Greg Carrasco takes leap of faith to become dealer owner

December 4, 2024

There’s something happening at Direct Nissan in Mississauga now that Greg Carrasco has joined the dealership as managing partner. 

Carrasco, known for his catchphrase “there’s something happening here” in his radio commercials that air on prominent Toronto, Ont., stations, has been in the business for more than 30 years and has become an owner for the first time. 

The 53-year-old, who had worked for more than five years as Vice President of Operations/General Manager of Oakville Nissan and Oakville Infiniti, began thinking a year ago about leaving the car business because he and a partner co-own several thriving martial arts studios, OCTA BJJ.

His plan changed recently when he and Dave Raymond, President of Direct Nissan, had lunch with a mutual friend a month ago. Raymond and Carrasco knew one another because of their Nissan connection, but in that one meeting they developed a connection because of mutual interests, some related to history, politics, and a business philosophy of how to treat customers.

Following some more meetings, Raymond, who is also President of Erinwood Ford and has been in the automotive business 35 years, offered Carrasco a chance to become managing partner. Raymond told Canadian auto dealer, though he wasn’t actively looking for one. 

When Carrasco publicized his job switch, it created a flood of congratulatory comments on social media from industry people, customers, and people who listen to his weekly radio show. “I’m humbled by this because you forget sometimes how many people watch from afar. I don’t have a lot of friends — I have a circle of four friends — but a lot of people know me.”

Carrasco said he discovered a “level of humanity and humility” in Raymond that was foreign to him in a dealer principal, and that’s why he accepted the offer to put “some skin in the game.” He had steadfastly refused in the past when presented with similar opportunities.

“There was an incredible amount of synergy with him that I had never felt before, and if this person is what he appears to be to me right now I would have considered becoming a dealer principal way before,” said Carrasco. “I felt if I was going to align myself to something or someone, maybe this was the right time. The more I get to know Dave, the more I understand him.”

Raymond said he wasn’t looking for a managing partner, but that changed after several meetings and their mutual interests, combined with Carrasco having a huge following. 

“I know he’s good, and when you meet somebody that good, you’ve got to do it,” said Raymond. “He’s a gut guy and I’m a gut guy, and the two guts connected in terms of ‘I really like this guy’ and he saw something in me. He’s an impressive guy, for sure, when you meet him. He can draw a lot of customers in, which is what he does. There’s some really good guts to the store. It just needs somebody with Nissan expertise, and where can you find a guy with 100,000 followers? There aren’t any. I think it’s an opportunity for me to learn a lot.”

Carrasco said sticking with the Nissan brand was paramount because loyalty means too much to him. He began in the business as a salesman at Dixie Nissan after he had come from his native Chile in 1989 and was broke, unemployed, and could barely speak (English). He worked for the company for 20 years, the last 10 years as general manager.

Carrasco said things happen when they are supposed to and anything that you force is not sustainable.

“I never wanted to force this,” said Carrasco. “After 30 years in the car industry, you learn a thing or two about human nature. You start trusting your intuition a little bit more, so when the opportunity came I couldn’t pass it up. The universe wasn’t talking to me, it was screaming at me.” 

He said “with all due respect” to the people he’s worked with over the years, there was a specific type of personality that you need to have in order to run a store. “It was never aligned with who I was because I don’t build companies, I build families,” said Carrasco. “These people are not colleagues, they become almost like relatives.” 

Carrasco also said another factor is that his life is changing. After “taking a break from church for about 30 years” and becoming a “devoted atheist,” he said he began contemplating life differently for a while and returned to church. He is also about to become a father again with his second wife, as he has three children from his first marriage. He said becoming a managing partner is a “come to Jesus moment” in every aspect of his life. 

“Personally, professionally, spiritually, it’s like everything has just come together for me and I’m not fighting it anymore,” said Carrasco. “It’s like I allowed this to take place. I’m accepting that I have been called to do something. If you have a good partner you can accomplish remarkable things. I think my time of service has come. The statement is pretty straightforward. I think the name of the store reflects my approach to life and the business. You just be direct about it. There’s no beating around the bush. Just be honest and tell the truth, do no harm, look after your customers.”

“I think the simplicity of the process is going to blow people’s minds away. It’s simple to be successful in the car business, but what’s really, really difficult is to be simple. People complicate their minds too much. After so many years of being a student of the industry, I have come to some conclusions I’m going to validate here. I’m putting my money where my mouth is. I’ve always had a reckless, almost irresponsible belief in my ability to do something special, so I’m betting on it and I will always bet on myself. If you think I was annoying before, now you’re going to want to multiply that by a hundred because there is a different purpose behind it.”

Raymond bought Direct Nissan three years ago. Before that Carrasco said he had been eyeing the dealership for some time before that and had been aggressively asking the group that owned Oakville Nissan and Oakville Infiniti to buy it.

“I thought this was a diamond in the rough,” said Carrasco. “Mississauga has been underserved for a very, very long time, but that will no longer be the case. There are more people living here than just about anywhere in the entire country. From my perspective the era of enormous car dealerships is gone, it’s done. In fact, if you want to ensure your failure you build a giant store. I saw it, I tasted it firsthand. I figured this is a little, tiny place, you don’t need a lot of people to run it.”

Carrasco has the number 47 on the window outside his office, inside on his whiteboard, and throughout the dealership. He said the number is the dealership’s overall rating of all the 70-plus Nissan stores in Ontario. He plans to make it number one in three years, because he believes his reputation will literally drive traffic to the dealership. He said he plans to make a tattoo of the number to go along with the numerous tattoos he has on his body.

“The last time I ran a Nissan store in Mississauga, I made it the biggest one in the country. I expect to do the same,” said Carrasco. “I’m going to use all the accumulative knowledge and experience in customer service and dealer operations and humanity. I’m going to laser focus all of that into this tiny little place and make it the biggest turnaround store in the country for a Nissan store. If people only knew how safe it is to buy a car from me, no one would ever go anywhere to buy a car. But they don’t because they don’t know me.

“We’re going to introduce a lot of new things here. We’re going to introduce all the lessons I’ve learned in 30 years and give the customer something special. It should be special. It will be awesome.”

Related Articles
Share via
Copy link