L r
D
apN'eCDM4
Key To Success
Those loyalty cards on your key chain? Make room for more.
HARRY KIRSBAUM
Staff Writer
A
tidy Wolfe has grown out of the upstart
business model of working in a home-
office, holding sales meetings in a restau-
rant and contacting staff though e-mails.
Dealer Concepts, the company he founded four
years ago, now merits its own office in Bloomfield
Hills.
Wolfe's concept is one of those "Why didn't I
think of that?" ventures, he said.
As the former co-founder and vice president of
Stoneage.com , an automotive marketing Web site,
Wolfe said he kept hearing car dealers talking
about ways to get their customers back to service
their cars.
At the same time, his wife kept coming home
every month with another card attached to her
key chain: first a Kroger . card, then one from the
Detroit Zoo.
"Everyone was putting offers on my keys," he
said. "One day I was thinking, 'Now we use our
key chains to hold our loyalties. If Kroger's put-
ting something on my key chain, why isn't my car
dealership?'
"It gives the dealership the opportunity to say,
`Here are the keys to your new car. Enjoy the car,
and, by the way, we want you to come back, so
here's a loyalty card."
The loyalty card can give discounts or offer free
Joel H. Kaufman
services as a way of retaining customers — some-
thing the dealers have ignored until recent years.
According to the national average, dealerships
lose 80 percent of their customers after a purchase
— and they're starting to realize it, he said.
"Jiffy Lube, which has 2,200 locations around
the country, would never be
in business today if car deal-
erships 30 years ago would
have serviced their customer
properly," he said. "We're try-
ing to be on the cutting edge
of that."
Four years ago, he went
door to door with the idea
and found most of the stores
using just a plain key chain
with a dealership emblem
that cost 45 cents apiece,
Wolfe said. "For the same
amount of money, we can
give you something that will
bring the customer back to
the dealership," he told them.
Four years later — and
after numerous trade shows
and dealer referrals — Dealer
Concepts has 1,200 cus-
tomers across the country,
and prints up 400,000-
Andy Wolfe
550,000 cards a month.
Wolfe has four salespersons and a few support
staff people. "The foundation's in place," he said.
"We're actively trying to find more people. We'd
like to get this up to 30 or 40 people."
There's been no need for an office the last four
years he said. "Why spend money on an office?
No one calls on us," he said.
Weekly meetings were set at
8:30 every Monday morning at
the Orchard Grill in Bloomfield
Hills — same tables, same wait-
person.
But he will soon move to an
office in Bloomfield Hills, and
he said the sales should double.
Wolfe can be reached at (248)
763-0870.
"We want to eventually take
the idea to the fast food busi-
ness, key cards for Blimpie's or
Subway, dry cleaners, spas and
hair salons, he said. "But now,
we're focused on the car busi-
ness for a while." ❑
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