WORKING hard and enjoying it is one of the overriding principals driving one of WA’s largest family businessesAHG is WA’s second largest private company after the Multiplex Group, according to the WA Business News Book of Company Lists.
WORKING hard and enjoying it is one of the overriding principals driving one of WA’s largest family businesses
AHG is WA’s second largest private company after the Multiplex Group, according to the WA Business News Book of Company Lists.
It holds 25 vehicle and truck franchises through 13 dealerships – expected to ex-
pand to 14 next year with the addition of a new Toyota dealership in Clarkson – in-cluding well-known names such as City Motors, Big Rock Toyota and Chellingworth Motors.
It also has a major parts distribution business that holds the WA distribution rights for PPG (formerly Dulux) auto-motive paints, Holden, Mitsubishi and New Holland parts; a motorcycle distributorship; and a major transport concern.
Its chairman, Vern Wheatley, said the business, which was created by his father, Syd, in 1952, was on the brink of even bigger things.
Mr Wheatley said his passion for putting new businesses together kept him involved with the group.
Technically semi-retired, Mr Wheatley still keeps an office in the group’s headquarters and can access virtually any aspect of AHG’s businesses from his home office. He is also in his 50th year as an employee of the business.
“The car business is dynamic. But if it doesn’t grab you don’t go into it, because it is all embracing,” Mr Wheatley said.
Another of his key business principles is that staff be well trained and involved with the business.
“It sounds trite, but people are everything. Without people we don’t have a business,” Mr Wheatley said.
This has helped solve one of the key problems facing many family businesses – succession.
The company has a philosophy of promoting from within. Most of the heads at its 16 different divisions have come up through AHG ranks.
Mr Wheatley said AHG now had a professional management team running the operations, which was the ultimate in succession planning.
“We start our dealer principals off in smaller dealerships and then promote them,” he said.
“You do have to import some new blood from time to time but the majority of our staff have been trained within the group.
“We have a huge number of long-serving staff members. They are the backbone of the company. But we also have a fresh team of people that have been recently promoted to dealer principals.”
Mr Wheatley is also a strong believer in accountability. Each general manager of the group’s divisions has to sign off on the budget for that division before it is included in AHG’s budget for the year.
“They commit to achieving that budget,” he said.
“It’s DAYSYWD – ‘Do as you say you will do’.”
The family connection remains strong at AHG with Mr Wheatley, his wife Jo and daughter Michelle Harris holding board positions. Michelle is also part of AHG’s senior executive team.
Indeed, AHG is one of the major sponsors of this year’s Family Business Awards.
Mr Wheatley said the company’s size was one of its biggest assets.
“Size is everything. You have to keep your expenses down and to do that means you have to be a certain size,” he said.
“Profit is only one factor of business. You have to look after all of your stakeholders. In this business that’s your shareholders, the factory (car manufacturer), your customers and your staff.
“You can boil business down to being very simple. Of course it’s the detail that can prove complex.”
In AHG’s case the detail is both complex and simple. It has just embarked on a major overhaul of its information technology systems by standardising its equipment and centralising its operations.
With the computerisation has come the ability to reduce some dealership overhead costs.
For example, there is one administration service covering its three dealerships on the Wanneroo Road strip between Balcatta and Wangara – Big Rock Toyota, Wild West Hyundai and Grand Toyota.
Mr Wheatley said change was a
crucial part of the business.
“If you’re not prepared to change to meet circumstances in a competitive industry then you’re not going to be around for long,” he said.
“If an organisation is prepared to change and it has enthusiasm, it will be successful.”
AHG has recently left its traditional marketing approach of only pushing its dealerships to promote its brand name.
“We want to be considered the Bunnings of the automotive world,” Mr Wheatley told WA Business News.
He said one of the biggest influences on his approach to business had been his mentor and former City Motors sales manager, Sher Newman.
“I regard him as a guy ahead of his time in terms of customer service and work ethic,” Mr Wheatley said. “He would get his sales team out to walk the streets of Perth.
“He knocked on every door and I don’t think there was a business in Perth that didn’t know Sher and his sales team.”
