On call

Brent Brown gives out his home and cell numbers to auto customers

Brent Brown’s pattern for motivating himself and others began on a musical note.

In his youth, Brent was pursuing a rock music career.

“I decided it wasn’t taking me in a direction I should be going for the rest of my life, so I quit the band to go on an LDS mission,” he says.

Brent told everybody about his mission plans.

“I had to convince myself, so the more people I told, the more committed I was,” Brent says. “I did the same thing with my diet, and I do the same thing in business. I’ll declare that we’re going to do something, and I’ll stand up and raise the battle cry. Then I’ll turn around and say to myself, ‘Now I have to come through. I’ve committed myself.’”

Brent has committed himself to Utah County and its automobile industry for more than 20 years.

In 1986, Brent was recruited by Utah’s Rick Warner organization to leave his job selling cars in Texas. Brent became part-owner of what was then Rick Warner Toyota in 1992, and then purchased the dealership in 1999 and renamed it Brent Brown Toyota. Since then, Brent has purchased additional dealerships and become Utah Valley’s first choice in automobiles (see the January/February Best of UV nominations in Utah Valley Magazine). His combined sales for 2008 will top $250 million.

Not bad for a man who barely graduated from high school — but would earn an “A” in risk taking.

“It was all along just crazy risk,” Brent says.

He was told he only had a 25 percent chance of pulling off his initial dealership purchase.

“I decided I would rather be sitting in the gutter completely bankrupt and homeless than to spend the rest of my life wondering if I could have pulled off the 25 percent,” Brent says. “That would be hell to not know. Every day I would have wondered.”

The first and all subsequent acquisitions have been based more on gut than GAAP (generally accepted accounting principles).

“I don’t spend nearly as much time in due diligence,” Brent says. “I just really believe things are going to work. I want my bullet flying before anyone else can get theirs up. Some people spend way too much time aiming and never get the bullet in the air.”

Although expansion has dictated that Brent no longer hands out every paycheck or knows all 400 employee names, he still keeps plenty on his to-do list. Namely, advertising and marketing.

“If I could speak every ad to every person face to face, that would be the truest form of advertising,” he says. “I have to rely on media to do that for me, but I want it to be exactly the way I want to speak to my customers. I can’t give that away to other people to do.”

Fortunately, Brent’s wife, Kim, owns Kim Brown & Associates, an advertising agency.

“We’d both be elected presidents of each other’s fan clubs,” Brent says about his wife of 27 years. “Her abilities in advertising are phenomenal, and she thinks I’m a whiz in the car business.”

People person
Brent builds relationships with employees by inviting them to go to lunch.

“I always have to preface it with the fact that I don’t have an agenda, I just want to spend some time with them,” he says. “Some of the good directions we’ve gone as a business have been the result of those lunches.”

Occasionally, Brent will go to lunch by himself to collect his thoughts. His dining spot of choice?

“Anywhere with a good salad!” he says. “I’ve lost 57 pounds. We had a diet contest at the dealership, and I won! I’m extremely competitive.”

Work hard, play hard
Brent is not an 80-hour-a-week entrepreneur. He has a “work-hard-play-hard” mentality.

“I try to do both to their fullest,” Brent says. “I will never be accused of being a workaholic. I don’t like workaholics under my employment. I’ve never been impressed with someone who skips their vacation or works their day off.”

Brent vacations about once a month.

“Because of the level of craziness in my work, I have to go and retreat,” Brent says. “I couldn’t keep this level up if I didn’t.”

The Browns like to leave work behind, but they come back into town “swinging,” Brent says.

“I feel very blessed to automatically shut off the business when I walk out the door,” Brent says. “When I lay my head on the pillow at night, it all shuts off and I sleep really well. But when I’m at work, I’m very much at work.”

Just a phone call away
Other than his ability to bend over backwards, Brent is perhaps most well-known for listing his home phone and cell phone on his business cards. He also has “red phones” around his dealership that ring straight through to his very own red Blackberry.

Although giving out his numbers seems like it would reduce his quality of life, Brent says it’s the most ingenious thing he’s done.

“By being so accessible, I bought myself freedom,” he says. “I’ve sent the message to my employees that if someone is having a problem you might as well solve it because if you don’t, they will call me. And then I’ll come to you and ask why you didn’t solve the problem. In essence it says, ‘Take care of it.’”

But the phone does occasionally ring — even in Italy at 2 a.m.

“I saw that it was a ‘red phone’ calling from the dealership, so I knew the caller didn’t know what time it was for me,” Brent says. “They were calling to say how great of an experience they had. That is actually the most common call I get — other than those who just want to see if I’ll really pick up.”

Economy Drivers is a new department for Utah Valley Magazine and will replace Eclipse Entrepreneur. As the sponsor of the department, Brent Brown is our first featured entrepreneur.

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