Bob Rohrman: CEO of Bob Rohrman Auto Group.

Company stats

Bob Rohrman Auto Group

Headquarters: Lafayette

Founded: 1963

Revenues, 2007: $850 million+

Employees: 1,300

Snapshot

Robert V. "Bob" Rohrman

CEO since: 1963

Birthplace: Lafayette

Education: Lafayette Jefferson High School, officer training in the U.S. Army, and many automobile training schools

First "real" job: Washing pots and pans and cooking at Midlothian Country Club in Illinois, between his sophomore and junior year of high school.

O&A

How did you decide to pursue a career in this industry?

I started selling Ford cars after the Army at the Glenn R. Pitman dealership. After six months as salesman, I was promoted to used car manager. Six months later I was promoted to new car manager, and six months later promoted to general manager. After seven years at Pitman, I decided to venture out on my own and opened a used car dealership in 1963. In 1969, I acquired a Toyota franchise.

What is the best business advice you recall getting and who made the suggestion?

It was from the vice president of Glenn Pitman Ford. After two years of working at Pitman's, I went in to talk to the VP about quitting and starting my own dealership. The VP of Pitman told me I needed to wait awhile--it was too early. He told me to wait another five years, so I did.

What has been your most successful project?

Opening up the Schaumburg, Illinois, Honda store in 1985 as a new dealership point. From then until now I have opened up 14 dealerships in the Chicago suburbs.

Can you share an experience that didn't turn out as you expected, but provided a valuable lesson?

I sold a car to a farmer a couple years after starting at Pitman's. The farmer would come to town every day and trade wheat, corn, etc. This farmer talked me into buying several train car loads of frozen eggs. I put in $5,000. One week later they said the $5,000 was gone and they needed more money I put in another $2,000. Since then, I have never gotten into commodities market.

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What goals would you like to accomplish in the near term?

Get a new Honda Jet when they come off the assembly line in a couple years, learn to fly it and then fly to Europe.

"OLD BOB ROHRMAN IS a good friend of mine." So goes the car commercial that most of us have heard at one time or another--and probably many, many times.

That's also what they've been saying a lot in recent years at his alma mater, Jefferson High School in Lafayette. Rohrman made his mark on the school with a $3.5 million donation that has been used to construct what is being called the Rohrman Center for the Performing Arts. The center will include a renovated theater, dance studio, keyboarding laboratory, rehearsal and practice rooms, classrooms and conference rooms. New construction will open in the fall, and existing space will then be renovated.

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"I have always loved this school and its community," Rohrman told an auto-industry publication when he announced the donation. "I strongly believe a student's overall learning experience should include participation in the arts. It makes not only the student, but all of us more complete and well-rounded."

Rohrman was a hard worker all the way back in his high school days. Not only did he get a summer job as a country club dishwasher, but he also ushered at the Lafayette Theater. And during the two years leading up to his 1952 high school graduation, he worked full-time at the Brown Rubber Co., putting in time on the 11-7 shift. After spending a couple of years in the Army, he started selling cars in 1955, at Pitman Ford in downtown Lafayette.

That, of course, is what he has been doing ever since, but the scale is vastly different now. Several years after joining Pitman Ford, he opened his own lot at Sagamore Parkway and Kossuth Street, and in 1969 he started selling Toyotas from that spot. Today, Rohrman is one of the biggest car dealers in the country, with some three dozen dealerships in Lafayette, Indianapolis, Fort Wayne and the Chicago area. He easily makes the Automotive News list of the nation's top 125 auto dealers, routinely in the top 30.

Chicago is where Rohrman has made his biggest mark. His dealerships dot the suburbs, and his advertising jingles fill the airwaves. Among his latest projects is a $100 million, 50-acre auto mall in Arlington Heights, which will employ 500 people and is projected to sell some 900 cars a month. Rohrman plans to move some of his existing dealerships to the auto mall.

One unusual facet of the auto mall will be a Lexus dealership with out-of-the-ordinary amenities. Lexus customers will be invited to not only visit the dealership's coffee shop and boardroom but also take in the services of an onsite multimedia room and day spa. Lexus general manager Paul Batchen tells the local media that other dealerships may have coffee shops, but this is likely to be the first with a fitness center, hair salon, manicurist and massage therapist: "Lexus is about luxury and innovation."

And so, apparently, is Indiana native and car king Bob Rohrman. Certainly, Lafayette Jeff arts students will benefit from his appreciation of the arts and luxurious surroundings. And they'll be grateful for his loyalty to his alma mater.

"I will always be a Broncho," he told a Jefferson High School crowd when he announced his donation in 2003. Rohrman pointed out that he continued to buy tickets to every basketball home game, decades after his graduation. Of the school's mascot, he said, "I could never figure out why they spelled it with an 'H'--B-R-O-N-C-H-O. Well, I got it now. The 'H' stands for heart."