or like, hey, you haven't eaten,
eat this.
Sure.
Right?
And so it's the same thing inbusiness, but so, right?
(15:13):
The I've won races, he's wonraces.
SPEAKER_00 (15:16):
So, what we'd like to do is, Anthony, uh-huh.
We'd like to challenge you andwhoever else you want to be on
your team.
Bingo.
Okay, it's a team race, and youand your partner can race Shelby
and I, and we'll see who laststhe longest.
SPEAKER_03 (15:33):
I love it.
Oh, coming in there.
It's a good question.
All right, you got the next one?
Yeah.
What made you guys realize youneeded to move locations?
SPEAKER_01 (15:42):
Cars parked on top of cars.
That's the easy part.
Our building was from 1969.
Yeah.
Um, we kept it so fresh with thefreshest paint and many
renovations, uh, but it was timeto modernize.
SPEAKER_03 (15:56):
Yeah, and it was probably really a which you know
of go and listen to our podcast,it was definitely a long-term
move.
It wasn't that we have done aspur of the moment, oh no,
anything else.
It was a well thought out.
SPEAKER_01 (16:08):
We didn't put lipstick on a pig.
It wasn't the first placeavailable.
So there's a lot of real like weneeded uh interstate.
Yeah, we needed more space, uh,parking lot, and in our
buildings.
You know, we quadrupled in size,maybe more, and inside parking
spaces grew from nine acres totwenty six acres.
(16:30):
It was time to do it, right?
And it wasn't on a snap, it was10 years worth of research.
SPEAKER_00 (16:34):
So you guys have heard the stories about the 10
years.
I won't walk you down throughthat again.
Uh, we hired outside companieslike CBRE and then companies
that both the manufacturers hadto do all the data to see if we
should move or not.
We knew it was guaranteed thatwe needed to modernize, we
needed new facilities.
Did we do it at the old locationor the new location?
But let me tell you, and thisstands out in my brain over
everything else.
(16:55):
Everything else.
Let me tell you what really putthe nail in.
When we were out and about, andespecially as we would go up
north and and we'd run a halfmarathon or a marathon, you talk
to people during the first 90%of it, okay?
And same story.
Hey, who are you?
Where do you work?
Blah, blah, blah, blah, blah.
And time after time we hadpeople say, Lewis, where's that
(17:18):
located?
Yeah.
And this is a perfect example ofif you're in the middle of the
forest, you can't see what'sgoing on.
Because we are advertisingeverywhere, we were at every
kid's event, we had been therefor 70 plus years.
Yeah.
And we said, okay, thevisibility, the old real estate
(17:39):
business saying of location,location, location, became
evident that the new people thatwere moving into northwest
Arkansas were not driving up anddown college anymore to see us.
We needed to move.
SPEAKER_01 (17:51):
That's so funny because we thought we had it
handled, and from someone else'sperspective, it's like, uh, you
know what?
We don't.
SPEAKER_00 (17:56):
Well, and even our customers, if you took somebody
that grew up from here and youask them, they're like, you guys
are everywhere.
You're on billboards, you're onmy kids' t-shirt, you're not
going to be able to do that.
SPEAKER_01 (18:04):
They were in the trees with us.
They were.
Yeah, all right.
That's so good.
All right, next question.
If I told you I want to besitting in your chair one day,
what's the roadmap you suggest Ifollow to earn that opportunity
the right way?
SPEAKER_00 (18:21):
Okay, I'll jump in there.
Um depending upon uh which seatyou're in right now, that is you
need to be willing to work indifferent positions within the
dealership, even if some of themare just lateral moves to gain
the experience, not only theexperience, but two to figure
(18:42):
out where are your strengthsactually at.
You might think you're doinggreat, and you may be doing
great exactly where you areright now.
But what if that's not reallyyour strength and in services
and you're in sales or financesand you're in sales?
So, so number two, do that.
Or number one, whatever number Iwas on.
Uh the next part, no, is it it'sa long-term game.
(19:04):
It's not an overnight.
And that's why we have people inmanager positions that have been
with us 20 plus years.
Okay, it's because we make surethey're in the right fit.
And then you need to make surethat the people you're getting
advice from are at the levelsthat you're trying to go to.
I love being in a room where Iknow I don't need to talk
because I'm not the smartestperson in the room.
(19:25):
Because that means I'm in theright room and I'm shutting up
and I'm listening.
SPEAKER_01 (19:28):
Yep.
You know, I think it's reallygood to realize, and we hear it
sometimes and get re-reminded ofit from podcasts and whatever
else, but you don't have to bein this seat, you don't have to
like not today, but tomorrow buyin to your seat.
Sure.
Right?
So you don't have to go buy astore to sit in a seat you want.
(19:51):
You also don't have to be anheir, like a family member to
get there.
More often than not, that whatwe see, like the last time we
talked about a dealer group andwe were listening to a podcast
as sales managers.
Uh, this was a guy that had beenraised in the car business in
not his later days, but hewasn't like through it
(20:11):
completely like we were, and hadjust come on as an employee and
then had done really good,listened correctly, operated
very efficiently, and had beenwildly successful.
Then he saw opportunity, he wentand worked here.
He saw opportunity, he went andworked here within his group,
and he kept growing, and nowhe's the CEO over a very, very
(20:32):
large group.
So don't ever handicap yourselfand say, Well, I don't have that
opportunity.
Everybody's got that opportunitysomewhere, someplace, but you're
gonna have to put some skin intothe game of some sweat equity.
SPEAKER_00 (20:46):
Yeah, that's good.
Absolutely going there.
All right, next up here it says,This is automotive, would you
rather?
How many cars do each of y'allown?
And which one is y'all'sfavorite?
SPEAKER_03 (21:01):
This guy's a thousand plus for sale out
front.
And my favorite one, and I lovethis because it's always our
they're like, What's yourfavorite?
The one that's in your driveway.
And they're like, no, Taylor,really, what you know.
SPEAKER_00 (21:14):
This kind of goes back to the seasons of life.
Yeah, no, it it does.
It does, you know, and it it itall goes back when we talked
about our first car, we can talkabout you know the car, whatever
car we're we're at.
Um, but it does go back toseasons of life for sure.
SPEAKER_03 (21:28):
Yeah, and it's so funny because it's wherever you
because if it's your first car,if it's your car that you got
that uh when you were growingup, what was fun and you
remember, and um of course welove fox body my stains, and
that was that era of growing up,and then you know, Broncos and
(21:48):
all right, so we gotta saysomething here.
SPEAKER_00 (21:50):
So here we go.
Yeah.
All right, so if I gotta say oneof my favorite ones, I'll say a
favorite.
Uh unfortunately I don't have toever drive it.
Uh I have a 93 Till Cobra.
unknown (22:01):
Okay.
SPEAKER_00 (22:03):
My wife's never ridden in it.
But uh now Till Cobra that I'vehad for a while.
Yeah.
Um, yeah, I really like that carbecause it's the first year they
came out with a Cobra.
Uh-huh.
Uh they only year they producedit in that color.
Um yeah, it was really cool.
(22:23):
It kind of came to me toobecause the SVT team started
from the SVO team, and my firstcar was at 85 and a half Mustang
SVO.
Yeah.
And then SVO changed to SVTin '93.
Yep.
It's a cool car.
Yeah.
SPEAKER_03 (22:42):
I'd probably say my uh my You gotta tell them about
it.
Oh, absolutely.
My Mustang that I'd boughtwhenever I was 14.
And uh funniest story about, andeveryone's always like, hey,
how'd you and I love tellingthis, but uh, hey, what'd your
dad buy you or anything else?
Whenever it started, it said, hesaid, hey, I'll split with
whatever cost of you forwhatever your car, and your mind
(23:02):
goes way up, like, oh yeah, I'mgoing all out.
And then you're like, wait, Igotta come up with half of this
one.
I gotta find I gotta go cleansome more stalls.
Absolutely.
So bought it whenever I was 14,still have it.
SPEAKER_00 (23:13):
Uh, don't have for drive.
White fox body, what color theinterior?
Red, it's the white and redinterior.
SPEAKER_03 (23:20):
It is uh straight old school.
It's an 88 model.
So I bought it out of Texas, andI remember the only thing I
bought it off eBay, and Imessaged the guy and I said,
Hey, will it make the drive?
It was like that was part ofmessaging through eBay.
Will it make the drive fromTexas to up here?
It had under 100,000 miles atthe time.
And he's like, Oh, yeah.
So we got it, and the first timeI drove it, I had got my permit
(23:42):
and I made mom ride with me.
We went to a baseball game overin Oklahoma and drove it for the
first time.
I was like, Yeah.
SPEAKER_01 (23:50):
She was too pretty used to it by then.
SPEAKER_03 (23:52):
Yeah, absolutely.
She was like, Okay, all right,sounds good.
She asked Dad, okay, are we okayto drive this?
And he's like, Yeah, whatever.
I'm going to work.
SPEAKER_01 (24:04):
Don't call me if it breaks that.
Yeah, so um I've got uh myoriginal Fox body that bought as
well.
Um, I'll tell you this, becauseI was trying to think, okay,
what's I have a 09 Shelby GT500KR.
Now it's not my color schemebecause everything that I own is
red.
(24:24):
Yeah.
Right?
Um, it's become my favoritecolor.
Yeah.
Um, but this one's not.
It's silver with blue stripes.
Um, it's got uh less than athousand miles.
But the funny thing about it, soyes, I bought it.
Yes, I went and registered it,and the lady at DMV gave me a
hard time that I paid too muchfor it.
Uh and I was like, well, yeah,well, I sold it to myself.
(24:48):
Uh but I was getting plates forit, and the lady, they were
like, hey, do you want standardplates?
And I was like, you know what?
I was laughing thinking aboutMarino 911, right?
I was like, I would die for you.
So I got a vanity plate and Iwas like, hey, let me look this
up.
It's like uh I'm not gonna drivethis car, right?
It sits under a cover on a lift.
But uh, so I remember when thevanity plate came in and my wife
(25:09):
saw it, and so it says Shelby, SH B Y or something, and it says
KR, because it's a GT500 KR,very limited production.
It was a car built by Ford andthen sent to Shelby America.
Uh and my wife saw it, she'slike, Oh, that's so cool.
It's Shelby Kara.
It's like Shelby Kara.
(25:29):
I was like, uh huh, we can takethat to launch as long as it's
close.
I'm gonna keep it under athousand miles.
Like, no, it's Shelby KR.
Because I had a Shelby beforethat, and then we started having
kids, and I sold it, and thisone came and I was like, I gotta
buy one back, right?
I can do this now.
So yeah, so now you know aboutsome of our cars.
SPEAKER_00 (25:50):
Thank you, Eric.
Thanks, Eric.
I didn't look up to see whoasked this next question, but if
when y'all see it, you can callthem out.
All right, next question here.
Whew, y'all are really gettinginto it.
What's the most difficult partabout running a family business
together as brothers?
That came from a one writer.
(26:10):
Rider.
Ryder.
Okay, let me break this down foryou, writer.
Um That's very difficult.
Especially if you have notestablished that you need give
and take, and you've notestablished the difference
between personal or family, youcan put that in its own
category, and then business.
(26:31):
And if everybody's establishedthat and they know that you need
to have conversations that arebusiness and you need to have
conversations that are family,then you're gonna make it
through it.
And if everybody understandsthat, hey, we gotta make some
business decisions, and we mightnot all agree on this, and we're
gonna have to take one of ourideas and then support each
(26:53):
other on it, you're gonna beokay.
If you don't ever say that andyou don't ever go through it,
then it gets really messy.
And the farther you let it go ofnot saying, hey, this is
business, we gotta have abusiness conversation, that's
why so many family businessesfail.
And and that's why only threepercent of businesses have made
(27:16):
it to the fourth generation.
Now, I we make it work very welluh because we've seen my dad and
uncle and his cousin worktogether on this.
And we've seen I I think thebiggest takeaway, and then I
want to get y'all's takeawayhere, but the biggest takeaway
I've seen from them is no mattertheir position in the company,
(27:37):
who's over who, that they havegive and take.
And if somebody's reallypassionate about something, as
long as it lines up, they jumpin there and then they help
them.
Uh, but they have theconversation, hey, this is
business and we're gonna have tohave a tough conversation here.
It's not personal.
SPEAKER_01 (27:53):
Yeah, you know, I uh uh to go and build on that, it's
one of those things if it's likean understood respect and
authority.
And it's not by age, it's not byseniority, and it's not by
title.
Right?
It's out of respect because youwould want the same thing,
right?
So I don't think there's everbeen a conversation in the the
(28:15):
20 years that we've all workedtogether, even before that when
we worked with dad and we workedwith dad too, that it was ever
because I'm in charge of you.
Like because I I'm a manager ofyou, you know, and like it might
be like, hey, here's what Ithink we should do, but it was
never, no, I'm in charge of you,I'm superior to you, and you do
(28:39):
this because I tell you to therewas always a respect of like you
you have to give direction.
Sure.
Hey, I'm seeing this because I'mat a different level, and I mean
like you're in the trees, I'mout here, and I hey Taylor, we
need to adjust this, or heyShelby, you need to do this, or
hey Matt, you need to do that.
Or, man, generally it's how youapproach it.
And because we teach and preachthis stuff constantly, and most
(29:01):
of most of it's based off offailure, things we've learned,
then you just figured out to howto have that respect with each
other and say, hey, have welooked at this lately of how we
should do this?
And then one of us would belike, Yeah, I was realizing like
I fell short there.
Like, you know, that's an areathat I kind of had taken over,
and I like give me somefeedback, you know, what's going
(29:25):
on there.
But you know, we wouldn't make agood TV show in this aspect.
We don't have crazy drama.
SPEAKER_02 (29:31):
Yeah.
SPEAKER_01 (29:32):
We're just none of us are that high strong.
We're not MFing each other andslamming the door and peeling
out of the parking lot, youknow.
SPEAKER_00 (29:39):
And I think it's it it's it's too, it's not because
we're not competitive, it's notbecause we're not passionate.
But I think you hit on a greatpart there of just of respecting
that and understanding the longgame.
Now, have we ever come out of ameeting or a discussion
frustrated?
Yeah.
But it never got to the pointwhere we close the door and
we're just yelling and cutting.
(30:00):
Cussing at each other because,like, what was that gonna
accomplish?
And we we've all had discussionsin here with each other.
And we come around, we're like,son of a gun, that that they're
not seeing that, or that's justnot right.
We let those emotions calm down,and sometimes we'll circle back
around and talk about it.
Yeah, you know, because we wecan sense, you know, like, okay,
we weren't all on board there.
(30:21):
I was really passionate here.
We better like let that simmerfor a second, and then we'll
come back around.
Don't just like hope it fixesitself.
No, you know, but uh again,yeah, what what's the long game
here?
And it's for us to continue afamily business, support each
other, help it be wildlysuccessful, and then we're here
for our employees becausethey're the ones that are
(30:42):
generating it all.
You know what I mean?
So I think that's and a greatexample of this, and then
Taylor, we got to get yourthoughts here.
But I was thinking about thisthe other day.
A great example of this is ifyou look at the the name of our
business, it's Lewis Automotiveor Lewis Ford or or Lewis CDJR
or Lewis Farmington.
It's our family name.
(31:03):
We haven't split up in it'sShelby Lewis this, Taylor Lewis
this, Matt Lewis this.
You know, that that that'schecked to the side.
SPEAKER_01 (31:12):
It's funny you say that.
Uh there was a time that it waslike that.
SPEAKER_00 (31:16):
It it was even within our organization.
SPEAKER_01 (31:18):
Yeah, that it was Andy Lewis Springdale Ford.
Yeah, it was Tim Lewis Ford.
Yeah.
Uh I don't know if they everrenamed the CDGR for Tom.
But when I was doing research onold documents and I was going
through old newspapers, I foundthat.
And so I was like, Dad, what'swhat was the theory here, right?
Andy Lewis Springdale Ford stuckaround the longest.
And dad was like, I don't wantmy name up on the building.
(31:42):
This is a team.
Like we're doing this a team,and it's Lewis Automotive.
I'm not talking speaking offamily, Lewis.
I'm speaking of family ofeveryone who works here.
Yeah.
And that I think that's just hasbeen our we don't want the
spotlight.
We want it on all the peoplehere.
SPEAKER_00 (31:56):
We're proud of our family and what our family is,
no doubt.
But like together we're gonnawork on that.
And you see that some, and I'mnot calling anybody out, but you
see that some in some otherbusinesses, and then they got to
w add the word in there andsons.
But if you say, you know, if itwas Tim Lewis Automotive and
sons, like we would still beliving like under that umbrella,
you know?
SPEAKER_01 (32:16):
Yeah.
SPEAKER_00 (32:16):
Um, and and I know they got deeper on this one, but
this is one that, you know, isis very difficult to do.
And if you do it the right way,it's not that difficult, and
it's wildly successful becausejust think about it.
Oh yeah, we have three people inhere that have the same goal,
some some different paths to getthere, and different strengths.
We're all highly competitive.
This goes back just to Anthony'sconversation, too, about running
(32:39):
the race.
And if we can collectively worktogether, holy moly.
SPEAKER_03 (32:44):
Yep.
Absolutely.
Y'all hit all the the nails onthe head there, but what I love
about it, it's not hard at allbecause we've done what you've
talked about from the get-go.
I talked to multiple buddiesthat are outside of our market
area that are different indifferent professions, and they
have that knockdown, drag outfights.
(33:04):
And like, Taylor, what would youdo in this?
I said, Y'all've got to sit downand have the real deal
conversation, and it's just beeningrained in us, not to lay down
and not be competitive, but tosee strength, see weaknesses,
and work together.
It's really pretty easy for usto work as brothers.
There's no one else I wouldrather work with because you
(33:25):
have trust built into them thatyou never have to question
anything.
You know they're always gonna bethere.
And then it's a strength thatcan be able to help you all go
to new heights, but you have tohave the conversation or you
cannot run a family.
SPEAKER_00 (33:40):
I'm gonna this just hit me as you're talking, and
and I know we need to move on,but we don't.
Um I think one of the thingsthat's naturally, and and and I
gotta thank dad for this.
One of the things that naturallydevelops that is all of our
positions were earned, theyweren't given.
Correct.
And I I can tell you time andtime again when I was very
(34:03):
frustrated that I hadn't movedup quicker in positions.
You know, because I'm like, whatother accolades do you want?
What other records do you wantbroken?
And at the time I couldn't seeit.
unknown (34:15):
No.
SPEAKER_00 (34:15):
But if you look at now the positions we're in, it
didn't come overnight.
We didn't come out of college orout of, you know, this
certification and automaticallyget a manager job.
They were all earned.
So we know people are in theposition, and it's not just
like, well, son of a gun, Matt'sin this position because of who
he is, and and Taylor andShelby, and we just gotta figure
(34:37):
out how to deal with that.
SPEAKER_01 (34:38):
Yeah.
You just take that and throw itin the trash and and just you
know, you get what you uhdeserve and what you aren't.
Yeah, right?
That's all.
All right, next question.
What's the biggest hurdle intransitioning from traditional
advertising to social media thatcomes in from Chris?
SPEAKER_00 (34:56):
Okay.
Uh I'll jump here.
I think the biggest hurdle is isthere's a whole lot more
streams.
I think the the concept and andhere's what I try to tell people
that ask me about this, becauseI'm in a unique position.
You gotta remember when Istarted, we were newspaper.
We we we were, you know, insertsin the newspaper and just radio
(35:17):
and TV.
And now I'm in social media aswell.
You know, you guys are even moreversed in social media, but all
of them are just ways to connectwith customers and getting them
to either make a phone call,send a message in, or show up at
the dealership.
That that's all they are.
Now, the the biggest hurdle isin with traditional media, you
(35:39):
just had to cover radio, TV,okay, and newspaper.
Maybe throw a billboard in thereif you want to be complex.
There's four.
When I first started, you couldpretty easy guerrilla market all
of that.
Now with social media, you haveto be very strategic because you
have it coming from all thesedifferent sources and you could
way outspin your ad budget.
SPEAKER_01 (36:01):
And the how and the when changes so often.
Like, how do you, you know, in anewspaper, on radio, on TV, it
was generally the same styleformat.
Yeah.
Right?
It was just insert new copy.
Exactly.
Insert new copy, insert newcopy.
It's pretty easy.
Put the money behind it, knewthe area, knew the times, knew
how to buy the best uh time.
(36:23):
With social, it's like headspinning of like, okay, how do
we not blow the budget?
How do we make sure it'srelevant?
How to make sure it has sometype of ROI with a call to
action.
SPEAKER_00 (36:33):
Yeah.
So I think, you know, sometimesit gets out there, well, it's so
much more trackable, and it'sthis and it's that.
There's some great things aboutit, but it's way more complex.
Way more complex.
So that that that was a good onethere.
Um, what is one decision thatchanged the entire trajectory of
your business?
That's from Dom.
(36:54):
Wow.
SPEAKER_01 (36:56):
You know, I'll I'll take this.
Uh changed one trajectory of ourbusiness, right?
There's many fashions and itmoves constantly.
But I'll say when we s startedthis transition to construction,
because it happened before wemoved here to our new location.
Oh yeah.
You know, a year and a half ago,um, was we were now on a growth
(37:17):
pattern.
We could see farther down thetracks that if we move from nine
acres to twenty six acres, from45,000 square foot to 150,000
square foot, I don't know whatour total parking spaces were,
about 500 parking spaces to 1700parking spaces.
We knew we would have to hiremore to produce more.
(37:39):
And when we produced more, wewould have to sell more to be
able to keep this wheelspinning.
And so we knew it was a go froma business model of take care of
the customers we know, the localhometown, the doors open, come
on in, everybody knows yourname.
(38:00):
To we have to now go gunsblazing, blazing new paths,
finding new areas of people wehave not met.
And it was about vehicles andoperation.
Yep.
Vehicles and operation, and themore vehicles we could get in
operation.
So that like was a machine gun,very precise, sniper-like, but
machine gun of okay, how do wedo that?
(38:20):
Insert Lewis guarantee.
Why buy?
Move to the interstate, vehiclestorage tower out front, the big
car tower.
That was another thing to say,hey, the car display, the whole
way the whole thing lays out,the pickleball courts, the
basketball court, the gym.
So that was for employees andthat was for customers.
That was a trajectory ofchanging our entire business was
(38:43):
growth mode.
SPEAKER_02 (38:44):
Yeah.
SPEAKER_01 (38:44):
Like, okay, now we're gonna transition over and
it needs to look completelydifferent.
It needs to have the same feel,but completely different.
So this was not an okay.
We got to really accelerate.
SPEAKER_00 (38:57):
And I think that the you hit on it's such great, like
we're always gonna be able to goback to that if when we went
construction and we actuallymove, because we always wanted
to grow across town, but we putourselves in a position where we
had to.
And we had these big aspirationsand growth that we wanted to do
into all these buildings, andthen we built them.
(39:17):
Like, no, we we gotta make ithappen.
You have to make it happen.
Um, and and for sure, I'll saythat that decision of like when
that construction came up, youknow, you guys were were helping
in all the areas.
I took it on, and it forced meto give up the reins on some of
(39:38):
the other areas where Imicromanaged for too long
because I found success in itand it had some self-feeling
there.
But and the construction tooklonger than we thought.
So it created new habits on mypart that then really set up for
all these new systems andprocesses to actually be able to
(39:59):
grow the business.
SPEAKER_03 (40:00):
Yes.
SPEAKER_00 (40:01):
Yeah, that was really bad.
Yeah, for sure.
Man, that that's some good ones.
Do y'all see any other oneslisted out there we need to talk
about question-wise?
And if you're listening to this,we'll do it again because we we
love going over information thatyou guys want.
You know, we we really likeanswering questions that, and it
can be about us or it can beabout the business or what
(40:21):
you're struggling with or ideasyou have.
Shoot it over to us on social.
We're looking forward to doingmore episodes like this that are
a shorter format, and we'regetting into exactly what you
guys are looking at.
SPEAKER_01 (40:33):
All right, last question I found from Frankie.
How involved are you guys in therunning community?
I think that was the only one Ihave.
SPEAKER_00 (40:40):
Well, we spent 25 plus hours on Mount Kessler.
SPEAKER_01 (40:44):
Hey, let me tell you, let me give you the best.
Sorry, I didn't mean to cut youoff, but I'm gonna cut you off.
Yeah.
You do run.
Yeah.
Yeah, people don't think I do.
So we've always talked aboutthis.
Our style of advertising is notjust riding chase.
It's local community hands-on.
We just did the hero halfmarathon.
We love doing that because it'san aid station that we get to
(41:06):
see the runners twice.
Yeah.
And so we just bring thecommotion.
I I would argue, and I feel badbecause I've been part of the
board, that our aid station hasmore rally than the Start
Finite.
SPEAKER_00 (41:17):
I think our aid station has more rally than any
other athletic event you'd goto.
SPEAKER_01 (41:22):
It's just because we've been to a lot, we've seen
a lot, and we've learned frombig athletic events.
But we recently had, I laughedabout this.
SPEAKER_00 (41:30):
Okay.
SPEAKER_01 (41:30):
We recently had, because we are involved in the
running and biking community,someone reach out to us from
Beast of Bird and from ORC andwas like, hey, um, we want to
have our year-end event, but ournormal place is booked up and
we've checked a couple more.
And because anyone that comeshere, we say, Hey, have you been
here before?
Let's go on a tour.
We show all the they said thatconference room, is there any
(41:52):
possibility we could use it?
Say, yeah, absolutely.
Let's go.
SPEAKER_02 (41:54):
Yeah.
SPEAKER_01 (41:55):
And so we said, We'll put you on the schedule,
tell us what you need.
We've got audio, video, smoke,30,000 watts.
And they were just like, ohgosh, we just need room for
kids.
And I was like, Yeah, send mesome stuff, I'll make a
slideshow.
And they were just like, uh thefunny thing is, in their
presentation, they had asponsor, a pretty big sponsor
from another automotive dealer.
And so he was going through,hey, this year we've been able
(42:16):
to do this and this.
And one of the parcels, likethere was multiple different
divisions here, we had helpedout, and we're building a new
one.
Yeah.
But the main one, we'd just beenthere for support.
Sure.
It's not even a team that we'rea part of, but they were the one
that reached out to us throughthe grapevine.
And so they were like, hey, wewant to say thank you to Raising
King's Chicken.
(42:37):
We want to say thank you tothis, uh, it wasn't McClung, but
some type of civil engineering.
We want to say thank you toSuperior Automotive Group.
Yeah.
And everyone in there starteddying laughing.
SPEAKER_00 (42:47):
And he knew, like I knew he had to go over it.
And they're a good supporter oftheirs.
SPEAKER_01 (42:51):
Yeah.
But and no shade on superior byany means.
Like we all have our ownpockets, right?
And but he said that andeveryone started laughing.
So the difference of what wealways want to do is to be
hands-on.
Because we know people arewriting checks everywhere,
right?
SPEAKER_00 (43:07):
And it's, you know, there's that old saying of how
do you make somebody feel?
You know, and it's not just thecheck, but what was the
experience and how'd they feel?
And we, I don't know if we had150 or 160.
I don't know how many peoplewere down there last night, but
it was the biggest capacityever.
SPEAKER_01 (43:21):
We're gonna need the carpet machine put on.
SPEAKER_00 (43:22):
I know.
But but they all, and then sothen he circled back around and
he thanked us for doing that.
And it was a rowdy round ofapplause because it was how we
made them feel.
We made their kids feel special,the event, we were there, we
were helping them out.
You know.
SPEAKER_01 (43:37):
Yeah, and so that's that that's something we get to
be involved in.
SPEAKER_03 (43:40):
Well, and that's something you can't buy.
You can't buy.
Doesn't matter how big the checkis you write or anything else.
And we've seen it throughout theyears of us being frugal and
realizing this is what we cando, where we won't write as big
of a check because it doesn'tmake sense.
Yeah, we will make up tenfold inthe energy and the atmosphere
that we bring to an event.
SPEAKER_01 (44:01):
Yeah, at the Beast of Burden you were starting to
talk about, it was it was thewhole thing.
I mean, we had like threetransits full of speakers and
stuff and tents.
And so as many as we can beeffective at.
That's the key word there.
Effective at, we will be a partof locally because we love how
it builds locally.
Because teaming up with a lot ofthose places helped build the
(44:22):
running community, the trails,the divisions that you get to be
a part of, that we get to bepart of I think so.
SPEAKER_00 (44:27):
You know, and I had a lot of people ask me last
weekend, well, why didn't yourun the hero half?
Why didn't you do that?
And I would have loved to runthe hero half.
Yeah, but that's not what it wasabout.
It was about being there.
So you'll see a mix if it's abeast of burden or if it's at
hero half or if it's at hoghour, any of that stuff that
we're there supporting.
And then we'll pick our otherstuff that we go run.
But I'll say too, you know, it'sno different than this is a
(44:49):
season for we help a lot offundraisers in in most of the
cities uh with a shop with acop.
And and how do we make themfeel?
And you know, tonight we'll havethe big gala with with
Fayetteville, and we'll get totalk about that.
And one of the things, I'mfortunate enough, they allow me
to get up there and and talk,but that I'll talk about, we
love being a part of thisbecause not only does it make
(45:10):
sure that kids have presenceunder the tree every year, it
also forms a bond between locallaw enforcement and those kids.
You know, so we we love thosedifferent events.
And I know they were talkingabout running, but all those
events that to your point ofshowing up and being a part and
feeling in there going, man,those guys are a part of the
community.
SPEAKER_01 (45:30):
Yeah, and the cool thing, it allows those other
groups or other, like think of arun club that's just getting
going.
It allows them to have access tostuff that normally they
wouldn't have access to becausewe use it on the regular.
Sure.
Right?
We have all these tents and allthese speakers and all these
lights and all these generatorsand a uh a driving digital
(45:51):
billboard truck and vehicles andall these things that they
wouldn't have access to.
And we always offer for free 99and sometimes give money with
that, right?
And so then it allows them tohave that big event feel, that
big community feel.
Yeah.
Uh, and it makes us feel goodbecause we're able to help
somebody local.
SPEAKER_03 (46:12):
That's really good.
A lot of good questions todaythat we went over there.
Hey, always check us out, LewisSuperstore.com for the freshest
specials and all the contentthat we go over at Crossroads
Conversation Podcast dot com.
If you enjoyed this episode, besure to give it a like, share it
with your friends and family,and visit our website to send us
questions about what you wouldlike to know about the
(46:34):
automotive industry or familybusiness in general.
Who do you want to hear from?
Send them our way, and we'll doour best to answer any questions
that you have.
Thank you again, and we'll seeyou in future shows.
Popular Podcasts
Stuff You Should Know
If you've ever wanted to know about champagne, satanism, the Stonewall Uprising, chaos theory, LSD, El Nino, true crime and Rosa Parks, then look no further. Josh and Chuck have you covered.
My Favorite Murder with Karen Kilgariff and Georgia Hardstark
My Favorite Murder is a true crime comedy podcast hosted by Karen Kilgariff and Georgia Hardstark. Each week, Karen and Georgia share compelling true crimes and hometown stories from friends and listeners. Since MFM launched in January of 2016, Karen and Georgia have shared their lifelong interest in true crime and have covered stories of infamous serial killers like the Night Stalker, mysterious cold cases, captivating cults, incredible survivor stories and important events from history like the Tulsa race massacre of 1921. My Favorite Murder is part of the Exactly Right podcast network that provides a platform for bold, creative voices to bring to life provocative, entertaining and relatable stories for audiences everywhere. The Exactly Right roster of podcasts covers a variety of topics including historic true crime, comedic interviews and news, science, pop culture and more. Podcasts on the network include Buried Bones with Kate Winkler Dawson and Paul Holes, That's Messed Up: An SVU Podcast, This Podcast Will Kill You, Bananas and more.
Dateline NBC
Current and classic episodes, featuring compelling true-crime mysteries, powerful documentaries and in-depth investigations. Follow now to get the latest episodes of Dateline NBC completely free, or subscribe to Dateline Premium for ad-free listening and exclusive bonus content: DatelinePremium.com