By Matt Mauney | Staff Writer
Plant City Mayor Mike Sparkman is getting out of the car business.
On Aug. 30, Sparkman closed the sale of his Bartow Chevrolet dealership to Stingray Chevrolet owner Steve Hurley for the acquisition of Sparkman’s Chevy dealership in Bartow.
The Bartow location will take the name Stingray Chevrolet of Bartow and will be run by Hurley’s son, Matt.
The purchase price has not been disclosed at this time.
Sparkman purchased the Bartow dealership Sept. 22, 2008, but decided earlier this year to move forward to sell the dealership.
“I’ve been in business all my life, and in business, we learn that timing is of the essence and is essential to be successful,” Sparkman said. “We feel like we got into it at the worst possible time back in 2008, and the situation has not changed that much. It’s extremely difficult for small dealerships to make a profit in this type of economic atmosphere.”
Hurley opened Stingray Chevrolet in December 2008 and has guided it to become the largest Chevy dealership in Tampa Bay.
Sparkman contacted Hurley several months ago about his interest in buying the Bartow location. Hurley said the acquisition allows for an expansion into the Polk County market, and by taking on the Stingray name, the dealership will gain more exposure given marketing resources.
“It allows us to use the Stingray name to get the word out, and it will allow us to really market Stingray Bartow,” Steve Hurley said. “We have opportunities now that we didn’t have before by having another dealership in the marketplace.”
Sparkman said his previous business relationship with Hurley helped the deal run smoothly.
“He’s been very active in the community, and with my association with the city and with the Florida Strawberry Festival, we’ve got a real special friendship going and have a lot of respect for each other,” Sparkman said. “That’s the reason I went to him with this, because we have like feelings and like community involvement and I feel that he can take Bartow and be just as involved with the community there as he is here in Plant City.”
Sparkman also said with the Stingray name, the Bartow location can thrive, even under economic uncertainty.
“Stingray is a big company and is very well known and established in the industry,” he said. “This is an industry that we really didn’t have any knowledge about, and it was just difficult for a start-up business in this industry and, at this time, to be successful.”
Hurley said the new acquisition can see success, noting that when he took over the dealership off Park Road, many people didn’t think that it would be a success.
“We were told that you couldn’t sell Corvettes in Plant City, and Matt was in charge of Corvette sales and took us to No. 2 in the nation last year,” Hurley said. “We have to find what our focus is and find that niche market.”
Bartow is known for truck buyers, and the dealership fared well in truck sales under Sparkman’s ownership, run by his son, Chris, chief operating officer of Sparkman Chevrolet LLC. The Bartow location ranked No. 2 in market performance in the state, which is based on the sales-to-population-size ratio.
Matt Hurley also noted with another Stingray in the region, crossover business could occur, bringing some business from the smaller Bartow location to the much larger Plant City dealership.
“I’m thinking that I may do a little better in trucks, and my dad do better in Corvette sales,” Matt Hurley said. “He (Steve Hurley) has 1,000 new Chevrolets on the ground, and I, of course, have much less than that, so, of course, if we have a customer (who) needs a car in Plant City, we can bring it over and sell it. The same goes to him, so that’s a huge advantage for us.”
Sparkman also owns a Chevy dealership in Zephyrhills. He currently is in the process of trying to sell that dealership and is hoping make progress in the next 30 to 60 days.
According to Steve Hurley, he has no interest at this time in the Zephyrhills location.
“I think we have our hands full at the moment,” he said.
Contact Matt Mauney at mmauney@plantcityobserver.com. mazda 3