Latest / Auto Collabs / For The Sake of Retail Auto with Nick Askew
Transcript
- 0:00Michael, I think we need an update. [upbeat music] This is Auto Collabs. You're looking more and more fit every time you show up for a podcast. How do you feel? W- what, do I feed myself? Is that what you mean?
- 0:17No, how do you feel? I feel great. Um- How long has it been? Wait, I remember, like, when you flipped the switch and you're like- It's been-... "I hired a trainer." Yeah. What's the, what's the count?
- 0:27Uh, it's been almost a year. A- April, end of April will be a year that I've been going to the gym like six days a week. That's alarming, because I remember that, I remember that like it was, like, four months ago. Yeah.
- 0:37But I'm sure- Yeah... it felt like 12 months to you. [laughs] What's cool about it is he's actually decided to do all of the setup for ASOTUCON because he can now do it quickly without getting tired. Single-handedly.
- 0:46Single-handedly. Just woop, woop, woop. It's funny, man. [laughs] I was talking to, I was talking to my doctor, and I was like, "Something weird's going on." He's like, "What?"
- 0:54I'm like, "I'm still working out," and I'm like, "I hit the treadmill on a 12 incline, three miles an hour," and I'm like, "But I don't run out of breath." He's like, "You're healthy."
- 1:06[laughs] I'm like, "I've never experienced that before." Such a weird doc. I've done it. [laughs] Oh, that's so good. That's so good. That's so good. Speaking of being out of breath. Hey. I, I don't know. I got nothing.
- 1:15Kyle's like- Ah. That was nothing. There was no good segue there. I was like, "Where is he going?" I don't know where you were going with that. Where is he going with that?
- 1:20We're, uh, we're talking to, uh, um, someone that I've known for a couple years now, Nick Askew, today, with Space Auto. I didn't know that. Yeah, yeah.
- 1:28We met back, like, a few years back actually, um, through a mutual connection, doing some consulting work and, you know- Got it... met Nick, and he was still only a couple years into his thing.
- 1:39Crazy growth since then, so- Did he take your breath away?... I'm excited to kind of like, I don't know a bunch of his backstory. I'm excited to kind of hear about it. What'd you say, Cirillo?
- 1:47I was like, "Did he take your breath away?" I was trying so hard to find a segue. Da, da, da, da, da. There is no good one. Yeah. [laughs] Yeah, nothing like that.
- 1:53Listen, guys, we hope you enjoy and are as excited about this conversation with Nick Askew from Space Auto. Let's do it. [upbeat music] All right, we got Nick Askew hanging out with us, man.
- 2:05Thanks for coming to Auto Collabs. Oh, great to be here. Thanks for inviting me. First, I, some of the people can't see this, but my man has a backwards hat, and his shirt says- So good... "I hold gross."
- 2:22Is that a one of one? Did you make that? Uh, it's not a one of one. We actually, uh, made it for, uh, some of the, uh, conventions we were speaking at.
- 2:32And, uh, then every o- every sales manager and other vendors started coming up to us- Oh, that's cool... saying, "Can we get some of that?" So, yeah, no, it's a- So tell, tell the story.
- 2:42Where, where'd the idea come from for that shirt, and w- who was like, "We're making this thing"? Uh, so, [laughs] you know, uh, brand merch, you know, apart from you guys, you know, brand merch is not something...
- 2:53Uh, uh, you wanna go to a, uh, a convention and everyone's in the same polo T-shirt with their brand logo there, wearing some khakis and, and, you know, looking like they're from automotive, right? Um- [laughs]
- 3:06So- Easy... no sha- no shade.
- 3:08[laughs] Um, hey, look, I sold cars for a long time, and I was, you know, I, I, I was always just given this, like, "Hey, this is what we wear here," and it's a golf polo with a brand logo on it.
- 3:19So, we wanted to get the, um, you know, and, you know, we're digital retail, so everyone's always going, "With digital retail, you're giving up all your gross. You're giving up everything.
- 3:30We, we don't have control over it. We're just selling online prices." So I just said, "What? We just need some, like, Helvetica font with 'I hold gross' or something stupid like that." [laughs] And then
- 3:41the marketing department just went with that exact idea and it ended up- That's- [laughs]... [laughs] Yes. That's the best. Perfect. That's the best. Just no frills. No frills.
- 3:51I, I'm sensing a designer in you, too, 'cause you specifically called out the font name. Well, that's his, that's his firstborn's name, Helvetica. Helvetica. I'm just kidding. [laughs] Yeah. What the Helvetica? Yes.
- 4:03All right. So I'll ask the question because Paul normally gets- I already see how this is going... Paul normally gets super excited. I did get excited about it. I just- He got excited about it, yet again...
- 4:12I bit my tongue. But go ahead. No. Every single time, he's like, "Oh, we got a vendor in the room that sold cars." [laughs] He's like, "Tell me what. Tell me when."
- 4:21All right, so go back, because you sold cars for a little bit, but your entrance in the car business was a little unconventional, as is maybe is a lot of ours, but I like your story best.
- 4:29Uh, so tell me, tell me about when, how you got in the car business back in the day. Yeah. So, um, I was a... I went to school for, uh, music composition, right? Perfect. Um, dropped out, uh, which was fun.
- 4:43Um, so couldn't even handle a, uh, music degree. Um- John Mayer dropped out of his, his degree, too, just so you know. That's great. That's, uh- You're fine. You're fine...
- 4:52so did, so did many great entrepreneurs, and that's what al- [laughs] That's what I tell myself, right? It's, uh, um... So did that, uh, moved to America, moved to Texas, and then joined a band, started touring,
- 5:07and then ended up, uh, finding out my girlfriend was pregnant. Um, so that was, that was cool, at 20 years old. Um, then- With Helvetica, right. Helvetica. Yes. [laughs] Followed by my second child, Comic Sans.
- 5:19Um- [laughs] Ah. And, and veneers on the- I see, I see what you did there. Hopefully we'll have- I see what you did there... a Papyrus soon enough. [laughs] Oh, yeah. One day, one day.
- 5:27Um, but yeah, no, so needed, um, needed to make some cash- [clears throat]... because, you know, uh, being in a, uh, small town band doesn't obviously, uh, support that kind of lifestyle.
- 5:37So went to a c- a car sales interview. They turned me away. I was 20 years old, couldn't be on the, uh, insurance plan. Right.
- 5:46About 10 minutes later, the GM called me and said, "Look, if you don't drive any of the cars, if you let the customer pull them, pull themselves out, then you can s- you know, sell up until your 21st birthday.
- 5:57But if you, if we catch you driving any cars, you're fired." So- [laughs]... from 20 years onUm, I've never left the car business. I was in, um, uh, s- sales, internet sales, F&I, on the desk.
- 6:11Um, and then I ended up being a, uh, marketing director and, and, um, and operations for, um, a 40-store group, uh, in Texas and Arkansas, that area.
- 6:21So yeah, just after that, uh, decided that I got tired of having 13 windows open every day to, uh, to work car deals, so wanted to come and do my own thing, so yeah. And now you have 22 open every day. Yeah, exactly.
- 6:37[laughs] Isn't that weird, though? I did the same thing. 'Cause I took a similar path to you. I was like, "This is dumb," you know?
- 6:44And then, like, if you're honest, if you're, like, in SaaS or, like, the vendor world, it's... Everybody is always like, "Oh, but if you get Salesforce, all you gotta have open is Salesforce, right?" It's not true.
- 6:54Like, they're, they're- That's not true. That's not true. Yeah, it's not true. I just swapped them for different windows now, so. Yeah, right, exactly. [laughs] But you're solving it for the other side. Yeah, exactly.
- 7:04That's the, that's the benefit. But do you like selling cars? Now, now he also has, like, you know, insurance and HR window. Like, you have all the other fun windows up, too. Oh, yeah, exactly.
- 7:13[laughs] No, I did like- Do you like selling cars? Is that- I, I, I did. Um, you know, uh, it was weird for me at first because I'd never sold anything in my life. You know, I, I didn't come from a sales background.
- 7:28Um, but if, you know, well, I remember selling my first car and going, you know... Uh, the previous job that I had, I was, and I was pulling, uh, pulling pallets for a Dr. Pepper distribution factory.
- 7:41So, you know, we all imagine how great the wage was there. Um, so when I got my first check on my first sale, and I was, like, it's like 450 bucks or something for a Nissan Juke.
- 7:52And then they went to finance and went, "Oh, we sold them a warranty, so you get a spiff of $100." Well, I made in one hour my entire week's wage in my previous job. [laughs] I was...
- 8:03It, it was an addiction at that point. I got that rush. [laughs] You know, that first sales rush. You got that close. Exactly. Exactly. Yeah.
- 8:08Um, you know, I, I was maybe, uh, addicted to the rush of the close more than I was, uh, anything else. But I'm also a car guy, so it, it, it was a good thing to m- uh, to marry both.
- 8:20Um, you know, uh, so I, you know, I, I really did enjoy retail for sure. It was a, it's a, it was a lot of fun, um, and really gave me a good grounding.
- 8:31I think selling cars was one of the best things that I could ever do for what I do now because it, it taught me how to close, how to ta- talk to people, but it also gave me the primer to be able to build software for dealers,
- 8:45knowing how hard it is to actually do that job. Yeah. So it was a really valuable experience. Mm-hmm. It's so interesting because it's like, you know, I did music. Then I sold cars. Then I did marketing operations.
- 9:03Now I develop software. Like, when, when did you... You said, you know, it was the 14 windows or whatever it was, but when did you kinda say... When was the moment that you said, "Nope," that, "I've had...
- 9:13Enough is enough.
- 9:15I'm gonna move, do my own thing," and, and it's important to me, it's important enough to me to serve the industry in a different way than with my local group, uh, that it, that it, I have the opportunity to impact the industry in a more broad way from a software perspective?
- 9:31You know, it's a... It was a hard situation, 'cause, you know, I was... Uh, you know, I got my first management position at 21. Um, so and I started moving into F&I. I was the youngest F&I manager in the group. And,
- 9:45you know, started making more money than I could have ever imagined in automotive. And m- as my career evolved, you know, the next logical step after you get to a certain area is, like, do you get your own store?
- 10:01Do you become a GM? Do you, you know, do you take that part of retail? And, and I don't know if it was my own ego or just wanting to, yearning for something, uh, m- more creative. I felt like being a GM and
- 10:17going into having my own store may have not been the right path for me personally. Because, look, I'm a, I'm a, I'm a creative. I love to design. I love to build. I love to, uh...
- 10:28You know, the, the advertising thing really spoke to me. And you kind of plateau as that point of a career, or you make a decision to go full pelt into retail. So I just decided to. You know, it, it, it was a,
- 10:44it was a big gamble because I stepped away from a really good salary to zero, and I had to go make it on my own.
- 10:51But you stepped away, you stepped away from something that is probably, like, in the, the top 1, 2, 3% level of income. Yeah. No, totally.
- 11:01Like, people, most people will never, automotive aside, across the board, ever, uh, get to that level, even of personal income, right? Yeah. So stepping away from that is, at 20... How old when you stepped away?
- 11:14Uh, I was 25 when I actually stepped away to start my company. Yeah. Nice. Can I, can I just... I gotta ask. Do you by chance like running? [laughs] He thinks he found your brother, which is why he's saying this.
- 11:29[laughs] I, I think, I think I found metaverse Kyle Mountserre. [laughs] Like, I, I think I found Kyle 3.0. [laughs] Because as I'm listening to you talk, I'm like, "Oh, okay." Like, "So, Kyle, hey, meet, meet Nick."
- 11:44[laughs] "I got a new Kyle." Nick just was faster- You're the same person... on the uptake. Nick, Nick just picked it up at 25. [laughs] Yeah. No. Yeah. It's like... Look, I, uh- It's, it's, it's uncanny, Nick.
- 11:55It's un- Is it really? I was a music major. I know. Like- I was a music major in college, started selling cars when I was 21, was an F&I manager by the, the age of 23, uh, opened a store by the age of 25.
- 12:07I just took another eight years to actually leave the whole thing. So yeah. [laughs] Oh, yeah. Well- Legitimately, that's crazy. [laughs] That's funny. No, well- Yeah... we'll need to, we'll need to talk more.
- 12:16We'll need to jam sometime, for sure. Yeah, that's wild. [laughs]That's why I'm, I'm not, I'm not asking anything I'm like, I'm like, "What is this world?" I'm like, "Kyle, take it away." There's another one of me.
- 12:25[laughs] I'm like, "Kyle, take it away. You know what questions to ask." [laughs] Yeah. I'm like, "All right." Yeah. "Here's the next five." It's Metaverse Kyle, though, right? Like- Yeah...
- 12:32if all of a sudden it was Metaverse Kyle, you'd look more like Nick. [laughs] Did, did I miss... What brought you to America? Why, why'd you... And where did you come from? Somewhere in the Commonwealth.
- 12:40I'm hearing an accent. Yes. Um, so as, um, originally, uh, from, uh, North of England. Um, I used to have family here. And, uh, just to be super candid, my, uh, my dad used to live here and I, uh, he passed away in 2011.
- 12:58Um, so I came to take care of my grandpa for a couple of years until he ultimately passed away. Um, so I, I'm the only family member really over here from that.
- 13:08Uh, so, but by the time that happened, I had a baby and a great career in the automotive, so I just stuck around, um- Right... built. You know, when you look up and you have more life here than you did back home- Yeah...
- 13:21what's there to go back to? So, um, yeah, it was just a, a turn of events that, uh, led me here temporarily and, um, I never got on my return ticket, so. I, I'm curious. Wow.
- 13:33Paul, Paul kind of asked a question a little bit earlier, right? Like y- you get into automotive. People are like, "Once you're in automotive, you never leave automotive."
- 13:40And I think especially on the retail side- Mm-hmm... because the income for the role is so disproportionately higher than it would be anywhere else. Exactly. Right?
- 13:49Like, a marketing director in a retail dealership is making way more than a marketing director in some other, you know, business.
- 13:59But you, you talk about kind of this friction in, in direction and where you wanted to head. I'm guessing money wasn't necessarily fully, s- contextually fully part of your definition of happiness.
- 14:16Can you talk to us a little bit about making that decision to leave, you know, the top three to o- one to 3% earners in America, and going off and saying, "Hey, I'm gonna take this risk.
- 14:25I'm gonna put the chips on myself"? You know, so when I first moved here, you know, I, I,
- 14:33I, I, quite frankly, I, I walked 45 minutes to work in a town that didn't have sidewalks to go work at a frozen yogurt store when I was 19, right?
- 14:44I was under no circumstance unfamiliar with struggling financially, right? I lived in a trailer in someone's backyard, right? And even having a...
- 14:57Getting from that point to a manager's salary from 19 to 21 is, like, a wild experience, right? Mm. But then you start to look around you, and you start to... And you, you said it right. It's the,
- 15:14uh, the, the, people don't leave because how can these sales managers that are making two, $3,000, uh, $200,000 a year ever step away with no credentials, no, uh, uh, you know, no experience?
- 15:29Uh, generally, a lot of the people that I know are, are not formally educated. They were- Mm-hmm... educated by just sheer hard work and resilience. So,
- 15:42uh, it, it hit me one day that I had a decision to make now, was I will be in too deep for the rest of my life in retail. What... And what do I care about? Security? A paycheck?
- 15:56Or do I c- do I care about doing something that I'm super passionate about in my life to be able to go and make a difference? Even if it fails,
- 16:05you know, I don't wanna get to the end of my life and regret never trying to create something that [laughs] would make me feel so fulfilled in the fact that I chased my passion. Mm.
- 16:21So it was a gamble on the fact of what do I value more, the security of a paycheck or the allure of the what if?
- 16:30Um, and you know, fortunately, the focus that I've been able to provide it over the last five years has been able to... You know, and look, we're, we're still upcoming.
- 16:39It doesn't mean that we're, we're, we're, we're at like a Cox Automotive or something like that, where we're just, you know, wildly successful to all of our shareholders and, and, you know, turning the biggest profit imaginable.
- 16:51But we're continuing to build something that I'm really passionate about, and that, to me, is way more, uh, fulfilling in, in trying to change those things for automotive than, you know, staying where I was. And, uh,
- 17:07you know, the last thought on that is, you know, these kind of hours that automotive people work at retail, right? The kind of stress that you get put under. Mm-hmm.
- 17:20The kind of experiences that customer have spending five years, uh, you know, five days at a dealership. Uh, or five hours at a dealership, sorry. [laughs] Feels like five days sometimes. Feels like five days.
- 17:30Five years. Um- Five days. Okay, five hours. No, no, five days. [laughs] Yeah. Uh, th- those, those kind of experiences are the things that I wanted to solve so I could make life better for
- 17:41my fellow people that work in retail. Mm. Make life easier, make the experience better for customers. It's like, if I get the chance to be able to participate in something that moves the industry forward, then
- 17:58that is- Yeah... gonna be really fulfilling for me, so. Let me ask you- Fist bumps to that. I know. I'm so in. You know- Yeah... let me ask you this. You absolutely have
- 18:11a passion for your future and for, like, the long game. You see it. You saw what the path looked like in automotive. And that's one of the... I mean, people see that as a benefit in automotive, too. Oh, yeah. Right?
- 18:21Is there's a very clear career path- Mm... if you don't have, like, a desire and vision for something else.When did you start finding other people in the industry that felt the same way that you did?
- 18:33Like, when did you realize that? Because you, you've just articulated in a way, uh, a care and a heart for the people in the stores, and you're doing something to solve some of the, the issues.
- 18:44When did you realize, like, you think about it a little bit differently? [sighs] You know, being part of a group allows you to... You know, we had 40 stores in the dealer group.
- 18:55So it allows you to get different perspectives. And one of the biggest, uh, fundamental, uh, mindsets is, "This is just the way it is, and we can't change that." Right? Yeah.
- 19:09"Oh, w- between OEM programs and, you know, co-op, and all of the things that they have to do, this, this is just the way it is." Mm-hmm. And not a lot of people, uh, questioned why.
- 19:22You know, if you speak to someone in the digital side, they're like, "Oh, God, we're, you know, OEM's telling us to do this again."
- 19:28You know, if you speak to someone in operations, "Oh, great, we're getting this audit again." And, you know, you know, it's kind of a just suffering in silence, right? Mm-hmm. And not doing anything about it.
- 19:40But then you start to meet people that are progressive enough to understand that things need to change, and not just for the benefit of the dealers. But, you know, the consumer behavior's changing.
- 19:53Um, you know, uh, we-- the, the OEMs are changing. The way that we want to do business is changing. But the technology and the processes that we use don't necessarily support that.
- 20:07So when you start to verbalize those things, you n- you know, like attracts like. And when you start to just open up about those things, you start to find those people that go, "Okay.
- 20:18Yeah, we also have that progressive point of view. But again, we can't do anything about it."
- 20:24If you, if you're loud enough and you have the right conversations, and you, you know, network the right way, you start to realize that those people are out there.
- 20:33You know, I'm speaking to those people on the pho- on the, on this call right now, is that there are people out there that do see a future of, of, uh, being,
- 20:44uh, you know, letting technology get out of the way, letting all these games get out of the way of, of, you know, tricking the customer into providing, uh, providing their informations and focusing on arbitrary metrics like, you know, uh, like, how many leads did you get?
- 20:58And it's like, actually, can we focus on just being good business people and taking care of the customer and, you know, be part of the revolution that needs to happen?
- 21:09Uh, and, and, and, you know, I think it was just about, about the time that I started getting loud about it is, is started realizing that, oh, wow, there are other people that wanna have this conversation too. I love it.
- 21:21Uh, I, I've got one more question for you because we've, we've kind of danced around it. But clearly and concisely, like, Space Auto is, is solving a lot of this, right?
- 21:32The 19 tabs, the how do we engage with people, and there's a bunch of website companies out there. There's a bunch of digital retailing companies. There's a bunch of CRM companies.
- 21:42There's a bunch of communication companies. There's a bunch of companies talking about AI. And you would have all of those words come out of your mouth in some way around Space Auto. But what makes it different?
- 21:54What about everything that you just said about your career path, about the way that you see automotive retail, what makes it different as Space Auto go, uh, you know, is providing a solution to the problem that dealers have?
- 22:06Yeah, no, so that... I'll be as concise as possible here. You know, there's a lot of great tools out there, and there's, there's, there's a ton of software.
- 22:16Uh, most people use-- Every time I've talked to a dealer, they use about 10% of the CRM, right? [laughs] It's, it's like they've got all of these functionalities. They use about this much of it to do, to, to do business.
- 22:27From a customer side, you know, people are inundated with, uh, widgets on a website. "Oh, value your trade. Oh, fill out your credit application.
- 22:38Get your instant tra- get your instant quote," and then all of these things. It's... You wouldn't treat people like that in real life.
- 22:45You would try and create the path of least resistance to give the customer exactly what they want and keep that process in a way that actually serves the customer. We think about digital customer service, right?
- 23:00If I went into a dealership and said, "Hey, I'm interested in trading my car," you wouldn't go, "Oh, yeah, but have you been pre-approved yet? Let's go." You know, like, you would treat me like a human being.
- 23:09[laughs] So we decided to take everything that the customer needs to transact and everything that the dealer needs to transact, connect them together in a way that makes sense, no ma- And, and look, we're not here to tell a dealer how to sell cars.
- 23:24We're just here to put everything together to where a dealer can then choose how to serve that customer
- 23:30in a way that speeds up the process and in a way that serves the dealer and makes the CRM side very delightful to use. And then in comes AI, right?
- 23:42If all of your different lobes of your brain was all separated with no connections and just, you know, if you had your inventory over here, you had your website traffic over here,
- 23:53being able to place AI on top of that to help speed up the process and make those decisions like, you know,
- 23:59what can Kyle afford, and what bank should we send him to, and how can we, you know, maximize his coverage on F&I products, right? We wouldn't be able to make those decisions.
- 24:10So if you tie all of that together, you can actually finally use AI to do one thing.
- 24:16That's to make the process really easy for de- dealers and then buy, as a byproduct of that, speed up and make the customer experience more delightful.
- 24:24And that's what we're here to do, is just make that customer experience ultimately more delightful and move technology out of the way, so we can focus on being human again.I love it, Nic.
- 24:35That's like the, uh, the chef's kiss on a really awesome conversation. Uh, sounds like you guys are doing some incredible stuff. Love the mission. Love what you stand for.
- 24:45Uh, we're super grateful that you could join us here on Auto Collabs today. Thanks for having me. Look forward to also OCON. [upbeat music] I don't know about you guys,
- 25:00but I have so many good band names coming out of that episode. [laughs] Oh, my gosh. Like, 13 Windows Open. Could be a Christian rock band. [laughs] Could also just be a satirical techy band. A satirical '90s punk band.
- 25:18No, it's, it's a, it's a math, math rock band that came out of Microsoft. [laughs] There you go. What about Allure of the What If? "Everybody, we're Allure of the What If." [laughs] Right? Yes. [laughs] It is good.
- 25:32A town with no sidewalks. You know, so apparently Nic has some, um, music on YouTube that our producer Nathan found. I haven't listened to it yet. Oh, okay. But, um, it's, it's five or six years old. We're gonna go look.
- 25:44We're gonna go check that out next. Maybe he will, uh, be surprised to see himself on the jumbotron at ASOTU CON. [laughs] I love it. I love it. That would be amazing.
- 25:54Can we get him- Either way, the, the conversation that we just had with him, one, like, I was up and down in it, just- Yeah...
- 26:02y- you know, it's like, like all the levels of emotion of, like, feeling the same way and then hearing his story from 19 to 21 and just knowing, like, that's a possibility in auto, that then you can go from music degree to tech entrepreneur, right?
- 26:19Like, this is what auto gives. Yeah. And this is what the opportunity is in auto if you take it and grab the bull by the horns.
- 26:26Um, and then near the end there, just to kind of wrap it all in this massively deep purpose-driven thing- Mm-hmm...
- 26:35that says, "No, I'm gonna impact the industry," because if I can have that level of impact, then I'm just, I'm good. Yes. Right? Solving problems, man. Love it. Loving people more than cars. Love it.
- 26:48There's a thing about that. [laughs] Uh, well, look, if you hear this happen, hear this before May 15th or 16th, we hope you join us and Nic and a bunch of other people, like 90 other speakers at ASOTU CON.
- 27:00Uh, you can get information there at asotu.con.com. But until then, on behalf of Michael Cirillo, Kyle Mountsier, and myself, thank you for listening to Auto Collabs.
- 27:10Sign up for our free and fun-to-read daily email for a free shot of relevant news in automotive, retail, media, and pop culture. You can get it now at asotu.com. That's A-S-O-T-U.com.
- 27:23If you love this podcast, please leave us a review and share it with a friend. Thanks again for listening. We'll see you next time.
- 27:36[upbeat music] Welcome to Auto Collabs. [laughs] Why are we recording? Are we rolling yet? Not yet.