PERSONA Life In A Two-Wheel Fastlane The owner of Monterey Peninsula Sports Center, John Rossi, began his motorcycle sales and service business out of a Seaside basement after taking over a tiny dealership that had become a failing enterprise for the reason that it lacked coherent business operations and processes. The owner had been simply flying by the seat of his pants, selling bikes as a cigar shop operation, and ignoring unnecessary business frills such as accounting and inventory management. Summer 2008

DON HUNTINGTON AND ANDREA STUART

Completing his baccalaureate degree in Economics from the University of Colorado, John was looking to put into practice all the lessons that he had learned from his course studies.

Meanwhile, John’s dad was in a period of transition, having sold a profitable business and gone into retirement. However, Dad was not the kind of person to get hooked on Daytime TV or shuffleboard. He was seeking new worlds to conquer.

Getting Down to Business
Neither man were knowledgeable about selling motorcycles when they began selling Yamaha and Suzuki motorcycles — the two product lines that the original owner had been selling.

John discovered that the general dishevelment of the operation made the challenge greater than he expected. He felt like someone who had been thrown into a strange room with the lights, only discovering things by stumbling into them.

Fortunately, John wasn’t forced to learn everything this way. The single most important decision he made was becoming part of the Retail Powersports Management Group where people with a wealth of industry experience began to guide and educate him about such things as quality guidelines and standards.

Retail Powersports Management Group only permits top performers to join the group — dealers who indicate that they will make a contribution to the project. Limited to 20 members, the group represents various size dealerships across the country. The network is a true example of symbiosis because everyone supports one another with advice, warnings, and helpful marketing ideas.

Every month the members submit financials to one another and meet quarterly via conference call to share new ideas and information about industry trends. Each member submits a brand new idea and John then creates an implementation list of ideas to incorporate into his business.

For example, John’s service department has four technicians, all with varying degrees of knowledge and experience. One idea was to create a lane called Gravy Work — repairs that can be done easily.

Repairs are less efficient if you mix gravy with heavy work. Assigning different people to each technical level of service creates a much smoother flow of repairs. The Gravy Work Lane results in quicker turn-around because a leaking gas cap can’t get backed up behind a transmission overhaul that might take three days.

John and his father diagnosed the business structure and learned that the motorcycle industry has four profit centers including Sales, Parts & Accessories, Service, and Finance and Insurance. They dissected each department, spending more than two years bringing each department up to high quality and efficiency standards.

When the business finally reached a stable operational point they still weren’t making wheelbarrows full of money, but they weren’t in the red anymore.
One way to get on the inside track for area motorcycle sales is by incorporating diversity. The Rossis formed a relationship with an Italian company called Aprilia, and received phenomenal sales action out of their products.

They purchased a second local underperforming dealership and overnight found themselves in the business of selling and servicing Ducati, Honda, and Kawasaki motorcycles. Able to apply their business model to the new company’s business challenges, the acquisition presented them with opportunities for synergy. They hired nearly all of the employees that had worked at the newly purchased company and moved both businesses into a single location, merging departments, and achieving economies of scale. To John’s knowledge, they now carry more products and product lines than any other dealership.

Selling an Experience
The competitive industry of motorcycle sales is steeped with game theory. Success requires both developing good strategies and tactics.

They must sell more than motorcycles, they must sell their store, their service department, their parts department, even themselves…

People who buy John’s motorcycles buy into the dealership and become like family. Bringing your motorcycle in for repairs entitles you to an introduction to the technician who will be working on your bike.

Continual change is their only constant. Nobody in this business ever outgrows the need to learn and improve. Dealerships must keep adapting just to stay even. It’s a different business now than it was five years ago.

They’re not selling your grandfather’s motorcycles, or even your older brother’s. Technology itself is always moving forward. Advance is relentless because the industry is continually reinventing itself. Every year their plants, systems, materials, and designs raise the technology bar; thus, marketing and sales programs must evolve every year.

John had to learn to focus upon customer experiences more than any practical consideration. John learned to capture customers’ energy, to sell them dreams and visions.

At Monterey Peninsula Sports Center, the dealership is big, but it has heart. They will never succumb to the temptation of becoming big box retail. They remember who their customers are; they remember the names of their regulars.

Instituting a practice called Customer Relationship Management, they keep in contact with their customers, following up with and taking care of them. John and his staff continue in various ways to develop relationships that were formed at the time of purchase.

Monterey Peninsula Sports Center has actually become some customer’s Third Place where they can drink coffee, share experiences, and engage in some “bench racing.” John feels it’s a privilege to share in other people’s enthusiasms. Talking shop with these guys is a pleasant part of the business, which is partly why they sponsor special events called Bike Nights, complete with BBQ, a band, and shop talk.

John’s customers actually represent a wide demographic range from younger sport bike enthusiasts to more mature cruiser devotees. In light of the current gas crisis, Peninsula residents are also starting to get the idea of commute bikes. A Vespa scooter might get 70 miles per gallon while some of the smaller scooters might get 110 miles per gallon. Some people who have never been motorcyclists are throwing off the shackles of the Ford and GMC psychology.

On to the Future
Monterey Peninsula Sports Center is in a good place but the fact remains that a business like this demands constant attention. They’re always thinking about what’s ahead and are moving into an exciting and undifferentiated future. One of John’s heroes, Wayne Huizenga, began with a single garbage truck and grew his Waste Management service into the country’s largest waste disposal company, and leveraged the company in founding three Fortune 500 companies.

Following Huizenga’s business model, John plans to acquire other underperforming dealerships, make them profitable, and then sell them, leveraging profits for ever-more-ambitious acquisitions.

John is an ambitious 20-something-year-old who has found it tough to be as young as he is and lead such a sizable company — managing people who are, in some cases, three times his age. He has hidden his age, even grew a mustache and a beard to look older.

Fast forward six years to today and John’s dad is pleased with the results of his investment. Present during the struggles and challenges, Dad is now retired, but John consults with him. John never imagined while growing up that he would have such a phenomenal relationship with his father.

John doesn’t have much personal time but manages to get away to Laguna Seca on some days. He gets on his 170 HP Ducati 1098 Superbike and on one of the straight-aways, when he’s hitting 140 MPH, caught up in the grace of the experience; he understands what ballet must be like.

It’s these times especially that John’s one with the experience and becomes brother with their customers. He’s with them and shares in their passion for the power and freedom that motorcycles provide. °

To learn more about John and his Monterey Peninsula Sports Center go to www.sports-center.com, call 888-286-4890, email him at sales@montereypotheyrsports.com, or visit him at 1020 Auto Center Parkway Seaside.