Group 1 Automotive buys Mercedes-Benz, Jaguar-Land Rover and Volvo dealerships

Group 1 Automotive Inc. has acquired three dealerships and a collision center to expand its presence in Louisiana.

The stores are expected to add $110 million in annual revenue.

The auto retailer said Monday that it bought Mercedes-Benz of Shreveport, Jaguar-Land Rover Shreveport and Holmes Volvo Cars, also in Shreveport.

The seller was Holmes Auto Family, according to Kerrigan Advisors, a dealership sell-side firm in Incline Village, Nev., which represented the Holmes group in the transaction, which closed Monday. The deal also included a Sprinter franchise.

Group 1 renamed the Volvo dealership Volvo Cars Shreveport but retained the other stores' names.

Daryl Kenningham, Group 1's president of U.S. operations, said in a statement that the company was pleased "to further expand our brand footprint and scale to our already successful Shreveport operations."

Group 1 also has a Ford-Lincoln dealership in Shreveport.

The retailer, meanwhile, said it disposed of two dealerships in the second quarter that combined generated $75 million in annual revenue. In June, Group 1 sold a Hyundai dealership in Houston to Steele Auto Group, of Dartmouth, Nova Scotia.

Also in the quarter, it sold Volkswagen Norwood, a dealership in the Boston market, to DCD Automotive Holdings. Group 1 had purchased the dealership as part of its November acquisition of most of Prime Automotive Group.
Christopher Dagesse, president of DCD Automotive Holdings, announced the acquisition in a June 28 LinkedIn post. The dealership was renamed Nucar Volkswagen of Norwood.

Group 1's latest buy-sell activity follows the retailer's April purchase of a Toyota dealership in New Mexico from Asbury Automotive Group Inc. and its March acquisition of Charles Maund Toyota in Austin, Texas. In February, Group 1 sold Honda and Toyota dealerships in Massachusetts to Automotive Management Services Inc., owned by Terry Taylor.

Group 1, of Houston, ranks No. 4 on Automotive News' list of the top 150 dealership groups based in the U.S., retailing 146,072 new vehicles in 2021.