In February, Luis Somoano acquired his fourth Ford Motor Co. franchise in the Miami area. His Doral Automotive Group now includes two Ford and two Lincoln dealerships.
For Somoano, acquiring a second Ford dealer was a family-related decision, he told WardsAuto in a Zoom call. He wanted to give his daughters Karen and Kristy, both of whom work for his Doral Automotive Group, a better chance of future success.
“Thinking about the future,” Somoano said, “I know that inventory will be vital to survive, and also scale.”
On Feb. 23, he acquired Ford of Hialeah from Victor Benitez and the Gus Machado Revocable Trust. Prior to this acquisition, Doral Automotive Group consisted of one Ford dealership and two Lincoln dealerships.
Somoano said he is very loyal to the Ford Motor Co. and trusts the automaker. He is currently a dealer principal on Ford’s global dealer council that’s led by Elena Ford, the great-great-granddaughter of founder Henry Ford and company’s chief dealer engagement officer.
Elena Ford asked him why he is so loyal to the company, Somoano said, and he told her Ford was responsible for “everything I own.”
So, when he was looking to grow his business, he was most interested in acquiring another Ford franchise that wouldn’t compete with his current Ford francise in Kendall, Florida, Somoano said. Then he was presented with the the opportunity to acquire Gus Machado Ford in the city of Hialeah, about 15 miles away.
The obvious choice
Gus Machado was a larger-than-life figure in the Miami area, as were his dealerships, Willie Beck, co-managing partner of a buy-sell advisory firm Bel Air Partners, told WardsAuto on a Zoom call. “In Hialeah, directions were given based on the Ford dealership,” he said.
When Machado passed away in 2022, Benitez, his minority partner and long-time general manager of the Hialeah Ford dealer, became its majority owner, while the Machado family retained a minority stake.
Early last year, Benitez started thinking about selling to spend more time with his many grandchildren, Beck said. Bel Air Partners represented Victor Benitez and the Gus Machado Revocable Trust in the transaction.
Somoano acquired the Kendall Ford dealership from Machado in 2019. So, when Bel Air began looking for a buyer for the Hialeah Ford store that would carry on Machado’s legacy, “we quickly identified Luis as the best buyer,” Beck said.
A luxury experience all around
The Ford of Hialeah dealership is compliant with the Trustmark image program, but in November of 2025 Ford announced a new image program called Signature 2.0”, which the automaker says puts “hospitality first.”
Somoano said he will upgrade the Hialeah store to the Signature 2.0 look, though not immediately. He figures it will take up to two years to get started on the renovation.
But he sees renovation as a good business investment. “In order to be effective, we need to have a great place,” Somoano said.
His experience with creating a luxury experience at his Lincoln stores has taught him the value of a high-class feeling, whether it’s the facility or the customer experience, Somoano said. He has taken lessons from his Lincoln stores to his Ford of Kendall store, as well.
For example, all of his dealerships have greeters, and every person who walks in is offered coffee or water, Somoano said. He eschews salespeople “who are waiting at the door” to pounce.
The greeters start by asking customers why they are there, then go a little deeper, Somoano said. It’s a defined process consisting of “a lot of small things,” he said.
Somoano expects implementing the new process means there will be staffing changes at Ford of Hialeah. “When you come to a legacy store, you need to be ready for anything and everything,” he said. But Somoano said he won’t be laying people off. Attrition will happen naturally.
After he puts the new processes into place, those who aren’t comfortable with them will leave, Somoano said. He expects more than half the current staff will leave voluntarily.
“People, they spend time in a business, they have an idea of that business, and sometimes you cannot change that idea,” Somoano said. “Right or wrong, you cannot change the way they do business.”
Today’s customers have so much information when they walk into a store, the salesman is “only a vehicle,” he said, “that can serve well if they know that the only duty they have, or 90% of the duty they have, is to make the customer feel that they are the center of the universe.”
Family first
Somoano isn’t opposed to acquiring more franchises, so long as they are in the Miami area. Although he is open to different brands, Ford has proved to him that it is the manufacturer he wants to be associated with, he explained, so “that doesn’t mean, tomorrow, that if I can buy a VW store in Miami, I will.”
He isn’t aggressively looking to expand, however. “I would say my primary focus was to buy another Ford dealer,” Somoano said.
It all comes back to his daughters.
“I don’t know how many more years I got, maybe 20, maybe 50,” Somoano said. “But in case I’m not here tomorrow, they can have a little scale on the market. And that was my priority, and from now on, if I can find something else in this city, I will.”
