Big Man in Little Havana

From 1965 to 1973, more than a quarter of a million people fled Fidel Castro’s communist regime in Cuba. They landed in Miami as part of the Vuelos de la Libertad, or Freedom Flights, the largest U.S.-sponsored resettlement program for political refugees.

Mario Murgado was among the first to arrive in 1966, just days before his fifth birthday. He was cared for by a foster family until his parents arrived months later.

The Murgado family settled in downtown Miami near the neighborhood that became known as Little Havana. When Murgado was in high school, he would gaze longingly through the showroom window at Packer Pontiac on SW 8^th Street and dream of someday owning a Trans Am.

His love of cars led to his first dealership job at Braman Honda in Miami. He advanced from salesman to president and CEO of Braman Imports. In 1993, he became chief operating officer of Palm Beach Imports, one of south Florida’s largest BMW, Porsche, Audi, Rolls Royce and Bentley dealerships.

Today, as president and CEO of Brickell Motors, a Honda and Buick-GMC operation he purchased in 2001, Murgado is at the same location on SW 8^th Street, where he gazed inside at that Trans Am.

But now he’s on the other side of the glass, proudly surveying the business and the community he has helped bring back to life.

The Brickell district is known today as Miami’s Wall Street, with more than 50 banking offices, swanky restaurants and luxury high rises.

It wasn’t always so prosperous. As the original Cuban immigrant population became more successful and moved out, the area and many of its businesses fell into disrepair. That’s when Murgado made his move.

Revitalizing a Rundown Dealership

“After 19 and a half years in the auto business, I started to look for another opportunity,” Murgado recalls. “I knocked on the door at Brickell Motors and convinced the gentleman who owned it that he was not doing well. It was a destroyed store and had lost a lot of money, but I wanted to stay in Miami, so I offered to buy him out.”

The facilities he took over had leaks in the ceiling, ripped furniture fabric, worn office equipment and lingering unrepaired hurricane damage. And sales weren’t any better. In a month, the store had sold only 16 new Hondas, two new Pontiacs, four new GMCs and 22 used cars.

“When I drove my wife in front of the dealership and said this is what we’re putting all our savings into, she started to cry,” says Alex Andreus, one of Murgado’s two business partners, who serves as Brickell’s chief operating officer. “She didn’t see the vision of this becoming a great dealership like it is today.”

Murgado won’t say how much he paid for the failing store, but he has since invested $26 million in land and capital improvements. Sales of new and used cars are expected to reach 5,300 this year.

Brickell Luxury Motors, which sells Ferraris, Mercedes, Land Rovers, Porsches and BMWs, is on track to sell 300 units in 2014.

Brickell Motors ranks 98^th on the 2014 WardsAuto Dealer 500, with $136,9 million in total revenue.

“Our vision is to be the best dealership in our community and to grow,” Murgado says. “I’m a young 52 years old and I want to have more partners as we grow as a company. I’d be happy to expand all along the Sunbelt – Orlando, Tampa, Austin, Dallas, Houston, San Diego. All of these markets have growth potential.”

With an investment of $26 million in 2013, the company opened new Audi and Infiniti stores in Stuart, FL, a market that never had a luxury-car franchise, Murgado says. He expects combined 2014 new and used sales to reach 1,900 units there.

Murgado announced in September the purchase of Ocean Cadillac in Miami Beach. Brickell Mazda will open by the end of the year.

“Welcoming Mario and his family to Cadillac is an absolute pleasure,” says Jim Bunnell, Cadillac’s vice president-sales and service in the U.S.

“Miami is a dynamic auto market, especially in the luxury sector,” he says. “Mario is a proven leader, devoted to great customer experiences. I know it’s been a dream of his to join Cadillac. We’re honored this is now becoming reality.”

Community Leadership Spurs Other Investors

Since buying the original properties, Murgado has been as much a community cheerleader as a car dealer.

“We’ve spent time walking in the streets, talking to other business owners, promoting our business, then letting them see that there’s nothing better than your own actions – how you paint, clean, remodel, re-invest,” he says.

One product of Murgado’s evangelizing is Cuban-owned El Dorado Furniture. “They were also a catalyst,” he says. “We’re the two anchors. Between both of us, we fostered that desire, ability and drive and awakened the inertia of the entire area.”

“Mario was one of the first to have a vision,” says Evelio Medina, founder and president of the Downtown Miami and Brickell Chamber of Commerce. “That area was dilapidated, it had no economic development, and they came in and invested when no one else would.”

Murgado says an equally important part of his work is sharing his vision with his staff. “In 2001 there was a lot of condo and apartment construction going on in Miami,” he says. “I told our employees, ‘Look, one day those will all be filled and they will be our customers, and we should be there. It’s always about promoting a dual vision: how your community sees you and how your employees see the community and see the opportunity.”

He says many of his employees took advantage of the 2008-2009 real estate buyers’ market to move to the Brickell area, which gave them a stake in the community’s success.

In addition to entrepreneurial and community spirit, he credits his success to continuous improvement.

“The human tendency is to run away from change; we embrace change,” he says. “We look at how the industry has changed, how our business has changed, how our marketing and advertising have to change, and we devise strategies to embrace that change and try to be first in the market.”

“The thing I’m most proud of is during the downturn in 2008, when we took a step back and said we have to change something,” says Andreus. “We looked at the Internet, which is something we had not embraced fully at that time and became students of online marketing.

“As we did that we were the only Honda store in our district to have year-over-year sales increases and increased market share. Everyone else was going backwards and we were going full steam ahead.”

Andreus says the company changed its entire sales process from how it pays its staff to having more open communications with employees and customers.

“We don’t have a problem showing a customer what we pay for a car,” Andreus says. “It’s OK to make a fair profit and we explain that to our sales staff and customers.

“We tell employees what we paid for the car, this is what we get in holdback, and you’re going to get paid off of that full amount.

“We’ve reduced the percentage because now they’re participating in a much larger amount. The staff feels good about this transparency, and when we share information with our customers its helps put deals together.”  

Once the dealership established a new Business Development Center in 2009, Honda sales increased 25%, while overall district sales were down 13%. Murgado’s 2010 sales were up 23%, compared with a district-wide increase of 6%.

Even when the Japanese tsunami of 2011 temporarily halted vehicle shipments, Brickell’s Honda sales fell only 1.7% compared with an 11.7% loss for the Miami market.

Following a 26% drop in sales during the recession of 2008 and 2009, Brickell’s Buick-GMC sales roared back in 2010 and 2011, with 75% and 39% sales gains, respectively.

Murgado says these results would be impossible without properly trained employees.

“I look for a sales person who is service-oriented and who can communicate well,” he says. “In the past, all you had to do was talk. Today, it’s about a follow-up process, creating systems and processes for staying in constant communications with customers.”

What It Takes Today

Auto retailing has become more complicated, so salespeople need to know the market and understand the competition better, he says. “Today, all car makers are building good cars, so what separates you from them? Being a constant student of that product.”

He has looked at how Disney Institute and Ritz Carlton train their employees.

“If I can go to a Motel 6 and spend $79, why would I pay $250 at the Ritz Carlton?,” he asks. “It’s about the level of service, ladies and gentlemen serving ladies and gentlemen. Our customers are honored guests in our store; we want to make everyone a VIP.”

He describes his litmus test: “Would you want your mother or sister to shop at this store? Is it clean, safe, and attractive? Millions of people go through Disney every year and it’s one of the cleanest places you’ll even find. You can see their employees’ helpfulness and collaboration, their pride and passion – and how they can charge you a lot of money for those services.”

Murgado extends his passion to the world outside of his dealerships. As vice chairman of the Miami Children’s Hospital and chairman of its finance and marketing committees, he has helped raise $265,000.

In conjunction with the General Motors Foundation and the William J. Clinton Foundation, Murgado donated 30 GMC Sierra full-size pickups to earthquake relief efforts in Haiti. In 2012, as part of the “Pull Up Your Pants” community outreach initiative, he introduced a group of at-risk youth to the dealership business. 

His experience has given him a special sense of responsibility.

“We want to be a company that’s at the leading edge of the automotive world, that embraces change in the industry, that’s the best in its class, that’s admired by its competitors, that inspires its employees to achieve their dreams, and above all, a company that fulfills its clients’ automotive needs and is an active citizen in our community,” he says.  

Nearly 50 years after coming to America, he says “This is the greatest country in the world, a country where anything is possible.”

Company Profile

What: Murgado Automotive Group (corporate name), based in Miami, with several Florida dealerships.

Who: Mario Murgado, CEO of Brickell Motors.

Where on WardsAuto Dealer 500: No.98 (tied)

How many: 4,371 new and used units sold in 2014.

How much: Total revenue of $136.9 million.

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