16th June 2023

Visitors:  Sally Morrison, Ross Mosley, Bernie Taylor, Warwick De vere

President Linda welcomed all our guests to the Armitage along with Mike Farmer

 

 

Les introduced Mike Farmer the MD at the Farmer Auto Village group and noted their amazing involvement in the community including recently gifting an Ambulance to the city.
 

Mike started by mentioning their involvement in the Tauranga Coast guard, and their need to raise $200,000 next month, so please support.

 

Mike' gave us an update of the history of the Farmer Motor Group. It all started in 1991 is buying Bay Nissan with a team of 12. The new franchises that they built over the years included Subaru in 1993, Audi and VW in 1996. Chrysler Jeep and Dodge in 2002. Around 2005 the concept of the auto village was born and they sold their site with a current ANZ building on Cameron Road. With that they purchased a site along Hewletts Road to open under the auto village in 2008.

 

Recent brands included the addition of MG, Haval, as well as in 2011. They sold Hyuandai to Ebbetts who had  lost the Holden franchise 2013. In addition they have added  brands like Fiat, Alfa Romeo adding to the marquee of car brands. The Farmer Auto Village even opened up a Campervan Centre in 2019!

 

Today they employ over 180 people in the Bay of Plenty with turnover of over $190 million and sales of 250+ cars per month. They currently service over 150 cars every week and on their estimates have around 45% of the market share. Mike also noted that if you needed your wheels repaired they have the only state of the art diamond cut wheel repair service in Tauranga.

 

Then he set out to describe the next five years for the Farmer Auto Group. This is includes them building in Papamoa  a 12 bay service centre for all the brands. They will also introduce a new showroom for a Spanish brand built by VW called Cupra. On the corner of the Village there'll be new showrooms for MG and Haval overt the next three years.

 

Mike talked about the different types of alternative fuels available to the market, including ICE (internal combustion engine), mild hybrids, hybrids, PHEVs, and BEV’s (full battery EV’s)
Finally Mike told us about the huge number of electric type vehicles that are coming to market and the options available over the next 12 to 18 months. Mike's view is the traditional combustion engine is not going to disappear anytime soon. Although many manufacturers of Motor Vehicles won't produce petrol engines by 2035! He also thinks battery technology will continue to evolve, however, given the wear and tear we will still need to serve as cars.On that note Mike finished up and thanked the Club

 

Award presentation:

Pat Taylor presented awards to Wayne Shadbolt as a Kiatiaki, with an award for all the service that he does in the community which includes the House of Science, Graham Dingle Foundation board, Chamber of Commerce business mentor, The Link Trust Foundation Board, social supermarket, Foundation for the church.
Pat was also very proud to be able to present an award to Wayne’s wife Chris Shadbolt for all that she does.
Both very well deserved.

 

 

Dean gave us a update of the world of Costco, which he has recently come across on a visit to Auckland over Kings Birthday weekend. He ended up visiting Costco with his daughter to buy of all things Car Tyres. He didn't think that you could buy car tyres at Costco, and they wouldn’t be very good anyway!
However, after a $60 membership fee, and a very large warehouse, with 15 minutes wait to find a car park and queues out the door. They did indeed find car tyres at Costco, even Michelin  and Bridgestone.
He estimated that there might have between 3/4000 people spending their weekend/day at Costco.

With a 40 minute wait for a $2 Hotdog - the best hotdog you will ever have!
After all that Dean reassured us that his visit to Costco will not define him!
 

 

 

When you talk, you say no, you say what you know. If you listen, you may learn something new.