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About Portland observer. (Portland, Or.) 1970-current | View Entire Issue (May 28, 1997)
**» ’■ Black Dealers a t th e Crossroads Association Ponders R oad A h ea d *r *'• <?« - N * V jî ■U '4 ? -V &* •t ' 12 • -a A half o f our membership. ” To be sure, Vaden-W illiams wants N A M A D to be a force in the industry7 and plans to concentrate heavily on auto industry activism. “O u r efforts are not just going to be focused on dealerships,” she says. “W e re going to start taking a look at who sits on your board o f directors, who are in your key decision-making positions. O u r goal is that, in every aspect o f the autom obile industry, we w ant someone there w ho can represent the interests o f m inori ties. Before year’s end, you will be hearing much more from us.” Pittm an candidly adm its that he has no magic wand to halt the rise in car sales over the Internet or used-car superstores, both o f which are redefining the way con sumers purchase vehicles. But then, neither does anyone else. “T his is a brand-new frontier, one we don't have a blueprint for yet, Pittm an says. “N ot even the m anufac turers have a handle on w hat’s going to happen with this new way of doing business.' G M i i up A ll n^hh n \c n r d GM, G M ( f not at a crossroads, then the N ational Association o f M in o rity A utom obile Dealers (ÑA M A D ) could sorely use a new road map. T h e old one had routes for surviving econom ic dow nturns and collisions w ith autom akers reluctant to establish m inority dealerships. But no one foresaw com puter shopping and auto superstores as new hurdles to cross. “These are serious times, absolutely,” agrees newlv-elected Ñ A M A D President W inston Pittm an, owner o f Cardinal D odge in Louisville, Ky. “I m well aware of how critical it is that we don't drop the ball right now.” I he traditional way o f selling automobiles is bringing about dim inished market share and shut tered dealerships. Ñ A M A D — which represents African-A m erican, H ispanic, Native-A m erican, and Asian dealers — has w atched its m em bership shrink to 425 dealerships from 584, an eye-open ing 27 percent decrease. M any o f those lost 159 dealerships, representing millions o f dollars and thousands o f jobs, benefitted African-American com m unities. Now, only about 350 o f existing Ñ A M A D dealerships are black-owned. “Since about the end o f W orld War II, where there were about 50,000 new car dealers in the U nited States, we've seen a steady trend toward consolidation in the industry,” says D onna Reichle, N ational Autom obile Dealers Association spokes woman. T he total num ber o f dealers in the U.S. decreased to 22,700 in 1997, from 25,150 in 1977. NAM AD's executive director is Sheila Vaden- Williams, a Harvard-trained attorney who worked eight years as a corporate lawyer. She decided to pursue the entrepreneurial route through an event planning business. She became acquainted with the 17-year-old Ñ A M A D in 1994 while planning a Ñ A M AD conference. She assumed her current post in February 1996. “She is very effective at what she does,” says W il liam “Bill Shack, N A M A D ’s founding president and imm ediate past president. “H er job is to in terface between autom obile m anufacturers and vendors and other folks that we deal w ith on be hnun\ aiul llu GM( /<>(,•<» an n x i\lc n d inulcnuiris of General Molare ( oipomlion H ih kle I /». \ nie in </.' By Blair S. Walker U "inston Pittman mori AFRICAN AMERICANS O N WHEELS s r* ?: • . i \ IORM m i o s % ... : call , * ’* • i T oil iR ii 1 ' 8 8 8 ' 9 7 ' | I M M ^ - .«fc* 'k ■'v'» > < •> - . « ' R \ i n i T o t R u i f >> i T i \ ?"■' ai w w w g n ic . c o m j i m m y