LAST WORD

Gary Blake in his showroom. Michael McCord photo

In 1966, Gary Blake was 21, with a wife, a baby, and the proud owner of a three-bay Shell service station in Exeter on Portsmouth Avenue.

"I was a kid from the sticks of Maine," Blake told me when I recently visited his Gary Blake Saab dealership. "Gasoline was 31 cents a gallon and I made $60 a week.

"It was long, long hours for short, short money. I had to work so much but it's been a great, great ride."

I stopped by to talk with Blake because he has been one of those interesting souls who has followed his passion for an entire career -- in this case, the notoriously difficult auto-sales industry -- and done exactly what he wanted while building a successful business in the same neighborhood.

"Things were done a lot differently then," said Blake about the beginning of his journey, which led to owning two shops: the new car dealership Gary Blake Saab and Gary Blake Motorcars, which handles the pre-owned and repair side of the business and is located exactly where he started pumping gas and replacing oil filters.

Blake, a graduate of N.H. Vo-Tech (as it was called then and when it was located on Islington Street in Portsmouth), paid off his first business loan through a portion of every gasoline gallon sold. He got into the sales side not by design. He did a lot of "spillover" repairs for an independent Volkswagen dealer and after a few years ended up buying that business.

Ambition is one thing but surviving is quite another.

"This isn't rocket science but it was seat-of-the-pants training," Blake said of his business acumen. He also put himself in the position to take advantage of every opportunity. Call that luck by design.

"I had a mortgage and no capital money," he explained about his early business expansion plans. What he did have was a smart, local banker seemingly right out of a script from a Frank Capra movie. That crucial loan was "done by handshake" and he made the most of it.

"This was what America was all about to me," Blake said.

He hadn't planned on being a Saab dealer but a persistent representative kept knocking on his door asking him to take over the area franchise. Blake said no thanks a few times. He didn't know much about the funny-looking Swedish cars but the American-dominated auto industry was on the cusp of vast transformation with an influx of significant foreign competition.

The Saab guy stopped by one Friday evening and threw him the keys to a Saab and told Blake to drive it around for the weekend. Blake did and he was hooked. He bought the franchise in 1971 for $2,500 and he was in good position to take advantage of the first Arab oil embargo in 1973 when gas prices soared and fuel-efficient foreign cars began to grab market share.

"We grew it nicely," Blake said about the next 35 years. He's been offered chances to add a franchise or two to the business but he believes in his product. The consistency has allowed him to serve a few generations of customers from the same family. He tells me he's never strayed far from his roots and has donated time and money to countless local charities and organizations.

What has changed dramatically in his view is the love affair between Americans and their automobiles. It's less romantic and more pragmatic. He remembers his first auto love, a red 1957 Chevy Impala, and said cars when he was growing up were as valued as computers are today. He smiles when talking about two recent hires in the repair shop of young workers "who have fire in their belly for cars."

Blake has 25 employees and he still likes the thrill of greeting customers on the showroom floor (he couldn't resist trying to interest me in a Saab) or dealing with nitty-gritty business strategy. During his career, the sales environment has been turned upside down as customers come in today with more knowledge about cars than ever before. Sales professionals have to be smart, persuasive and understand their customers' needs better than ever.

Blake doesn't work the long hours for short money anymore. He's cut his schedule down to four days a week and is focusing his efforts on enhancing his company's brand name through marketing, while spending more time sailing, skiing and with his collie, Emma.

"Everyone has a passion," Blake said. "I've been very fortunate."