Despite crisis, Miami dealer increased advertising to keep up sales

In the 1990s, Arnaldo Bomnin was selling lobsters out of the back of a truck. Today, he's selling more Chevrolets than any other dealership in the U.S.

Bomnin, who fled Cuba after earning a medical degree and trading his dream of becoming a doctor for a career as a car dealer, got to No. 1 in the midst of a pandemic the same way he has approached everything in life: "You always need to be different to succeed," he said.

In early April, when many U.S. dealerships shut down to comply with government orders or voluntarily reduced hours, Bomnin, 49, told his employees that — other than implementing additional safety procedures — they would stay business as usual and spend more on advertising as competitors cut back.

"In the last two months, we have spent more money on TV ads than we have spent in the last 10 years," he told Automotive News. "I knew people would be at home. I knew that people would be watching TV."

Bomnin has three General Motors dealerships near Miami and one near Washington, D.C. His two biggest Miami stores, just 8 miles apart, rank first and third nationally in Chevy sales this year through May. Each has experienced less than a 10 percent decline year-to-date in a market forecast to be down at least double that.

If inventory wasn't strained because of GM's two-month production shutdown and he could count sales of loaner vehicles toward the stores' volume, they would rank first and second, Bomnin said.

In the second half of March, two of Bomnin's stores went from being on track for a record month to having their worst two weeks in the last decade. "The feeling was like a train impacting a concrete wall," he said.

Starting April 4, as the coronavirus continued to sweep through the country, Bomnin limited all of his showrooms to 10 employees and shortened their hours, with most staffers working every few days.

But he couldn't sleep that weekend because he felt he was "getting on the same train" as everyone else. So Bomnin asked his leadership team what they would want to tell future generations they did during the pandemic. Most wanted to be able to say they worked harder than ever to provide for their family, he recalled.

The idea resonated with Bomnin, who after arriving in Florida worked in landscaping, made boxes for avocados for $5 per hour and sold lobsters to earn enough money to bring his family to the U.S. So he called all willing employees back to work with safety measures in place.

"When you are responsible for 525 families, you cannot focus on the negative," he said. "You need to focus on solutions and opportunities so we can all succeed."

Most common areas within the showrooms remain closed, and customers and employees must wear masks and maintain social distancing.

Sales improved each week in April. New-vehicle sales were down 25 percent for the month, compared with an estimated 50 percent drop across the industry, according to the Automotive News Data Center.

While Bomnin's extra TV advertising promoted the big discounts GM was offering, his dealerships posted videos about health and safety on social media.

"What helps tremendously is the approach of being different," Bomnin said. "Taking the course that we're not going to hide at home and be at home every other day. We decided to step out of the COVID zone and not have fear."

In 1994, a 24-year-old Bomnin had just graduated from medical school and learned that the Cuban government wanted him to become a military doctor. He decided to leave for Miami to pursue his medical career in the U.S.

After multiple attempts to secure a visa and a year of convincing the Cuban government to let him go, he finally moved to Miami in 1996. He came with no money, only three gold rings and a watch, and he didn't speak English. He studied the language at a Miami community college at night.

Later that year, his cousin's husband offered him a job at a Nissan dealership. Bomnin assumed he'd be a porter or a service technician since he was still learning English, but the manager hired him as a salesman.

Three years later, he reached a crossroads: pursue his medical career or continue in auto retailing and bring his family to the U.S. faster. "I decided I'd make a doctor's degree in the car business," he said.

In 2000, Bomnin became sales manager at a Chevy store. A decade later, he bought the store, now called Bomnin Chevrolet Dadeland, with GM's help. He added Bomnin Chevrolet West Kendall in 2016, Bomnin Chevrolet Manassas, in Virginia, in 2017 and Bomnin Cadillac-Chevrolet Homestead last fall. The Dadeland store, which sold more than 7,100 new and used vehicles last year, remains his biggest.

With those four locations, Bomnin Auto Group ranked No. 88 on Automotive News' 2019 list of the top 150 dealership groups in the U.S.

His wife, brother and father now help him run the Miami-area stores. And two sons of the cousin who hired Bomnin at the Nissan store are his business partners at the Manassas dealership.