New Dealership All Added Up

Newcastle Herald

Saturday August 16, 2008

GR

GLEAMING motor vehicles at the front serve as a reminder that the Port Stephens Toyota showroom is not, in fact, a new holiday resort.

With water and light features, stainless steel, tiles, comfortable modern furnishings, big screen televisions and attentive staff, the first impulse is to book accommodation.

But this is the latest in motor dealerships, representing an investment of $4 million-plus by the Maitland-based Burton family.

It's taken just over a year to construct the impressive two-storey building on a two-and-a-half-acre block of land at Taylor's Beach, which once was home to a garden nursery.

And there's room for expansion, more than enough to duplicate service facilities in the future to meet expected demand.

For now, though, the 17 staff members who were all recruited locally are settling into their plush, new surrounds.

Most have spent the past three months undergoing training in Maitland.

Few live closer than Kim Burton.

With a home at Pindimar, he's only nine minutes from work by jet ski.

Port Stephens Toyota carries about 100 vehicles. It's roughly a 50/50 split between new and used.

It was when the Burton family first started crunching numbers that the seeds for the new dealership were sown.

They looked at the fact that there were no pre-existing dealerships in Port Stephens surprising given that there are 65,000 people in Maitland and a number of motor traders and 63,000 people in Port Stephens.

They considered the fact that there were 9600 Toyotas under eight years old in the area.

Last year 517 new Toyotas were sold to people living in the area better figures than those returned from dealerships in Coffs Harbour, Port Macquarie and Taree.

It was beyond doubt that there was a desperate need for a Toyota vehicle servicing unit in Port Stephens.

The Burtons decided to take it one step further and convince Toyota of the need for a stand-alone dealership.

The success of that argument is there for all to see on Port Stephens Drive.

© 2008 Newcastle Herald

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