Jack Frost, Owner, Roper Kia

Kyle Mountsier: 0:00This is In the Dirt with ASOTU all right, we're sitting here at the 800% automotive club in the dirt in the dirt with dirt way in the dirt. And we're sitting here with none other than it's amazing it's a perfect time of year it's a perfect time of year we're sitting here with Jack Frost He's never heard any joke associated with what I just said ever in his life during

‍Paul Daly: 0:23

the wintertime ever in the wintertime. Not ever. So where is roper? Kia?

Jack Frost: 0:27

We're right in the middle of the country in Joplin Missouri. Okay,

Kyle Mountsier: 0:30

that is exactly in the middle of the country if you've ever looked at a map pretty close. Yeah. And like close take map middle.

Paul Daly: 0:36

So give give us and listeners a little little background on the store. How did you come to own it? What is your operation? Like? How many you cardstock? How many do you sell?

Jack Frost: 0:45

okay, like a lot of other guys, I married into the business. Okay. My my wife's grandfather started the store in 58. Her dad took over in 70. And we took over in 2004.

Kyle Mountsier: 0:55

Oh, wow. Okay, so fairly recent in the in the I mean, that's 18 years now that you've taken over you? Were you in the car business before that, or that was kind of like is your

Jack Frost: 1:06

car business with the same group? Probably eight, nine years before that. And then, uh, grew up on the, in the service industry, actually with full service carwash was my first job, my first real job 16 And then Detail Shop and then worked up for the service drive. Didn't come up to the sales side of the business.

Paul Daly: 1:27

Alright, I'll just leave you to this. I love as very similar. I love car wash and detailing. Oh, yeah, making cars look good. Yeah. And up here.

Jack Frost: 1:36

I occasionally, you know, they'll say Hey, where's Where's frost at? So have you been to the Detail Shop?

Kyle Mountsier: 1:41

Yeah, right.

Jack Frost: 1:42

He's just pumping, you know,

Paul Daly: 1:44

the chemicals, right? It's just a happy place mode, right? You walk into a detail shop anywhere and I'm like, I love it's

Jack Frost: 1:49

kind of like that southern comfort food. It's just that smells in the work and, and, and sometimes it's just quiet. That's my

Paul Daly: 1:57

retirement plan. Actually, there's there are these deep, you might have them in Missouri, big car washes, where you go through the big conveyor, and then people hand dry your car. Right anywhere that has like when I started working out, yeah, that's my retirement plan. We're gonna get a job as the dryer. And we're gonna learn a magic trick or two. There's some kids in the car. I'm gonna walk by do the little magic trick. That's That's

Jack Frost: 2:15

my game. Sure. Leaving the folded up towel on the front. Yeah.

Paul Daly: 2:18

Little spin move in front of the car, just did he just do that, right? Tips are gonna rock and everyone's gonna be in my line, right? And I'm gonna work when I want because they couldn't possibly fire me.

Kyle Mountsier: 2:28

So Jack, one of the questions that kind of like, I've been asking a lot of dealers right now, because we've been through, you know, a couple years of continuing challenges, right? Sure. And nobody in automotive ecosystem is immune to that at this point. But I think kind of coming out of these couple of years of challenges, different dealers, especially depending on their OEM their location in the country. Like we kind of had this like, oh, everybody's dealing with, right for two years. Sure. And as we're kind of coming out of everybody's dealing with this, everyone's kind of off shooting into well, my kind of like, biggest opportunity or thing I'm working on, or the challenge that we're facing as a dealership is x, right? What's kind of that? What are you guys tackling getting your hands around looking at, over this next, especially like 3060 90 days?

Jack Frost: 3:14

Well, with manufacturers continuing to increase inventory slowly, the main thing we had to do was learn how to pivot and get into the used car business. We're new Kia, and had MIT's have Mitsubishi. I don't know how much longer on that. But we'll see. But, but really just refining the process with us cars. Because month after month, you know, we get the cross sale, and I see hundreds in my market that we didn't sell, or that a dealer didn't sell. And so how do we get that piece of the business? How do we pull that to us and get our fair share of that? Because nobody sells cars? Better than we do? Is our opinion of ourselves.

Paul Daly: 3:56

Absolutely. Why didn't Why do you say that? So like, what are the things that are unique that you've uniquely put focus on to get you to the point where you feel confident, and say no one sells cars better? You

Jack Frost: 4:06

do? Well, for 20 years, we built the brand. And with a name like Jack Frost, if you can just imagine. Yeah, what we've built there. Yeah, you know, I come on TV with a white suit, and a black hat with a snowflake. And my tagline is keep it frosty.

Kyle Mountsier: 4:19

Right? I love it. You just leaned in.

Jack Frost: 4:22

I love it all the way in. And when we first started, you know, I had heard every joke in the book, you know, and I was 38 years old. You had actually

Kyle Mountsier: 4:29

a pocket of them. Yeah, here's my notebook if anyone wants to use it. Yeah,

Paul Daly: 4:33

material for a year. Yeah,

Jack Frost: 4:34

let's get the carrot nose and the whole deal, you know, but so we just i It's I said, Look, I said I spent 30 years trying to avoid this name. Because I went by and my initials, which are Jeff JEF went by Jeff Frost forever. Okay. But my real name real name is Jack. So I show people my driver's license because they doubt they think it's stage name all that. So back to your question. We spent 20 years building a brand. You can go and buy a used car from anybody. You can go buy a Kia from any Kia dealer in the nation. But there's only one place on the planet that you can buy a Kia or a used car from Jack Frost. And that is Joplin, Missouri at Roper Kia, that's the only place on the planet. And so that is why we did it. And so we've spent years and years and years developing our processes are challenging. Our managers say, Hey, you guys are highly paid, you do this very, very well. You see chinks in the armor, basically problems within the process that speak up, we know, because if there's something we can be doing better, or we have to do different, or we have to change, you guys are on the front line. I can't be there every second. You know, if we're going to do what I can do, I'm 60 cars month. That's it, right? So I gotta keep building the team bringing those people in that no more that can do better, that can actually critically look at something without just killing it, and be able to adjust it or massage it to do what we want it to do.

Kyle Mountsier: 5:54

How do you create that feedback loop within your your management staff or even your frontline staff to get things like up the up the line and then pushed back in from change

Jack Frost: 6:05

a couple different things. We have a standing meeting with managers every Monday every Friday at 1030. And you're expected to be there. If you have manager next to your name, you're in the meeting. If you're not in the meeting, you better have a damn good reason why and have an explanation when you show up late or you don't show up right now I'm the only one that gets a pass because I travel a lot. But I can call in my general manager is always there. I mean, vigilant. But we put that stuff out on the table, we wrestle it, yeah, until it either submits or it dies, or it takes us out one or the other. And then we also do a couple of different off site meetings every year with our team, management team. And so just really building the community of trust right there to make sure that, you know, I'm not afraid to say something. You know, Mr. Frost isn't gonna lop my head off. If I take a shot at his pet project, right, you know, so I want to hear Yeah, because if it's not going to work, that's just a pet project, and I need to have it in my head and the only to have it's just his pet project. You know, I've

Paul Daly: 7:06

heard I've heard it. I've heard that said, I think it was Dave Ramsey, who I've heard it from when he wrote his book entree leadership, and he called that building an environment that is safe for dissent. Absolutely. And it's I feel like that's what you're saying. Someone has to be able to say, well, I don't really see it that way. Sure. And if that's something you hold, dear, you have to be willing to listen. And not retaliate. Absolutely.

Jack Frost: 7:29

Right. And we've had to go through like personality profiles, different different ones, you know, Briggs Myers?

Paul Daly: 7:36

Disc profiles, all the different things did use the Enneagram. What's that? The Enneagram? Do you ever get there? I haven't done that one. It's as complicated as the name is. Kyle loves it. People love it. It's actually one of the oldest. It's pretty neat. Yeah. So if you're looking for a new one,

Kyle Mountsier: 7:52

yeah, the new the new old one, and all the kids are in. So

Paul Daly: 7:55

all the right, bell bottoms come back, and all that other stuff. That's exactly like that was you know, it's all I know, it's circling the runway,

Jack Frost: 8:03

that's right, to bring that together so that everybody knows, you know, so like, this guy is like an introvert over here. And he's going to be quiet. And he's going to be stoic, and he's going to be very rigid on his, on his on his comments, and very rigid on his process. And you know, this guy is over here, you know, flailing around having fun throwing stuff on the showroom floor and making sure people are having a great time. So those machine, those two guys come together and they grind button, they actually make each other better. Yeah. And so having the knowledge of the team, knowing who the

Paul Daly: 8:32

other people are, how the process how they're thinking about it, because we

Jack Frost: 8:36

spend more time with these people than we spend with our own families. And so if we can keep that relationship solid and good, and somebody is not afraid to piss somebody off, or to challenge somebody, or to commend someone and say, Thank you, the team's better.

Paul Daly: 8:51

It's fantastic. 2023 Everybody's putting their plans together right now. Sure. Right. We're not gonna run the same playbook is 2022 or 2021, or 2020. Because we know definitely not those two.

Kyle Mountsier: 9:03

Yeah, for sure. No one that no one even wants that. Yeah, we had a playbook.

Jack Frost: 9:08

I never saw it was a great year. What's that replay? Yeah, so

Paul Daly: 9:12

heading into 2023? What is your mindset? What are the things you're looking to like really focus in on?

Jack Frost: 9:17

Well, to focus in on you know, like I said, the manufacturers have figured out that they can literally sell everything that they'll give to a dealer. And so as far as being a new car franchise, dealer, you know, being able to play the game correctly with with the manufacturer to I guess get the incentives get the get the allocation of the cars, get what you need and still do that. But then also same time, parallel being experts in the used car business because there's way more way more opportunity in the used cars and there is a new or ever has been. And so my father in law used to tell me he says I'm just a used car dealer who happens to have a new car shingle. And so that's he Wisdom for Mr. Roper, but, but really, that really is the thing is to refine that process and not just be buying, you know, the high end stuff, but having the whole range. You know, I don't mind having love having the 90,000 $100,000 Denali or whatever sitting on the lot, but then you exclude a whole lot of people that 10 grants where they're at you that went in 10 grand back when I was a kid, you know, 10 grand was like, that's, that's the car. Yeah. And so the 10 Grand card now is the 2500 car. Back in the

Paul Daly: 10:30

day. Yeah, my first car was 3000. Yeah. And it was like the best thing. Yeah. Well, I think for having this the first conversation the three of us have ever had. Yeah, right. So thanks for spending some time with us. I think we got a good lesson in people product and process all in one conversation. That's just how good operators operate. Or Jack Frost. Thank you so much for your time with us. Best of luck. 2023 and go out there. And are you going to do the skydive for lightning?

Jack Frost: 10:55

I would love to but I exceed the weight limit by 30 pounds. Oh, watch and Heckle. Thanks, guys.

Kyle Mountsier: 11:04

Thank you for listening to In the Dirt with ASOTU. We love the automotive industry and the people who make it run day in and day out. We would love to connect with you more through our daily dose of fun, a free email that you can sign up for at asotu.com That's a s o t u.com. We put our heart and soul into it every day. Thanks again for listening. Join us next time for more Conversations In the Dirt With ASOTU

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