In early February, Matt Bowers acquired a Chrysler Dodge Jeep Ram dealership in Indiana — further building on the dealer’s long-time strategy to target high-potential stores.

It was his first dealership in the Midwestern state, but his third CDJR store. It was also his second CDJR acquisition in the past three months. In December, Bowers acquired a CDJR store in Dallas.

Chrysler Dodge Jeep Ram stores aren’t at the top of many experienced operators’ must-have lists. But buying franchises which aren’t the most sought-after is part of Bowers’ strategy to find value and leverage his skill as a dealer operator, he said.

“My only value is to add operational value to the store. That’s it. So, I have to find something that’s been overlooked,” Bowers told WardsAuto in a Zoom call. Matt Bowers Automotive Group, headquartered in Louisiana, now includes 13 new-car franchises and one RV dealership. The automotive franchises include: three CDJR stores, three Hyundai stores, two Nissan and two Infiniti stores, two Chevrolet stores and one Ford store.

They are located in Texas, Louisiana, Mississippi, Tennessee, and now Indiana.

Improvements coming

The just-acquired CDJR store was called Bill Estes Chrysler Dodge Jeep Ram in Brownsburg, Indiana. Bowers bought it from publicly listed Asbury Automotive Group and changed the name to Indy CDJR.

He sees many areas where he can add value. The store “is in a position where I think I can improve just about everything that can be improved,” Bowers said.

His first move will be to bring in more inventory, he said. Then he will advertise the inventory. But advertising brings in more leads than actual customers, Bowers said.

The key to bringing in more customers is having the right inventory at the right price, he said.

“So, I’m gonna bring in more inventory and price it to the market very strongly, which should bring in more customers,” he said.

As for staffing changes, Bowers generally tries to keep as much of the service staff as possible in a new acquisition. “I really don’t do a lot,” he said, aside from letting the service and parts employees know his business philosophy.

The sales side is another story. “On the sales side, it is very rare that you can go in there and keep everybody,” Bowers said.

Even if the sales staff stays, he changes the sales leadership, Bowers said. In both his recent CDJR acquisitions, he also changed the general manager.

The building is image-compliant, so no changes were needed there, Bowers said.

“The store is a really nice store and, in my opinion I got a fair deal on it,” he said. “And so, you mix that together in the gumbo and you know, sometimes you can find a winner like that.”

Major sports franchise a plus

Until his recent acquisitions, some 80% of Bowers’ dealerships were located in Louisiana and Mississippi, “along a 50-miles stretch of the interstate along the Gulf,” he said.

That wasn’t by design, Bowers said, but when a store became available in the area “I would get the call first.”

He wanted to “to diversify the revenue stream without changing my core business,” Bowers said.

His first thought was to look for brands that were “sort of down,” he said. Most brands, with the exception of Toyota and Honda, have been cyclical in their performance, “and I said, ‘Who is at a low part of their cycle?’” Bowers said.

As for location, he wanted the market to be fairly large, in a top 30 Metropolitan Statistical Area, with a National Football League or National Basketball Association team, where the economy is likely to be stable or growing.

David Hacman, president of Hacman Financial, told WardsAuto on a Zoom call that Bowers approached him with these parameters in mind for an acquisition. Hacman advised Bowers on the transaction.

“I said, let me talk to Asbury,” Hacman said.

Hacman had worked for Asbury Automotive Group in the past, including as senior director of mergers and acquisitions. “I have multiple relationships within Asbury,” he said.

CDJR on the rise

Besides the location and the fact that Indianapolis has both NFL and NBA teams, the franchises fit Bowers’ strategy of buying value brands rather than high-flying ones, Hacman said.

Hacman said he sees a lot of value in Stellantis, which owns the Chrysler, Dodge, Jeep and Ram vehicle brands. “Actually, a lot of owners and car dealers think that they’re very bullish in the coming years, and what’s coming down the pipeline, especially on the Ram side.”

Bowers may continue to find more value-priced CDJR dealerships to acquire this year.

According to the Kerrigan Dealer Survey 2025, 50% of dealers surveyed expect the value of CDJR franchises to decrease this year. Only 15% expect it to increase.

The Kerrigan Dealer Survey is based on 525+ anonymous responses from franchised auto dealers in Kerrigan Advisors’ proprietary dealer database. Responses were collected from June 2025 to November 2025.

Things are looking up a bit, however. CDJR franchises “saw the biggest improvement of any franchise in valuation projections for 2026, improving 10 percentage points in its expectations of an increase [in value] and 26 percentage points in its projected decline,” the report said.

Bowers isn’t fixated on any specific brand.

More important is that the dealership meets his other criteria, at the right price. “The brand isn’t as important to me,” Bowers said. “What you paid is sometimes more important than what you bought."

He isn’t looking for “really small” stores, Bowers said, or stores that have been sold “over and over.” He also prefers stores in safe areas.

Bowers is okay with waiting until the right opportunities come along. “The more patient I have become, the luckier I’ve gotten,” he said. “A little bit of discipline and patience goes a long way in our industry.”