Canadian auto dealer reached out to several dealers across the country to better understand how they are adapting to the current situation amid the novel coronavirus pandemic.
Never having been faced with anything like this, car dealers across the country are adapting and innovating on the fly. The situation in March and early April was so fluid that the picture was changing on a daily or even hourly basis.
Canadian auto dealer reached out to a number of dealers to get a sense of how they were operating.
Towards the end of March, we caught up with Alberta dealer Perry Itzcovitch who was at his Mercedes-Benz Downtown Calgary store with a downsized staff and more time on his hands than he was used to, due to newly reduced hours of operation.
By then, COVID-19 had just about reached every province in the country and many dealers were feeling the impact in ways they could never have imagined. At the time, Itzcovitch said everyone was still adjusting to the change in conditions.
“When you are used to working on a monthly or quarterly or annual target, you are now working day-to-day. Your targets are based week-to-week, and no one is looking at the long-term. There are too many unforeseen issues popping up,” said Itzcovitch. “We are basically doing whatever we can in our service and parts department to take care of whatever needs the customer has, but at a much reduced amount.”
With Mercedes-Benz Downtown Calgary located downtown, Itzcovitch said there were few people walking in. And for the ones that did come in and request a shuttle, it was usually to return directly to their home. But that is not the only change the store is dealing with. Itzcovitch said they are also limiting who comes into the dealership by volume, and trying to keep the remaining staff calm.
Elsewhere in Canada, some dealerships had already closed. Canadian auto dealer connected with Susan Gubasta, President and CEO of Mississauga Toyota in Ontario in early April, to discover that the dealership was closed with the exception of emergency services. The team was preparing for when they would re-open.
“We have redone all of our processes in terms of how we will be servicing our guests, and minimizing the actual amount of actual contact we have with them so we can drop the vehicles outside, arrange rides for them, and everything will be by appointment,” said Gubasta. “One of the things that we have decided to say to guests, is that regardless of your service, we either need your car for half a day or a full day, because we don’t want people waiting in the customer lounge.”
Gubasta said they made a lot of changes while the dealership was closed, in terms of how they were going to service customers moving forward and the logistics of the physical distancing in the building. She said management arrived at the dealership to move things around to respect the physical distancing measures once they open their doors for business again.
“We’ve also figured out the full process now for buying vehicles online…and sanitizing,” said Gubasta. “Every time a customer goes in and out of a car we have to re-sanitize — and we will actually relabel the cars to say this vehicle has been sanitized, and it’s locked until the next guest wants to take a look at it.”
In Manitoba, some dealers are feeling grateful to be among the last provinces affected by the COVID-19 crisis as this provided them with more time to prepare.
“We had a chance to see what other people are doing across the country, and what they are doing in other countries,” said Steve Chipman, President and CEO at Birchwood Automotive Group.
Chipman was also lucky to have implemented a program years ago that includes contact-less delivery.
“We’ve had this Buy From Home program for several years now on used cars, and we’ve been trying to integrate it into a new car program. We’re close, and I wish I had about another three months and I think that would be a much better position, but we’ve used that,” said Chipman.
Disinfecting various areas such as work spaces and frequently touched surfaces are required at least four times a day.
The program has four steps: consumers visit the dealership websites and select the vehicle they are interested in; they select the “Buy From Home” option on a vehicle specific page; and once they complete part of, or all of the process — within 24 hours, the dealership will provide a free contact-less delivery of the vehicle for a 24-hour test drive. The fourth step involves assistance in helping the customer to complete the entire car-purchasing process online, from the comfort of their home.
It’s a useful offer, considering Chipman had shut down the showroom and left the service department open with half the regular staff. He said service advisors were meeting customers outside to greet them, rather than inside the dealership. And that they had shut down the shuttle van service, so customers were being picked up by a family member.
“There’s going to be opportunities coming out of this,” said Chipman. “I think the car business, in due course, I think there is going to be people who aren’t going to want to use public transit. So there’s an opportunity there.”
In Quebec, April 15 marked the first day that dealers in the province could gradually begin to re-open their dealership parts and service departments to offer repair and maintenance work on vehicles.
It’s a big win for those dealers who, due to the provincial government’s tight restrictions, had dealerships going mostly, if not completely dark for a period of time — with the exception of emergency service needs. But all that changed after the Easter holiday.
La Corporation des concessionnaires automobiles du Québec (CCAQ), which represents 890 dealerships (about 99 per cent of the dealerships in Quebec), decided to take action when Quebec premier François Legault suggested in a press conference that some businesses could gradually re-open.
“Of the 40,000 permanent (dealership) employees in Quebec, the reality is that there were probably something like 35,000 that were unemployed. So there were only a few left in Quebec to respond to emergency service needs,” said Robert Poëti, President and CEO of the CCAQ. “So we were proactive and we worked on a protocol — a strict protocol that is first and foremost about the health and safety of the customers, employees, and obviously the owners themselves.”
Poëti said they created a group of specialists from human resources, people that specialize in exceptional emergency health situations, and other areas, and prepared a “contactless protocol” that was then presented to the provincial government.
“We said, if ever there is a possibility that this will be accepted, we are ready to apply this protocol,” said Poëti. “They received it, they studied it, and then said that the protocol responded perfectly to what they wanted. We also drew a lot of inspiration and reference from the National Public Health Institute of Quebec.”
The COVID-19 Progressive Recovery Protocol is indeed well-defined, and extensively covers what dealers need to do in various departments in terms of hygiene and cleaning for reception and shipping, for technicians, mechanics and technical advisors, waiting rooms, rental cars, and cleaning of the vehicle’s cockpit after work or use.
Disinfecting various areas such as work spaces and frequently touched surfaces are required at least four times a day for example, and after each shift for the auto mechanic/technician’s workshop.
Dealers also need to install certain things such as a machine/distributor of hydro-alcoholic solution at the entrance and exit of the garage, among other places — and labels and posters with important information/reminders.
The protocol also includes what employees need to do during breaks and meals, along with the actions they need to take from the moment they leave their home and arrive at the dealership.
For example, upon arriving at the dealerships (which must be decontaminated), they must wash their hands, make their way to the changing room, and change into clean work clothes provided by the employer. Another round of hand-washing is also necessary after this, and they must immediately drop off their lunch in the dining area before starting the day.
“We fully complied with government directives, which surely did no harm when the decision was made after we filed our protocol,” said Poëti.
These are only a few of the stories, but they present a picture of how car dealers have had to adapt to the rules of their province, and the business reality they face.
For more updates and information on COVID-19 and to find interviews, white papers, resource guides and links to other helpful tools for dealers, visit our resource page: https://canadianautodealer.ca/covid-19-support-for-dealers/
