"And the Big Man Joined the Band”

I live very close to the Palisades Parkway, which starts at the George Washington Bridge and goes north along the Hudson River towards the US Military Academy. The Palisades Parkway is one of the most beautiful roads in America, it’s a winding road with two lanes, river views, lots of trees and no trucks. What a great ride and what a great time to listen to music, especially now.

When you’re my age you can’t go around the neighborhood or to Whole Foods with your convertible top down or windows and sunroof open blasting “Revolution” from the car. You really look like a degenerate old guy trying to look cool, but on beautiful Sunday mornings, after the gym around 9 am ish, without too much traffic on the Palisades and the top down or windows open with the radio blasting it’s totally worth it. I can sometimes even ride with the top down into November (with the heat and heated seats on).

When I first got my license there was only AM radio with a speaker the size of a coffee cup saucer. I remember the first car I drove was my mom’s Malibu Blue 1964 Thunderbird and The Beach Boys came on the radio... “Fun, Fun, Fun, till her daddy takes the T-Bird away.” I thought I was in heaven. You see, freedom for a 17 year-old was a car, and for less than $.30 a gallon you could buy $2.00 worth of gas and drive all day or night long with the windows open, radio volume on 10 and static every time you’d go under an electric wire. Actually, static all of the time, but you felt free.

Later on when I bought my own car, a 67 GTO, I bought one of the first eight track players. The guys who installed it suggested I buy separate speakers and run it through the new speakers not the existing ones... a really great idea. Plus, they gave me two eight tracks free, The Four Tops Live and Sargent Pepper. I remember the first time I went through the Midtown Tunnel and the music stilled played. (In those days the radio didn’t play in the tunnel.)

One of the pleasures of my life has been music. It helped define my generation’s politics and personality. And driving gave me freedom, the first freedom I really tasted as a young man. I have fond memories of both. I still treasure my freedom to drive every once in a while listening to the re-mastered “Born to Run” and I appreciate all the people who helped me get the freedom to be able to do this.

The reference to “The big man joined the band” at the beginning of this blog post is from the re-mastered “Born to Run” Tenth Ave Freeze Out, which I just downloaded from I Tunes. Give it a go yourself. What I do is divide the album in half and drive one-half of the album and then turn around.

I also sometimes drive to work on the Garden State Parkway listening to Springsteen. Does it get better than that? Oh yeah, I’m driving an F-Type… so it does even get better. Yep, freedom did some amazing things in those cars, especially in the back seats, but I never ate in them, drank coffee or put on makeup in traffic…

A Splendid Time was Had by All

This past April Jaguar Corporate invited their Dealers to Austin, Texas to a new State-of-the-Art Formula One racetrack to test-drive the three versions of the new Jaguar 2014 F-Type against it’s competition (if there is such a thing). 

It’s always a lot of fun to be with the dealer body, especially when there is new product. The event, as well as the reception to the new car, was great. There’s a picture of me with my favorite racecar driver, Davy Jones and of friends I’ve known over the past 20 years.

I had the opportunity to talk about family, furniture, music and cars with Wayne Burgess. He’s the young lad in charge of the design of the F-Type, boy that was fascinating. I had met Wayne a few times when I was on the Dealer Consul and traveled to the U.K.  He’s a very talented guy and is part of the “New Jaguar.” It also was fun watching the “Brits” enjoy the Texas BBQ and country music.

 

I invite you to Madison Jaguar to really get a sense of what the F-Type is like to experience. I’m personally enjoying the summer in a F-Type V8 495 HP S/C version, Italian red… sweet…

  

Goodbye Mr. Rata Tata... Good Luck & Thank You

Goodbye, good luck and thank you. This past December 31st Mr. Rata Tata retired from Tata as Chairman and CEO. I was very lucky over the past 4 years to have met with Mr. Tata at our store in Paramus, and at a few breakfast meetings I had the pleasure of attending.

 

Over the past 20 years I have met many people who have had a hand in changing Jaguar, but none had the real passion and “guts” to get it done. Not so long ago, I attended a meeting in the UK with a boatload of engineers that gave us (the Jaguar Dealer Council) an hour and a half long lecture explaining why we couldn’t have AWD in our XJ and XF. They also explained why we didn’t need it.

Mr. Tata took the time to tour the States and meet with dealers. He listened and asked questions, he didn’t lecture… We now have two of the best AWD sedans made.

I’m going to miss our breakfasts and wish him luck with his piano lessons. Who knows, maybe we can do a duet together sometime… I’d like that.

Best holiday wishes to you and yours...

Customer Service vs. Hospitality

First I would be remiss if I didn’t congratulate the people of Jaguar that were responsible for moving Jaguar 20 spots from 21st in JD Power’s Initial Quality to number 2 tied with Porsche (which is not bad company) and probably also a historic move-up for JD Power.

Jaguars are beautiful fast cars, always in style and more reliable than a Mercedes, BMW, Audi, and so very close to Lexus. How many of the competition do you see on the highway vs. Jaguars?

Recently I was watching a business news program on PBS and a segment came up from a professor (from Harvard I think) who was commenting on the difference between customer service and hospitality. It started me thinking about efficient service vs. personal service. I’ve been very lucky in my life and over the past 30 years I’ve been able to spend my summers in the Hamptons, mostly East Hampton, and for 25 years I was going to a very famous steak restaurant, maybe a couple of times a month for over 25 years.

I’m not famous but I’ve been known to be a generous kind of guy and you would think I would at least get acknowledged when I arrived. Now I’m not saying I ever had a bad steak, or in the middle of a snow storm in December didn’t get served the best beef steak tomatoes either.

The waiters were always efficient and sometimes even engaging. In fact, one now works at The American Hotel in Sag Harbor (best onion soup I ever had). But, I always felt like a customer; in, out, on to the next (I think they call it table turn).

Now look, for a good steak it was okay. One evening the place was crowded and they weren’t take reservations (it was early but not too early for the single working moms with the kids). The restaurant’s host, we’ll call him Mr. T, actually saw me, but then turned his back on me, making believe he hadn’t noticed me. I really didn’t expect him to stop the operation and get me a table at that exact moment, but I thought I deserved some kind of acknowledgement. Long story a little shorter, I never went back. Believe it or not, by me not eating there they are still in business.

So fast-forward a few years and friends from Florida are out and although they were in NYC for a couple of days (they eat mostly Italian) they get in the mood for a steak. Where you gonna’ go in the Hamptons for steak? So in spite of hearing “we only have reservations for 5pm or 10 pm and “my history” there I make a reservation for four of us at 5pm.

I don’t want to say that I opened the restaurant but most of the folks there were from “Bella Vista Phase II” (retired older folks). Who do I see at the desk, but none other than Mr. T. who says, “Mr. Squitieri we haven’t seen you in such a long time… we missed you… blah blah blah…”

After we’re seated he comes by the table, my wife comments how he hasn’t changed a bit, he asks, “where have you been?” So I tell him how last time I was here he offended me… he apologizes, talks about his retired partner, Spain and his place in Florida.

We had a wonderful dinner, a great bottle of wine and will go back and give it another try…so I’m thinking, “is this the difference between efficient customer service and hospitality?

So maybe we should revise Madison Jaguar’s mission statement to “We will seek to anticipate your needs, earn your trust and treat you like a guest, not just a customer.”

Pair of Italian Gloves: $4,957 with Free Jaguar XKE

A long, long time ago in a galaxy far, far away… (in Boston, Massachusetts.) Back when The Beatles were still a group, I was a wannabe advertising guy stuck as a communications major in a town that invented the “wind chill factor.” 

I was given an assignment to develop an advertising program for an existing company. Now it’s fair to say that I was more of a muscle car guy (having a GTO) than a foreign car guy, but for some mysterious reason unknown to me now, I chose Jaguar as my assignment. 

I had long hair, was cocky, and been known to take mind-altering concoctions. I always thought my advertising ideas were going to change America, no “plop, plop, fizz fizz,” or “that’s one-a spicey meat-a ball.” 

I was going to change things and have a social agenda to boot, probably a Frey boot, anyway now with the current bruhaha because of Mad Men, imagine, my first assignment I chose was Jaguar. Not a real macho second-generation Italian kinda car. 

This all came back to me like a “flash back“ because of the recent press on the XKE. My first attempt was a picture of a pair of Italian gloves…. only $4,957 and they come with a 1967 XKE… lame… maybe. 

But remember, it was the 60’s and Nixon was President. My next attempt was received with, “Mr. Squitieri very interesting…” Another magazine ad with the following letters taking up most of the page… A B C D F G H I J L M N O P Q R S T U V W   XKE… ”We not only invented the English language we reinvented the alphabet…” 

I would like to say thank God I never made it into advertising, maybe Jaguar wouldn’t be around today, or I’d be hanging from the back of my office door, or both. 

I would like to commend Jaguar and how they handled the recent press. We’ve always had reliability as an issue. We are the first to admit we had and are able to have some fun with it. I guess the real theme is, can you imagine the most beautiful car ever made was only $4,957?

All Things Must Pass

It’s been two months since the sale of Bergen Jaguar and things are moving along quickly at our Madison store… Renovations are scheduled to be completed by the end of the summer, which will include some additional improvements in our “state of the art” service center.

One store and one brand has already improved our customer relationships, which is our number one goal. We are also working on all points of customer communications with our staff so that our clients are communicated with in a timely, courteous and caring manner. Our strategy is to anticipate our customers’ needs and to earn their trust.

We have some of the most qualified, experienced, and nicest staff in the Jaguar business and they provide not only efficient, courteous service, but a personal experience you can only find at a Jaguar only store. We are not part of a large automotive group, we are a single point Jaguar dealer that wants to give you the “Jaguar Experience” you’ll only be able to find with us… Madison Jaguar, exceptional service, exclusively Jaguar.