Andy O’Donnell, working accomplice at Valley Truck Facilities and Valley Auto Group, which owns three Ford shops in Ohio, mentioned he is planning to construct two Elite Industrial Service Facilities.
The primary, in Cleveland, will likely be between 55,000 and 63,000 sq. ft and is scheduled to open by yr finish. It would have 30 service bays — up from 18 on the retailer at this time — in addition to a technician coaching heart and value between $8 million and $9 million to construct.
O’Donnell, who’s a part of Ford’s supplier council, mentioned his Cleveland retailer has about 350 open restore orders a day and he expects to double the shop’s throughput when the Elite heart opens.
“Making the monetary dedication within the amenities is considerably of a no brainer for us,” he mentioned. “It is a nominal funding as a supplier after we’re taking a look at what the return goes to be.”
Chris Gulbrandson, president of Apple Autos in Apple Valley, Minn., opened the primary Elite heart in January.
His retailer was planning to develop its service capability even earlier than Ford CEO Jim Farley created the Ford Professional enterprise unit in 2021, and he labored with the automaker to fulfill the required requirements throughout development.
Gulbrandson mentioned his business service store, separate from the shop’s retail customer support operations, beforehand had eight restore bays which struggled to maintain up with demand.
“We had been simply jammed up,” he mentioned. “You can barely drive by the car parking zone as a result of there was a lot work there.”
The brand new facility contains 26 service bays, a 22-bay collision heart and a 13,000-square-foot components division. He is now open on Saturdays and plans so as to add a second shift of employees for the expanded weekday hours.
Gulbrandson mentioned he spent $12 million on the constructing, $3 million on gear and a further sum on land.
He is already seeing a return on his funding.
Two months into this yr, he mentioned the middle is worthwhile, with business service gross revenue up 13 p.c over 2022.
“Service is vital,” he mentioned. “We’re going into some headwinds this yr with rates of interest and pricing of recent automobiles. … Industrial service is basically the spine of the shop.”
Whereas Ford doesn’t require sellers to construct new collision facilities as a part of the Elite facility, Gulbrandson mentioned he is additionally seen an uptick within the quantity of restore work fleet house owners are opting to do.
“Industrial, generally, is underserved,” he mentioned. “You possibly can see that in our car parking zone, in the truth that there’s stacks of automobiles ready to be serviced. For probably the most half, it is plumbers, HVAC individuals, development individuals. They cannot afford to have a truck down 5 days or two weeks when you wait to get to it. The faster you may get to those vehicles, the extra enterprise they’ll do, which helps everybody.”