MARK O’BRIEN
President, O’Brien Ford — The Impact of electric cars on dealerships.
OCTOBER 25, 2022
Mark O’Brien is a third-generation Ford dealer and had been a 45-year resident of the Grosse Pointes until his recent move to St. Clair Shores. Club members will know his business by the familiar slogan, “Stay on the right track to Nine Mile and Mack…..”
For the past 30 years, Mark has served as general manager and chairman of Roy O’Brien, Inc., one of the Ford Motor Company’s most successful and long-running dealers, with a current 4.4 out of 5.0 score in DealerRater.
Mark currently resides in Saint Clair Shores with his wife, Gail. They have four adult children and a grandson. He and Gail enjoy world travel, fine dining, building, boating, and of course, grand-parenting. He holds a degree in Business Administration from Michigan State University, which he earned in 1981.
As Mark reported on the O’Brien website, its founder, Roy Edwin O’BO’Brien, Sr., opened the Ford dealership on March 14, 1946, with a $50,000 investment, ten employees, and NO NEW CARS FOR SALE! (World War II was ending, and all automotive production was shifted to war munitions and equipment).
Today, our 110 employees are engaged in bringing our customers the finest in automotive sales and services, and our average monthly payroll exceeds $600,000! Grandpa O’Brien would be very surprised to see how much we’ve grown!
His son, our past chairman, Roy E. O’Brien, Jr., ushered in an era of mass communication, increased customer satisfaction, and sales levels to place Roy O’Brien Ford in the Top One Hundred Ford retailers in the entire country!
As we look towards our future, our president and general manager, Roy Patrick O’Brien, envisions the new, state-of-the-art dealership. With a keen eye towards detail and our mission of “treating customers BETTER than they expect to be treated,” Roy continues the legacy that our grandfather and father created at the now famous corner of “9 Mile & Mack!”
Mark’s talk will focus on the electric vehicles coming down the road and how that might change the Dealership.