The Dealer Playbook

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The Dealer Playbook Inspired by car dealers, let's explore what it takes to thrive in the retail auto industry! Hosted by Michael Cirillo. New episodes weekly every Thursday!

The Dealer Playbook is a podcast about exploring what it takes to thrive within the retail automobile industry.

11/09/2026

I asked dealers about this before and the comments got interesting fast.

So let’s run it back.

What do you think some of the potential risks or benefits of this model would be, and do you think it would work in North America?

Share your thoughts in the comments section!

10/09/2026

Most dealers already know they should be doing more with used cars.

The harder question is what actually has to change inside the store before the volume follows.

I asked Rob Ruth that directly.

And I liked his answer because it wasn’t some big strategy speech.

It came down to where the operation starts, what dealers tend to overlook, and what has to be in place before you can really scale pre-owned.

Rob has already built it at volume.

That’s what made this part of the conversation worth revisiting.

09/09/2026

I asked Rob Ruth where a dealer should start if they really want to grow used cars.

Because it sounds simple until you look at everything that has to be right behind the scenes.

Inventory.
People.
Process.
Pricing.
Recon.
Knowing what your market will actually buy.

Rob has built this at real volume, so I wanted to know what he believes has to come first.

His answer is worth hearing.

08/09/2026

A lot of the reasons dealers give for not growing used cars sound reasonable.

Small market.
Not enough inventory.
Too much competition.
Hard to find the right people.

Rob Ruth could have used all of those reasons too.

Instead, Bob Ruth Ford built a used-car operation that sold more than 300 units in a month in Dillsburg, Pennsylvania — a town of about 2,900 people.

That’s why I wanted to bring this episode back.

Rob has actually done the thing a lot of dealers are trying to figure out right now, and he gets into how they did it; acquisition, buying from the public, pricing, recon, people, process, all of it.

I think there’s something useful in that.

Sometimes you don’t need another opinion about what might work.

You need to hear from somebody who already made it work.

Link in the comment section.

08/09/2026

In this episode, we’re bringing back one of those Dealer Playbook episodes that deserves another run.

Rob Ruth, President of Bob Ruth Ford, built a used-car operation that sold 300+ pre-owned vehicles in a town of roughly 2,900 people.

But what made this conversation worth revisiting was everything underneath that number.

How they buy inventory.
How they built a team that could do that.
How they think about pricing, reconditioning and merchandising.
And why Rob believes used cars can open up growth across the entire dealership.

A lot of dealers want to grow pre-owned.

Rob actually gets into what has to happen behind the scenes to do it at volume.

If you missed this one the first time, now it's your chance!

05/09/2026

David Spisak shared this a while back and I think it’s worth bringing back because the advice has only gotten more relevant:

Dealerships need unreasonable hospitality.

Great customer service is the baseline now.

Customers expect you to be friendly. They expect a clean store. They expect communication. They expect the process to be easy.

So if everyone is getting better at the basics, where does the differentiation come from?

David’s point was that you have to go past what the customer would reasonably expect.

Remember something they mentioned.

Solve a problem that technically wasn’t yours to solve.

Do something small enough but thoughtful enough that they tell somebody about it later.

That’s the part I think is timeless.

We spend a lot of energy asking how to make the dealership stand out.

Sometimes the opportunity is sitting inside a much simpler question:

"What could we do for this customer that they genuinely would not expect from a dealership?"

That’s unreasonable hospitality.

And I think we need a lot more of it in retail automotive.

04/09/2026

One thing I think we still take for granted in this business is how powerful it is to be genuinely known in your own community.

And I don’t mean known because your ads are everywhere.

I mean people know your store because they’ve dealt with you, heard about you from someone they trust, seen you show up, or watched you do what you said you were going to do.

That’s something Travis Baldwin reminded me of.

There’s a simple takeaway here for dealers:

Pay attention to the reputation you’re building outside the dealership, not just the traffic you’re generating into it.

Because over time, that familiarity can become a real advantage.

People are more comfortable buying from a name they already know.

They’re more likely to mention you when someone asks where to shop.

And they’re more likely to give you the benefit of the doubt because they’ve seen how you operate.

We talk a lot about getting in front of more people.

There’s still a lot of value in becoming more meaningful to the people already around you.

What do you think?

03/09/2026

From detailer to Vice President.

That’s a long way to travel in this business.

Travis Baldwin has seen the car business from the ground up, which is why I wanted to ask him one simple question:

If someone is making 2026 their first year in automotive, what should they know?

What he said had almost nothing to do with selling cars.

And that’s exactly why I think people coming into this business need to hear it.

What do you think?

01/09/2026

You can usually tell pretty quickly when someone has actually lived the business.

Travis Baldwin started detailing cars, moved into buying, sales, management, association work, and today he’s Vice President at Best Deal Auto Sales and Co-Founder of Dealer Defender.

So when I asked him what advice he’d give someone making 2026 their first year in automotive, I knew the answer would come from experience, not theory.

That’s what this conversation is full of.

Buying cars. Taking care of people. Building trust. Showing up in your community. Learning the business from the ground up. And carrying those lessons into how you operate today.

If you’ve been in the business for a while, there’s a lot here that will feel familiar.

If you’re newer to it, there’s a lot worth paying attention to.

Full episode is live NOW!

Link in the comment section.

01/09/2026

My conversation with Travis Baldwin this week gets into the parts of the business that rarely make the headline but absolutely shape the store.

How do you buy used inventory with more confidence?

How do you protect your reputation when every customer interaction follows you back into the community?

What does real follow-through look like when the deal is already done?

And how much of your growth can come from simply becoming the dealership people know will do what it said it would do?

Travis is the Vice President at Best Deal Auto Sales and Co-Founder of Dealer Defender. He has worked across detailing, auctions, sales, management, association work, and dealership operations, so his perspective comes from actually living the business from multiple angles.

We also get into why transparency matters so much in the used car business, how community involvement can strengthen a dealership over time, and the experience that pushed Travis to build Dealer Defender after getting burned on an auction purchase.

If you care about protecting your name, buying smarter, and building a store people actually trust, this one is worth joining us for.

See you in the episode!

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