Published December 2003

Lane marks five decades
in auto industry

Snohomish County Business Journal archive During the past 50 years, Dwayne Lane's presence in the auto industry has grown to include three dealerships in south Everett and Arlington.

By Kimberly Hilden
SCBJ Assistant Editor

When Dwayne Lane began in the auto industry 50 years ago, he was sure his first day would be his last. It was December 1953 and Lane, then a high school senior, was hired to wash cars at Walsh-Platt Motors in downtown Everett.

It was a cold, snowy day, at the end of which he had to help put the cars away, “because in those days, they had alcohol, not antifreeze.”

But as he was driving one of the cars up the ramp into the building, the “gorgeous, old black Buick” died halfway up. It then slid all the way down, grinding against the concrete wall along the way.

He looked out the car’s window only to see a man in a gray suit, with his hands on his hips.

“I thought, ‘It’s all over,’” Lane said. But the man, Harold Walsh, was impressed with Lane’s ability to “run” from morning ‘til night.

Photo courtesy of Dwayne Lane In the late 1950s, Dwayne Lane (second from right on bottom row) was sent by his bosses, auto dealers Harold Walsh and Frank Platt, to the Chrysler Corp. Training Center in Detroit, Mich. In those days, Lane said, there were no auto imports.

“That’s how I made it here — I did a lot of running,” said Lane, who began working full-time for the dealership after his junior year of college, becoming the dealer at Walsh-Platt Motors in 1969 and sole owner in 1971.

The dealership remained “Walsh-Platt” until 1987, when Lane built another store in south Everett for what would become his Chrysler-Jeep dealership, keeping his Dodge dealership downtown.

“That’s when I changed the name (to Dwayne Lane), because it’s less expensive to advertise one name than two names,” said Lane, whose business expanded further in 1995, when he acquired a Chevrolet dealership in Arlington.

Today, Dwayne Lane’s Family of Auto Centers includes those three dealerships (with the Dodge dealership relocated to south Everett), which employ 180 full time and more than 30 part time. All three dealerships regularly are listed among Auto Industry Cross-Sell Reports’ top 30 new- and used-car dealers in Snohomish County.

Since 1997, Lane’s son Tom has been chief executive officer.

“Tom’s done a good job,” said Lane, now 68. “He’s been running it for six years, probably some of the best years we’ve had. The economy helped quite a bit, but he’s done a nice job.”

And he has a great team — a key to building and staying in business, Lane said.

No easy task in the auto industry, a tough business that has seen its share of changes over the past five decades, the Everett native said.

“When I first started, there were no imports — absolutely no imports,” Lane said, adding that the added competition has been healthy for the American auto industry, leading manufacturers to improve their product and providing for greater consumer choice.

“Our truck and sport utility line are as good as anything in the industry, import or domestic, so we’re lucky there,” he added.

Relying heavily on repeat and referral business, Lane has learned that most customers reside within 20 miles of his dealerships, which is where he targets his advertising, from print ads to the now famous commercials featuring him with one of his horses.

“Arlington has a different market than the other two dealerships,” he noted. “It reaches into Everett, but you also have Marysville, Lake Stevens and Stanwood.”

It’s also the one that has grabbed the most headlines in recent years, as the company works to relocate the dealership, now on leased land in downtown Arlington, to a 15-acre parcel east of I-5 and south of Highway 530 at Island Crossing.

Bought in the mid-1990s, the acreage is part of 110 acres of land zoned for rural uses that has been the issue of debate for most of that time, as it has landed first in, then out, of Arlington’s urban growth area.

Lane has been trying to get the land rezoned for commercial use ever since, saying that while it sits on a flood plain, the dealership’s site development and design would mitigate any potential threat to the environment.

This fall, Lane’s rezone request was approved by the County Council, vetoed by Snohomish County Executive Bob Drewel and reinstated as the council overrode the veto.

In November, Gov. Gary Locke asked state officials to file a challenge to Lane’s rezone request. Lane has since begun the process of petitioning Arlington to annex the land.

Lane remains optimistic that the land will be rezoned, and a new dealership, one that will be developed over a little more than 5 acres, will be built.

“We hope to be breaking ground out there this spring,” he said. After that, well, the longtime auto man plans to concentrate his time and energy on horsepower — the kind with four legs, not four cylinders.

“Get Arlington built, and that will be the end of my run; then I’ll spend more time with my horses,” he said.

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