Last week, Texas was hit by one of the worst winter storms in recent memory. Today on CBT News, April Ancira, Chairman of the Texas Automobile Dealers Association (TADA) joins the show to discuss the aftermath of the storm and how it impacted automobile dealers in the state. Along with serving as Chairman of TADA, Ancira also holds the title of Vice President for Ancira Auto Group.
Ancira begins the conversation by providing her perspective on how the storm affected daily operations. She says that several of her automotive stores experienced some form of damage. As a state that hardly ever sees snow, Texas was ill-equipped to handle such a significant change in weather. At the time of the interview, Ancira says the temperature where she was located was 75 degrees Fahrenheit. However, the winter weather brought temperatures down to 9 degrees last week. Many automobile dealers closed their doors for the week as they dealt with a lack of power or running water.
The state of Texas is independent of the national power grid, leading to widespread blackouts across the state. The state’s power company tried to manage the outages with rolling blackouts. However, the rolling blackouts quickly turned to permanent blackouts leaving thousands of people without power while facing frigid temperatures. Ancira said that several automobile dealers returned to their business to find severe flood damage as water pipes froze and then burst.
Ancira concludes the conversation by sharing her thoughts on how to attract more females to the retail automotive industry. She says that automobile dealers must find a way to change the culture to meet family demands. Ancira believes that the working demands of females will need to change at a larger level in the country before the automotive industry begins to see real progress on this issue. Ancira says a diverse workforce helps customers feel more comfortable when going through the car-buying process.
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