Fury Motors, a 789 OLDCO Dealer, survived and is now opening a $5 Million Dealership

[XDCX]

There's no question that the vast majority of Chrysler's 789 OLDCO dealers have faced an uphill battle since their franchises were taken away in 2009.

This thread, however, is about one of the very few 789 OLDCO Dealers who won their arbitration case, was reinstated to NEWCO and now they're opening a renovated $5 Million facility for their Chrysler, Jeep, Dodge, Ram Dealership.

Here's the link to the news report on Fury Motors' new dealership - click here

The news report indicates the new CJDR Dealership is a remodel of one of the Hecker Dealerships that closed when Denny Hecker's empire collapsed. During the extensive remodel new lighting and heating equipment was installed which is expected to save the dealership $12,000 per month in utilities costs.

Not only is Auburn Hills getting a renovated $5 Million Dealership from the Dealer Principals they once kicked to the curb, Fury Motors is going to use their existing CJDR facility to open the first Ram Commercial Dealership in the nation.

Congratulation to the Dealer Principals Jim Leonard and his brother Tom - their success, in my opinion, proves that Chrysler's OLDCO selection process was flawed and a lot of great dealers lost their stores.

[mryan55]

This is good news -- just to see a long empty store get renovated and to see one of the 789 back in business!

[XDCX]

Originally Posted by mryan55

This is good news -- just to see a long empty store get renovated and to see one of the 789 back in business!

I agree - it's great to see some good news for one of the 789.

In the case of Fury Motors, however, they never went out of business. According to the report Fury Motors operated without a franchise for over a year after and then added the CJDR franchises back after winning arbitration in 2010.

It appears their business was so successful that they outgrew their facility and that was the motivation for opening the new location.

[57years]

Hoo-Rah! I just hope they weren't offered Fiat as an incentive....

[mryan55]

Originally Posted by 57years

Hoo-Rah! I just hope they weren't offered Fiat as an incentive....

Yes indeed.. Fiat is no incentive, at least if the Midwest BC has had similar experiences as the GLBC when it comes to Fiat.

A few GLBC stores have actually made their Fiat stores into wholesale parts operations with the Magnetti Marelli parts lineup. I guess some revenue is better than none!

[steve_biegler]

I just sold a '12 Harley to their motorcycle dealership in Minneapolis. Delivered it myself to see the store, just down from their Chrysler store. It was actually their old dealership before they moved. It was an old Hudson dealership and very cool. As a car lot you probably could only put about 20 cars on the lot, much less inventory back in the day. This was not the store that got cut, that one is in Lake Elmo Minnesota. Having 2 stores made it much easier to fight Chrysler financially I'm sure. I was hoping to have time to talk to one of the owners but being it was Saturday they were not at the store. To bad, I would have loved to be able to talk to them.

http://www.furymotorcycle.com/

[XDCX]

Originally Posted by steve_biegler

I just sold a '12 Harley to their motorcycle dealership in Minneapolis. Delivered it myself to see the store, just down from their Chrysler store. It was actually their old dealership before they moved. It was an old Hudson dealership and very cool. As a car lot you probably could only put about 20 cars on the lot, much less inventory back in the day. This was not the store that got cut, that one is in Lake Elmo Minnesota. Having 2 stores made it much easier to fight Chrysler financially I'm sure. I was hoping to have time to talk to one of the owners but being it was Saturday they were not at the store. To bad, I would have loved to be able to talk to them.

Thanks for the information - I wasn't aware that Fury had two stores - one that made it to NEWCO and one that got dumped to OLDCO and had to fight to get reinstated to NEWCO.

I totally agree that it would have been much easier to fight with Chrysler to get the OLDCO store reinstated since they already had a NEWCO store.

Too bad the Dealer Principals were not around when you dropped by the store - they sound like great people who were willing to fight for what they thought was right. I bet you would have had a great conversation with them.