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Ray Ciccolo has witnessed a lot of change in the car business. After 45 years – and if you know Ray it is safe to say that he’ll be around at least 45 more – just about everything is different. When he started out in 1963, Volvos were curiosities, Honda was known for its motorcycles, Hyundais didn’t exist, and Cadillacs bore white walls and tail fins. Dealerships were closed on the weekends, the car buying process took months instead of minutes, and all cars ran on gas.
Fast forward to 2008. The marketplace has been flooded with an overabundance of choices, due to the unending proliferation of makes and models. Dealerships and service stations have popped up on seemingly every street corner. The Internet has provided consumers with an abundance of tools and information, as well as opened huge opportunities for savvy dealers to expand their reach in the market. Today the industry is faster-moving and more competitive than at any point in its history.
But if you ask Ray why he has succeeded despite the changing landscape, his reason is one you won’t read about in case studies or in the latest business guru’s tome. It instead is a simple tenet that defines Ray’s life: family.
“I know that the whole ‘family’ theme can sound pretty contrived in these jaded times,” explains Ray, “with seemingly every dealership telling you how warm and fuzzy they are and how they’ll treat you like you just arrived for Thanksgiving dinner. But when you look at our Group, family IS the main reason why we have achieved so much. When I scraped up enough money from the sale of my first business – before cars I was a Laundromat baron – to buy Gene Brown Rambler/Volvo when I was 25, I didn’t know very much. But what I did know is that I needed to create an atmosphere where people loved to come to work. If I could create a family environment, then my employees would pass that on to the customer, and I would have a good shot to be a success.”
Forty-plus years later, the achievements of the Village Automotive Group are myriad. Boston Volvo Village – the flagship store – is one of the nation’s premiere Volvo dealers, as well as the largest in New England and one of the 10 largest in America. Cadillac and HUMMER Village of Norwood not only is the largest dealer of its kind in New England, but also the oldest. Charles River Saab in Watertown is the oldest Saab dealership in America and the largest in New England. Honda Village is the fastest growing Honda dealer in New England. And our newest locations – Nissan Village of North Attleboro, Hyundai Village of Danvers, and Saab of Norwood – are fast becoming the largest dealerships in their trading areas. All of the locations are renown for their customer service skills, each has top notch Service and Parts Departments, and all are recipients of numerous industry awards, including such prestigious honors as the Cadillac Master Dealer Award, Volvo’s Presidents Club, and Honda’s President’s Award.
Spend a day with Ray – if you can keep up – and you can see he practices what he preaches. He is constantly on the move, visiting with his employees, many of whom measure their tenure with Village Automotive in decades, not months (as is the norm in automobile retailing). And unlike a lot of owners, Ray loves to be out on the sales floor, talking to his customers, making them feel welcome, addressing any problems that arise. “For me, I still get a rush being on the sales floor during a big sale, with the hustle and bustle, the popcorn popping, all that activity,” says Ray. “I grew up on a side street in Cambridge, with family and friends and neighbors coming and going at all hours of the day. For me, being with people in a festive, friendly showroom is like being home!”
Beyond creating a family-atmosphere, family also holds another meaning for the Group. You’ll find the next generation of family involved in the business, with Ray’s daughter Christine running the Honda Village store, and sons-in-law Tony and Phil running the Sales and the Marketing Departments respectively.
But with all of the success and accolades, it all boils down to that recurring theme of family, according to Ray. “Sure we have a great reputation and people know that our stores are leaders, so they come and see us. But people ultimately didn’t start choosing to do business with us because we are the largest this, or the least expensive that. They come to us because we treat them like we would like to be treated, and we listen. Sure we do some dumb things sometimes – after all we are human - but accountability has a face here. You have a complaint, you can come to me and it gets solved. That is something you’ll never experience at any of those giant dealerships. I take great pride in the fact that while much has changed in this business, we haven’t lost sight of the fact that treating people with respect defines us.”
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