Jay Trivedi arrived in Canada as an international student from India in September 2010 with only 500 Canadian dollars in his pocket. Now, Trivedi is a dealer principal, having just acquired a Chevrolet dealership in Ohio.
“Imagine what I’m feeling right now,” Trivedi told WardsAuto in a Zoom call. “I’m nervous, I’m afraid, but a good nervous, good scared and good afraid to finally be living what you set yourself up for.”
The entire transaction process was a testimony to perseverance. It also proved the importance of finding a buyer who matches a longtime owner’s idea of whom he or she wants to take over a lifetime endeavor.
“The deal fell apart probably six or seven times, and we put it back together, you know, over the course of 15 months,” said Mike Funk, regional director for the Midwest USA for DSMA, also known as Dealer Solutions Mergers and Acquisitions, an international advisory firm headquartered in Canada.
The transaction closed on May 28, Funk confirmed.
Trivedi found out that the Ohio Chevrolet store was for sale after finding a listing on the DSMA website last April. The firm represented Don and Cathy Hayati, the sellers, in the transaction.
They had owned the former Don’s Chevrolet GMC in the small Ohio town of Wauseon for 30 years and were very selective about whom they would sell to. Wauseon is a town of less than 8,000 in Northwest Ohio.
Indeed, though Funk described Trivedi and the Hayatis as “the perfect match,” Trivedi said the most difficult aspect of the transaction was “navigating through an extremely demanding seller and his expectations.”
And while Funk listed dealing with immigration issues — a Canadian buying a dealership in the United States — as a top hurdle, Trivedi said it was “not even in the top five or ten or even top 20.”
His reputation preceded him
Getting General Motors to approve the sale was helped by Trivedi’s reputation in Canada, he said.
Trivedi, 38, worked for the Dilawri Group of Companies, Canada’s largest auto dealership group, for more than seven years. He left a job as general manager of a Dilawri Toyota store in Bolton, Ontario, to buy what is now Jay’s Chevrolet GMC. The dealership also sells the Hummer brand.
Getting the manufacturer’s approval for the acquisition was helped by the fact that he made commercials educating Canadian consumers about the value of buying American brands including Ford, Chrysler and General Motors brands, of which Dilawri owns franchises, Trivedi said.
Canadian consumers were knowledgeable about Japanese brands such as Toyota and Honda, but not so much the North American products, he said.
“I started educating them that if it is built here in North America, you will save on insurance,” he said. Also, that the build quality for North American brands was very good. His efforts helped boost Cadillac and Chevrolet sales in Canada, which endeared him to General Motors Canada, Trivedi said.
When General Motors “did my background check in the U.S., they connected with their Canadian counterparts and they said, just grab this guy!” he said.
Growth ahead
Trivedi is putting those marketing chops to work at his Ohio Chevrolet store. He sees the most opportunity in new-car sales, which weren’t a big focus for the previous owners.
Don Hayati leaned more into used sales, Funk said, and was reluctant to rely on new-car volume due to manufacturer control over inventory. “He said, ‘Never again am I going to have the manufacturer dictate my business,’” Funk said.
Trivedi, on the other hand, said that with new cars, “If you do it the right way, you can have unlimited potential.” Already, in his first official month on the books, he surpassed Chevrolet’s new-car sales target by 400% of the objective, Trivedi said.
The store sold around 750 new and used vehicles last year. “I want to scale it up to 1,000,” he said.
Triveldi, 38, has a five-year plan. Included in his current plan is to own three dealerships by the time he is 40. “It’s very strategic for the brand that I’m looking for,” he said. “One of them I’m aggressively approaching is the Toyota store, and another GM shelf store.”
DSMA is on it, Funk said. “We’re already looking for other opportunities,” he said. Funk figures the next transaction will be completed a lot more quickly.
Trivedi jumped through all the hoops to complete this transaction while working as a GM at Dilawri. Now that Trivedi can focus on growing his own business, “he is going to be a lot more prepared for transaction number two,” Funk said.
