Chrysler goal: Let dealers service array of makes

DETROIT -- About 2.6 million customers bring non-Chrysler vehicles into Chrysler Group dealerships each year, and the company wants to help its dealers get more of that business.

Chrysler's Mopar parts and service brand now will offer maintenance parts for many other makes to dealers through Magneti Marelli, Fiat's wholly owned component and parts maker.

In addition, Shell Lubricants will supply Chrysler dealers with marketing, training and business expertise for their Express Lane quick-service operations.

"We're giving our dealers the opportunity to become a one-stop shop," said Mopar CEO Pietro Gorlier at a press conference last week at Mopar's distribution warehouse and development lab in suburban Detroit.

Service revenue is challenging for many dealerships as auto quality improves and new-car sales are still recovering from the recession. Opening an "all makes and models" service department is one way to fight back.

Magneti Marelli will distribute 26 product lines and 3,000 parts to Chrysler Group stores from Mopar's 20 North American warehouses. Ten of those lines are now in stock, including such items as filters, wipers, shocks, struts, brake pads and brake rotors. The rest will be on sale by the end of 2011. The parts will carry the Magneti Marelli brand.

The effort will focus on vehicles made by General Motors, Ford, Toyota, Honda, Nissan, Hyundai and Kia, Gorlier said.

Pietro Berardi, vice president for Magneti Marelli North America Aftermarket, said customers with non-Chrysler brands might feel uncomfortable putting Mopar parts on their vehicles.

"Having Magneti Marelli helps get rid of that psychological barrier," he said.

Asked how dealers would service non-Chrysler vehicles, Gorlier said: "We will support dealers with training."

Tom Miller, president of Tom O'Brien Chrysler-Jeep-Dodge-Ram in Greenwood, Ind., said the improved quality of Chrysler vehicles means less warranty work for his service technicians.

"The maintenance business wasn't there because our shops were filled with warranty work," he said. "It's different now. We need to keep our technicians busy."

Gorlier also said Mopar is encouraging dealers to open Mopar-branded service centers separate from their dealerships.

Gorlier said his priority is getting more dealership service departments open on Saturday and getting more dealers to install Mopar's Express Lane oil change and maintenance facilities.

About 600 Chrysler dealerships -- about 26 percent of U.S. total -- now operate Mopar's Express Lane service. Gorlier would like that number at 80 percent by 2014.

Some dealers have balked at opening Express Lane operations because they say it is difficult to make money competing with the quick maintenance shops.