LMP Automotive Holdings Inc.’s brief and tumultuous tenure as a franchised dealership group — which began as a vehicle subscription provider and later as a small public auto retailer — appears to have come to a quiet end this month following the sale of its two final franchised stores.
The two West Virginia dealerships, sold in separate transactions, have returned to groups in the Mountain State.
LMP on June 12 sold King Coal Chevrolet in Oak Hill, W.Va., southeast of Charleston, to Stephens Automotive Group, according to Chase Barton, the Stephens group’s operations manager. It was renamed Stephens Chevrolet.
“As LMP began to wind things down, we kind of got together and made something work for everybody,” Barton told Automotive News. “We’re very familiar with the store, and I still live in Oak Hill.”
Barton said he had been a partner in the Chevrolet dealership with Ernie Davis and Lori Davis from 2016 to 2020. Barton left the Chevrolet store and in April 2020 became a partner with Richard Stephens at Stephens Automotive in Danville, W.Va.
LMP purchased an 85 percent stake in three West Virginia stores, including King Coal Chevrolet from the Davises, in March 2021. The stores were the first franchised dealerships for LMP.
He said adding the Chevrolet dealership was a natural fit for Stephens Automotive between its Mitsubishi dealership, which it purchased in March 2022, in Princeton, W.Va., south of Oak Hill, and its Ford-Chrysler-Dodge-Jeep-Ram dealership in Danville, northwest of Oak Hill, where the group is based.
Barton said the group is open to expansion if the opportunity makes sense.
“We have a good reputation here in southern West Virginia,” Barton said. “The market doesn’t work for everybody, but it works well for us.”
LMP on June 13 also sold Beckley Buick-GMC Auto Mall in Beckley, W.Va., to Dutch Miller Auto Group, according to Chris Miller, that group’s president. The store was renamed Dutch Miller’s Beckley Auto Mall, Miller said. Beckley is southeast of Charleston.
“That is a market that we really do want to be in,” Miller said. “We are a West Virginia-based company. We want to continue to invest inside of West Virginia. Any opportunity that we can find inside of the state, we are very, very interested.”
It marks Dutch Miller’s first acquisition since it bought a Buick-GMC store in Kansas last July, according to Miller, who said he is running for governor in West Virginia.
Barton said his group and Dutch Miller Auto acquired and closed one used-vehicle dealership each from LMP in the transactions. Barton said Stephens’ used-vehicle store is in Summersville, W.Va., while Miller’s is in Lewisburg, W.Va.
While LMP CEO Samer Tawfik did not respond to requests for comment, Barton confirmed the Chevrolet and Buick-GMC stores were all of LMP’s remaining franchised dealerships.
It’s unclear what happens next to LMP, which had eight franchised dealerships at its height. All told, the company spent a little over 27 months as a franchised dealership owner.
LMP said in August that it would voluntarily delist its common stock from the Nasdaq, and its shares are traded over the counter.
LMP’s grand plans to acquire 80 to 100 dealerships by the end of 2022 never came close to materializing, especially after numerous challenges obtaining financing and closing deals.
In August, LMP’s board of directors unanimously recommended that stockholders approve a plan to liquidate and dissolve the company.
LMP then revealed it had reached an agreement to sell four West Virginia dealerships, including King Coal Chevrolet and Beckley Buick-GMC Auto Mall and two Florida Kia dealerships, to Atlantic Coast Automotive Group. However, in October, LMP said that deal had been terminated by the buyer.
A lawsuit filed against LMP in May 2022 in the Southern District of Florida by a shareholder was voluntarily dismissed by the plaintiff in December, a dismissal order shows. Shareholders in February and May received cash dividends.
LMP in March sold its Subaru and Kia stores in Mount Hope, W.Va., to Friendship Family of Dealerships. In December, LMP sold two Florida Kia stores to Morgan Automotive Group. LMP in October also sold a Chrysler-Dodge-Jeep-Ram dealership in New York to Tasca Automotive Group.
To some in the industry such as Sheldon Sandler, CEO of Bel Air Partners, a dealership buy-sell advisory firm in Hopewell, N.J., LMP lacked experience and adequate capital.
“My sense is they didn’t have a really good business plan,” Sandler said. “It seemed to be very unfocused. Their acquisition strategy seemed to be whoever raised their head first. It didn’t seem to make much sense, what they were doing.”
“The professionals really know where they want to go, what they want to buy and what they’ll pay,” he said. “They want to have a collection of stores for the synergy they can gain from having a group in one platform. LMP seemed to be sort of amateurish at this.”
