Mel Farr still wows Detroit

Mel Farr hasn’t sold new cars in Detroit for more than a decade, but his passing this week was breaking news in the city, topping many local TV newscasts Monday night.

I ran into him about a month ago for the first time in more than a decade at the National Association of Minority Automobile Dealers conference in Orlando.

Besides being a former Detroit Lions football star, Farr was known around Detroit for donning a superhero-type cape and starring in his own TV commercials as the “Superstar” dealer. The commercials were corny but effective.

His Mel Farr Automotive Group of Ferndale, Mich., was hailed as the nation’s largest black-owned dealership company and largest black-owned company in 1998, according to Black Enterprise magazine.

Farr’s automotive group placed 54th on the 1998 Automotive News top 100 dealership groups list.

His group comprised 11 franchises and generated revenues of $596.6 million and at its peak touted Ford, Lincoln, Mercury, Toyota, Volkswagen and Mazda franchises.

I recall going to his stand-alone used-car superstore to interview him about his then-new business model of selling used cars and trucks to people with poor credit.

He stocked about 500 3-to-6 year-old vehicles. The business gained notoriety for its use of “On time,” an electronic device that, when placed on a car or truck, allowed him to shut off the vehicle if the buyer did not make a vehicle payment on time.

It was the first time I had heard of what amounted to electronic repossession, but it was not the last.

Farr attracted national media attention after two customers filed lawsuits alleging that the devices abruptly shut off the engines of their vehicles even though they had made their vehicle payments. He was also criticized for charging subprime customers interest rates of more than 20 percent.

“It hurts because after 25 years in business I’ve tried to treat my customers with the kind of respect that I like to get,’’ Farr told Automotive News in September 1999.

He was then selling about 700 used vehicles a month. He said about one-third of those customers were in the subprime category.

“I would like to help working-class men and women drive cars of their own. I can help those turned down everywhere else.”

But by the early 2000s, Farr began selling his dealerships. There was at least one high-profile lawsuit from a former employee and debt owed to Ford Motor Credit that Farr addressed in a March 2002 court document. His last two new-car franchises, Hyundai and Kia, were relinquished in 2003.

Farr disappeared from the pages of Automotive News and from Detroit. I would hear about him from time to time during small talk with other dealers.

Last month, Farr, along with former dealers Bill Shack and Nathan Conyers, were honored as pioneers who formed and crafted what is now NAMAD. The minority dealer group celebrated its 35th anniversary this year at its conference.

Farr flashed that familiar superstar smile and was as gracious as ever. He introduced me to his wife, who said she is expecting a baby in November.