Lithia Motors

Public retail groups: 'We're fighting tooth and nail' for margins

12:01 am U.S. ET | May 6, 2013
Profit margins on new vehicles are slipping for the nation's largest dealership groups as manufacturers and retailers slug it out for market share. New-car margins dropped for all the public dealership groups during the first quarter of 2013.... Read More »

 

Dealership groups expected to post first-quarter gains

4:29 pm U.S. ET | April 22, 2013
Dealership groups that announce their first-quarter earnings over the next two weeks should see continued growth as new- and used-car sales outperform 2012 levels, analysts say. Asbury Automotive Group, Sonic Automotive and Lithia Motors release their quarterly reports this week. Penske Automotive Group and Group 1 Automotive report next week.... Read More »

 

FINANCE & INSURANCE

Service lane focus lifts Lithia's F&I sales

12:01 am U.S. ET | April 8, 2013
New software and a boost in spiffs have made it easy -- and lucrative -- for Lithia Motors Inc.'s service advisers to sell extended service contracts and lifetime oil change plans.... Read More »

 

FIXED OPERATIONS

Lithia tests 2 service dept. apps

12:01 am U.S. ET | April 1, 2013
Lithia Motors Inc. is testing two apps for the service department: one that shows customers if their vehicle needs service and another aimed at streamlining communication with customers.... Read More »

 

FINANCE & INSURANCE

Dealers urged to replace loan reserve profit

12:01 am U.S. ET | March 11, 2013
Auto dealers are saying it's urgent to sell more F&I products, such as extended-service contracts, now that the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau seems ready to put stricter limits on how much dealers can earn on customer interest rates, also known as the dealer reserve.... Read More »

 

Public groups plan U.S. acquisition blitz

12:01 am U.S. ET | Feb. 25, 2013
Despite forays into overseas markets by Group 1 Automotive Inc. and Penske Automotive Group, public retailers intend to roll full speed ahead on U.S. acquisitions this year.... Read More »

 

Lithia reports big earnings, outlines aggressive growth plans

10:33 am U.S. ET | Feb. 20, 2013
Lithia Motors executives said today that they expect the dealership group to increase annual revenue by 10 to 15 percent in coming years through dealership acquisitions. To reach that goal, they said, Lithia will have to look beyond its traditional western U.S. base for acquisition targets.... Read More »

 

Lithia goal: Add dealerships, boost revenue

12:01 am U.S. ET | Feb. 18, 2013
Lithia Motors Inc. says it will grow in size and revenue this year.... Read More »

 

Lithia sweeps Shareholder Value retailer awards

12:01 am U.S. ET | Feb. 8, 2013
Lithia Motors Inc. again swept the retailer category in the annual Global Automotive Share-holder Value Awards in January. Lithia Motors' return to shareholders topped that of all public auto dealership groups in two time-frame categories. Lithia returned 74 percent in 2012 and almost quintupled over three years, according to the Shareholder Value Index developed jointly by Automotive News and PwC.... Read More »

 

Lithia expects more market share

12:01 am U.S. ET | Jan. 28, 2013
Lithia Motors Inc. expects its 2013 total revenue from sales of new and used vehicles as well as fixed operations to grow this year.... Read More »

 

Penske, Group 1, Lithia shares rise to records after analyst report

4:55 pm U.S. ET | Jan. 23, 2013
Penske Automotive Group, Group 1 Automotive, and Lithia Motors reached record prices after a KeyBanc Capital Markets report about the auto retailers cited a "confident" outlook on vehicle sales in the United States. Penske gained 4.2 percent to $32.32 at the close in New York, the highest since its 1996 initial public offering.... Read More »

 

2013 AUTOMOTIVE NEWS WORLD CONGRESS

Amid home-market turmoil, Europeans top shareholder value

8:38 pm U.S. ET | Jan. 16, 2013
Two German automakers and two European suppliers have delivered the best shareholder return in the industry this year, despite troubling economic conditions in Europe. For the past 12 months, Volkswagen AG provided the best shareholder value of any automaker, returning 64.5 percent to investors, according to the latest Automotive News/PwC Global Automotive Shareholder Value Index.... Read More »

 

FINANCE & INSURANCE

Store faces $100,000 punitive damage ruling

12:01 am U.S. ET | Jan. 14, 2013
Lithia Toyota in Medford, Ore., must pay $100,000 in punitive damages for "egregious" behavior that included intimidation, trickery and deceit in a debt collection case stemming from the sale of a used 1993 Toyota 4Runner, a divided state Court of Appeals has ruled.... Read More »

 

Cash in hand, Lithia shops for stores

12:01 am U.S. ET | Oct. 29, 2012
Lithia Motors is looking to buy stores east of the Mississippi River, where it presently has none, CEO Bryan DeBoer said.... Read More »

 

Lithia to hire, acquire stores after big jump in revenue

9:50 am U.S. ET | Oct. 24, 2012
Lithia Motors will hire more sales and service employees this year because of higher new- and used-vehicle sales and increased service business. The ninth-biggest U.S. dealership group continues to look to buy stores east of the Mississippi River, where it presently has no locations, CEO Bryan DeBoer told Automotive News Wednesday.... Read More »

 

FINANCE & INSURANCE

Savvy F&I managers match menus to their customers

12:01 am U.S. ET | Sept. 10, 2012
At Dimmitt Chevrolet, customers often view a menu of packaged finance and insurance products then ask for those packages to be broken up and sold separately. And Dimmitt's finance manager is more than happy to do it.... Read More »

 

Private buyers snapping up stores

12:01 am U.S. ET | Aug. 20, 2012
Despite more optimism in 2012, the dealership mergers and acquisitions market hasn't taken off the way many experts predicted. Through the first half of the year, acquisitions of U.S. dealerships by the public retailers ran at less than half the pace of 2011.... Read More »

 

JIM HENRY

Sell more service contracts? That may get tough

12:01 am U.S. ET | Aug. 15, 2012
Is the glass 40 percent full, or is it 60 percent empty? Perhaps it's neither. A couple of the publicly traded new-vehicle retailers reported their extended-service contract penetration was around 40 percent for the second quarter -- specifically, Group 1 Automotive and Lithia Motors Inc. The other public groups don't usually break out detailed F&I numbers.... Read More »

 

Political ads push dealerships out of TV, radio

12:01 am U.S. ET | Aug. 6, 2012
The presidential election will push many dealerships off the airwaves this fall. With political campaigns snapping up prime TV and radio air time early -- and driving up prices for those spots -- auto retailers such as Asbury Automotive Group are shifting advertising spending to other media.... Read More »

 

Strong F&I profits buoy 2nd-qtr. earnings for public retailers

12:01 am U.S. ET | July 30, 2012
Cheap and easily available credit, more subprime business, higher sales and additional training drove finance-and-insurance profits higher for the five public dealership groups that have released second-quarter earnings.... Read More »

 

Lithia bullish on U.S. sales but expects lower new-car profit margins

9:10 am U.S. ET | July 25, 2012
On the heels of a profitable second quarter, Lithia Motors' top executives remain bullish on new-vehicle sales this year despite economic uncertainty. But Lithia expects its new-vehicle profit margins to thin in the third quarter as it pushes to increase sales volume and market share.... Read More »

 

FIXED OPERATIONS

Lithia launches service app for smartphones

12:01 am U.S. ET | July 2, 2012
Lithia Motors Inc. is rolling out a smartphone app so young customers can connect with dealerships. The user can use the app to make service appointments, review new-vehicle inventory, receive sales and service promotions and perform other tasks.... Read More »

 

FINAL ASSEMBLY

Lithia exec: Being a car dealer is a no-lose proposition

12:01 am U.S. ET | June 25, 2012
Speaking to a group of investors this month, Lithia Motors CFO Chris Holzshu offered a sunny summation of why it feels so right to be a car dealer. Even when the products are wrong, he said, the dealer comes out all right.... Read More »

 

Lithia plans shopping spree

12:01 am U.S. ET | June 11, 2012
Lithia Motors Inc., expecting revenue of about $3 billion in 2012, plans capital expenditures of $43 million and has more than $100 million in liquidity to buy dealerships, company officials told investor conferences in New York and Boston last week.... Read More »

 

FINANCE & INSURANCE

Storm clouds gather over dealer markups

12:01 am U.S. ET | June 4, 2012
The dealer markup on indirect auto loans is the subject of intense debate among auto lenders, dealers, consumer advocates and government regulators. Some experts, including even some auto lenders, say a time may come when one-size-fits-all flat fees could replace the dealer markup, which can vary from customer to customer within certain limits, depending on what the market can bear.... Read More »