| Updated: 5/20/2009 7:25 pm |
Published: 5/20/2009 4:20 pm |
For the first time since Chrysler said it wanted to shut them down, Crain Chrysler/Jeep/Dodge is speaking out. It’s one of nearly 800 dealerships the bankrupt automaker wants to shed by June 9th.
This week, 300 Chrysler dealerships are telling the bankruptcy court in the state of New York in a filing why they should stay open but the Crain dealership is not one of them.
Larry Crain tells FOX16’s David Goins Wednesday afternoon Crain is going it alone in its attempt to keep their dealership.
The signs are on the windows at Crain Chrysler / Dodge / Jeep on South University Avenue trying to sell rows and rows of new cars even as Crain fights Chrysler's attempt to cut them loose.
Larry Crain Jr. is still shocked by the letter saying his Chrysler dealership is on the chopping block.
"We had been told as recently as a few days before we received our letter that we were, in fact, going to be the dealer in Little Rock," Crain says. "The fact that manufacturers want to get rid of dealers or eliminate dealers makes no sense, it's illogical.”
He says there was either a lot of misinformation being passed around or Chrysler wasn't being upfront with him. Either way, Crain is fighting back. He is planning to respond in bankruptcy court later this week arguing it's the only full-line Chrysler dealer in Little Rock and without it, the state's largest city is left with no place to buy or service Chrysler vehicles.
"That takes it to an extreme that I don't think was ever intended even by the corporation," Crain says.
Even now, Crain Automotive Group says it hasn't heard what put them on the list to close. Larry Crain suspects Chrysler targeted it's older showrooms.
"Clearly the facility that we're in today is not nice and it's not modern, and it doesn't meet our own expectations for a dealership," Crain says.
But any expansion plans to west Little Rock won't happen unless Crain gets off the list of 789 Chrysler dealers set to close in three weeks.
“It's not just us, it's the community at large that could suffer from these kind of closures," Crain says.
Crain says attorneys for the automotive group plan to file a motion with the bankruptcy court on Friday ahead of the May 26 deadline. The Crain Chrysler dealership employs 50-60 fulltime employees. Crain tells FOX16 News the overwhelming majority will move into one of the nine remaining dealerships the family owns.
Crain received preliminary approval from Chrysler in 2008 to move their location from University Avenue to a new multi-million dollar facility at Colonel Glenn Rd and 430. However, Crain put the project on hold once Chrysler entered bankruptcy on April 30.
