Just because they’re introducing a new approach to presenting price/tradein/financing options to a buyer doesn’t seem to be a compelling reason to change the name of the business. There’s a host of expense and planning required to change the name (and probably some trade dress as well) for over 250 dealerships. No, I suspect AutoNation [...]

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As reported earlier, AutoNation and John Elway are parting company in the Denver market. In that blog I speculated that Mr. Elway probably wanted more than AutoNation was prepared to pay to license the 17 dealerships they own that carry the marque name of Elway. Seems the real story is a little different: Elway wanted [...]

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Here in Denver, Colorado, we have a sports hero/legend who’s still revered by Bronco fans: John Elway. During his playing career, he purchased several auto dealerships and appended a new brand to each: John Elway Toyota, John Elway Chevrolet, etc.. In 1997, Republic Industries purchased the Elway franchise, and in 1999 as AutoNation, purchased another [...]

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