End of the road for car dealership

After 75 years in business, the Lawrence family’s last remaining dealership has closed.
“To make a long story short, we made a business decision that we felt better closing the doors and selling the property,” said Skip Lawrence, who co-owned the dealership at 5400 S. Laburnum Ave. in Henrico with his brother Mark.
The dealership, along with 788 others across the country, received a letter in June that the bankrupt automaker was abruptly terminating their franchise agreement.
The Lawrences, who are third-generation operators of the company, quickly re-branded the Airport Chrysler Jeep dealership to be the Airport Motor Company and began selling used cars.
That experiment ended a couple of weeks ago.
“This facility was built to support a service and parts department, and it just wasn’t able to support enough sales to pay for the property,” said Skip Lawrence, adding that they were unable to generate enough revenue to cover taxes and overhead.
Now the property is up for sale for $5 million. Lawrence said they have had a number of interested parties come and look, including auto dealers and other users as well. The county has assessed the property at $3.7 million. It is at the corner of Laburnum and Eubank Road.
All of the vehicles and parts have been sold at auction.
The Lawrence family once operated another Dodge dealership on West Broad Street that was sold late last year, before the forced closures.
The company’s dealership near the airport was one of two in the area that were dropped by Chrysler. Dodge also ordered Pearson Dodge on Midlothian Turnpike to close. Pearson Dodge is selling used cars at that location under the name Automax. Pearson was allowed to retain its other Chrysler dealership on West Broad Street.
Lawrence said the automaker’s handling of the bankruptcy was a disaster.
A week before the letters were sent out, Lawrence said, he was on a conference call with Chrysler Vice Chairman Jim Press urging dealers to buy more cars.
“Of course we did, hoping we were going forward,” said Lawrence.
Mike Allen, director of public affairs for the Virginia Auto Dealers Association, said about half of the state dealers who were axed by Chrysler have given it a go in the used car business, with mixed success.
“It’s a tough time to be in the used car market,” said Allen, adding that people who typically buy used cars are fixing up their older cars and keeping them on the road longer.
A handful of used car lots along West Broad Street and Route 1 have closed within the past year and now sit vacant.
And a used car operation misses out on performing warranty service, sometimes the only profitable piece of a dealership.
“Most dealers over the past couple of years have netted a loss on vehicle sales. Once they pay the overhead that are related to a sale, they actually come out behind,” said Allen.
As for the Lawrence family, an era in the car business has come to an end. But that ending comes a chance to start something new.
“I’m going to catch my breath for a couple of weeks and decide what I am going to do going forward,” said Lawrence. “One thing I’m pretty sure of: It won’t involve the car business.”


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Norwalk Festival features rare cars

MARTINSBURG, W.Va. — The brown, black and orange-trimmed 1930 Ford Model A on display this weekend at the first Norwalk Festival could end up in your driveway with the purchase of only one $5 raffle ticket.

“The Norwalk automobile is more important to the whole community, to Martinsburg ... than one little car is to two people,” said Shelly McFillan, who, along with her husband, donated the vehicle for an Oct. 18 raffle drawing toward the end of the Mountain State Apple Harvest Festival. “There’s more of those around. There are no more Norwalks. That is it.”

The couple, from the Spring Mills, W.Va., area, are members of The Friends of the Norwalk Foundation Inc., a group formed in August 2008 to bring what is widely believed to be the only remaining Norwalk car in existence — a 1914 Underslung Six manufactured in Martinsburg — back to Martinsburg and find a permanent home for it.

The group is paying off a $280,000 loan it obtained to purchase the car from a Colorado rancher last year. Since then, the foundation has paid about $60,000 toward the total cost and was awarded a $50,000 state grant, but the latter has yet to arrive from Charleston, W.Va.

“The tickets that have been sold (for the Model A) have more than exceeded our expectations,” McFillan said. “We’ve really been amazed.

“We’ve had requests for tickets as far away as Hawaii. I hope somebody there wins it — ’cause I’ll deliver it,” she said, laughing.

Rainy conditions appeared to dampen turnout for the first day of the festival, which continues today at the Berkeley County Youth Fair Grounds.

Tickets are $10, and the event includes pony rides, a truck and tractor pull, silent auction and raffle drawings in addition to dozens of arts and crafts vendors and antique vehicles, including a GM Futurliner.

The red and white buslike vehicle was one of 12 manufactured in 1939 by General Motors, which shuttled displays about “modern marvels” in science and technology across the nation as part of the “Parade of Progress.” The first parade was launched in 1936 with different vehicles.

Emmett Toomey of Rio in Hampshire County, W.Va., wasn’t bothered by the weather and urged organizers not to be discouraged because he expects interest in seeing the unique canary yellow convertible-style vehicle only will grow in time.

Toomey said his father, who had worked for the Fisher Body division of General Motors, talked about a lot of different cars in the late 1920s and 1930s when he was a teenager, but not the Norwalk.

“I think he said his first car, he paid like $27 for it,” Toomey said. “But that was a lot of money back then.”

Kenny Stotler of Berkeley Springs, W.Va., who was with Neva Thomas of Great Cacapon, W.Va., and Pat Crowl, of Hedgesville, W.Va., came to the festival to see The Fabulous Hubcaps, a well-known oldies music band.

“They’re fantastic,” Thomas said.

“They’re our time,” Crowl added.

Stotler said he didn’t know anything about the Futurliners and the “Parade of Progress” until he came to the festival.

“I was impressed,” Stotler said.


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