Bay Area dealerships do more with less

Ayman Moussa is doing more with less.

The co-owner of Carnamic in Hayward, Calif., leverages technology and a lean organizational structure to operate his eight Bay Area stores with about half the employees of a typical dealership.

The group, which has Nissan, Infiniti, Mitsubishi, Hyundai and Kia stores, sold 4,286 new and used vehicles last year.

Carnamic stores have six salespeople vs. the 12 found on a typical sales floor, said Moussa, who launched the company with his brother Chadi more than a decade ago.

The salespeople are product specialists tasked with walking potential customers through the vehicle, answering questions and conducting test drives. The product specialists are not involved with making the sale.

That’s the responsibility of the store’s two sales managers, who also handle arranging financing and selling aftermarket products.

“Our sales managers control the entire sales process,” Moussa said. “We’ve removed four layers of management per store — including the F&I manager, closers, general sales manager and general manager.”

This lean organization allows Carnamic to operate each dealership with about 20 employees across sales and service functions.

“The average work force in a store similar to what we do is about 40,” Moussa said.

Product pricing and inventory ordering — typically done at store level by the general sales manager — are centrally managed at Carnamic headquarters.

Moussa said that the streamlined organizational structure benefits the dealership, its employees and customers.

“Our payroll expense is about half the average dealership,” he said. “So that means higher profitability.”

Moussa said the average return on investment per Carnamic store is about 9.5 percent — more than double that of a typical dealership in the Bay Area.

And unlike a typical dealership, where the shopper is shuffled from one department to another, Carnamic buyers have just two touch points — the product specialist and the sales manager.

“You have fewer people touching the deal, shorter turnaround time and less pressure,” Moussa said. “That results in a better customer experience.”

Carnamic’s fixed-price business model also reduces the time shoppers spend at the dealership haggling over the deal.

Moussa said the average time a car shopper spends at a Carnamic store is about 90 minutes, which includes the test drive.

“We are a true one-price store for new and used vehicles — literally, we would not move $5 off the price,” he said. “That cuts down on an hour of back-and-forth.”

The business model has lifted customer satisfaction and loyalty. “About 50 percent of our sales are repeat business,” Moussa said.

Carnamic’s organizational model requires a unique labor skill set.

Moussa said that he seeks self-starters willing to roll up their sleeves and work across functions.

“You have to be prepared to wear more than one hat,” Moussa tells recruits. “So don’t limit yourself to the job description.”

Hiring for sales manager roles is challenging because the job requirements are far broader than at a typical dealership.

“If we recruited a general sales manager from another dealership and made them sales manager, they might consider it as going backward based on job title,” Moussa said. But in reality, they have more duties, they have more control over the deal, and they make more money.

To offset that, Carnamic promotes from within and looks outside the traditional auto retail industry, supplementing it with on-the-job training.

“Most of our product specialists have never sold cars before,” Moussa said. “We like people who’ve worked at Nordstrom or have sold life insurance.”