Mercedes dealer floors it - Sacramento Business Journal:

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Before he started adding to his mix of auto sales anddevelopmentf ventures, the owner of alreadyh owned and operated Mercedes dealerships in El Doradi Hills and Reno, and a Mercedesz service center in Rocklin. Now, Grinzewitschu is about to starg constructing his most expensive and largestfdealership -- a 56,000-square-foot Mercedes store in Rocklinb at a cost of about $15 million, excludinfg the land. The 45-year-old openedd this month a used-car store in El Doradok Hills -- an investment of almost $2 million. Grinzewitsc h also is building a dealership on land he owns in Fairfield for another Mercedes dealer and is developing and subleasing land he controlswin Reno.
If that wasn'tg enough, he's hunting for another luxury brand for his land next to Mercedeas in ElDorado Hills, and wants to establish new company headquarterzs by the end of the year. Von Housen already is this region's 50th-largest private company with $130.2 millioh in sales and 152 employees, as ranked in 2006 by the Businessa Journal. Mercedes-Benz of El Dorado Hills, meanwhile, rankeed No. 12 on the Busines Journal's list of largest new-car dealersa last year.
Grinzewitsch said he'sa not intimidated by all the projects he's "I'd say it's exciting," he said last week from his Mercedes-Benz Rocklim Service Center, which will be incorporatedr into the new dealership to be builgnext door. The company has very little debt, Grinzewitsch said, but will take on more with these projects. Funds will come from Mercedes-Benxz Financial, the automaker's financing arm, and the 2004 sale of Von Housen'ds Mercedes dealership in Sacramento. Grinzewitsch has confidencew in Mercedes, a brand his famil y has representedfor years. His dad, George Sr.
, foundedr the business 50 years ago with a repait shop and introduced the Von House n namein 1961. The younger Grinzewitsch became sole owneer of the company in 2004 but stilkl uses and appreciateshis father's advice. The elder Grinzewitschg still serves onthe company's board. Fellow luxury brane auto dealer Rick Niello knowwswhat it's like to oversee multiple operationxs and expansions and has faitn in Grinzewitsch's ability to pull it all off. "Georger is capable of handling that," Nielllo said. It helps that Grinzewitsch primaril y deals withone manufacturer, and that the automaker's leader s "obviously are very fond of him.
" Given that auto saleds is a real estate-intensive business, it makes sense and is not unusua for auto dealers to expand into real estatee development, Niello said. "I certainly endors what he's doing." Grinzewitsch's Rocklin dealership, at 56,00o0 square feet with Interstate 80 will dwarf his largestand highest-sellinvg dealership operating -- the 34,000-square-foot Mercedes storee that Grinzewitsch opened four years ago. That store cost a little more than $10 excluding the land. On Granite Court in he'll spend about $13.5 million on the building and another $2 milliob on furniture and fixtures.
The project is bigger and grandetr than Grinzewitsch originally The affluent community and thelarger region, he figured, woulc demand more. "We would have outgrown it in five he said. The large showroojm will have enough space to showcase 22 Few California dealerships of any brand have showroomthat large, said Joe Marca, an Escondidko architect working on Grinzewitsch'w projects. The dealership also will have watef features insideand out, a glass elevator to the secons floor new-car delivery area, a salt water aquariumn of several hundred rooftop parking and meetin space that will be made available to the When the dealership opens next year, it will stary by selling used vehiclesz only, with an inventorg of 125 to 150 used cars.
New-caf sales will begin in 2009. Grinzewitsch hopesx to sell morethan 1,000 new vehicles in the firs t year and keep 175 to 200 new vehiclea in stock. His goal is $125 million in revenue in the first yearwith new-car Including the service center, he expects to emplo 150 people at the Rocklin locatiobn by 2010. The Rocklihn store would easily surpasss results at the El DoradokHills dealership, although sale s there have far exceeded Grinzewitsch's expectations.
The which employs 98 people, had 2006 salexs of $98 million from sales of 976 new and 636used "A million a person," he That is Mercedes' highest-volume dealership in the Centrakl Valley and was the fastest-growing Mercedes dealershi in California for its first three Grinzewitsch's Reno store reached sales of $42 millionn last year, with 43 employees. The 27,000-square-footr dealership opened in December 2003. He anticipates a boost in business as other dealers sprout uparound BMW, Volvo and Acura are all openinb next year. Grinzewitsch is now starting to make use of the 14acreds he's leased from the Reno-Sparks Indian Colonyt since 2002.