RV dealership hooks up with new site
AUBURN – A golf cart isn’t what you’d expect to see at an RV dealership, but it’s the only way to get around the 20-acre site of the new Motor Home & RV Super Center.
For nearly 50 years, the former Motor Home Center made do with its two-acre lot at 747 Minot Ave.
But the continued growth of the business and the growing popularity of RVs prompted the owners to expand – in a big way.
“We’d outgrown our old space some years back,” said President Robert Armstrong, whose grandfather founded the dealership in 1954. “The business had been growing for a number of years and there was no room for added inventory, no room for the added employees or customers.”
Armstrong said he’d been searching for a new location for more than year before buying the site on Station Road, just off Washington Street.
The size of the lot and its proximity to the turnpike made it an ideal location.
And the dealership changed its name to reflect its growing inventory. Now, instead of keeping 60 or 70 RVs in stock, it has about 125.
“Everything can be properly displayed now,” said Armstrong as he drove the golf cart around neat rows of gleaming motor homes and “towables,” the industry name for RVs that don’t have their own engines.
That makes a “huge difference,” said Armstrong, and his sales have already begun to reflect it.
Open since mid-June, Motor Home & RV Super Center is on a pace to double its sales of last year.
“We’ve doubled our sales force from two to four and we still can’t keep up,” said Armstrong, who declined to say what the dealership made in sales last year.
RV dealerships across the country seem to be riding a wave of prosperity, according to the Recreational Vehicle Industrial Association.
Sales in the first quarter of 2003 were 8 percent above what they were in the same quarter of 2002.
And sales for all of 2002 were 21 percent over sales of 2001.
Industry analysts say a preference for domestic travel – especially since Sept. 11 – and low interest rates have helped RV sales take off.
“The RV industry doesn’t follow economic trends like the rest of America,” said Armstrong. “RVs fill an area in peoples’ lives for recreation, fun and time with your family. No matter what the economy is doing, people will have fun and enjoy their families.”
The prices for new RVs run the gamut from $12,000 for a small towable to $300,000 for the luxury motor homes. The Super Center also sells used RVs. And staff offer driving lessons for people intimidated by the size of RVs.
The dealership has a 30,000-square-foot building that houses several offices, a parts store and service area. The garage area has 10,000 square feet of service bays, enough to accommodate eight RVs simultaneously.
Armstrong has already doubled the number of employees to 30 and is still looking for more help. And he has plans to build a 25,000-square-foot interior showroom by bumping out one wall and enclosing what is now a portion of the lawn.
He’s got a reason to be optimistic:
Last weekend the dealership had its grand opening and cars were lined up back to Washington Street.
“It was incredible,” he said. “Yeah, we love this location.”
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