Family invests generations into cars

Janine Marnien

LA CRESCENTA -- Even though Bob Smith Toyota has been in town for a

relatively brief nine years, the family that owns and operates it is

anything but new to the car business.

The dealership on Foothill Boulevard is carrying on a family business

that started in 1919, when Bob Smith Sr. bought his first car dealership

in San Francisco.

Passed on from father to son for four generations, the Smiths have

sold Chevrolet, Dodge, Volkswagen, Porsche, Audi, BMW and Toyota products

for more than eight decades.

For Mike Smith, who now owns and operates Bob Smith Toyota with the

help of his son, Peter, being able to work with his family is an

“incredible gift.”

“How my father orchestrated us to be so compatible in business with

him and each other is unbelievable,” Mike Smith said. “With Peter, it’s

so exciting to walk into work each day and have my son there. It gives me

total energy.”

Peter Smith first began working for his dad washing cars for “four or

five bucks an hour” during his summer vacations. Although he makes

substantially more now as the dealership’s general manager, it was those

summers that gave him some of his favorite memories with his father.

“Going to lunch with him was a treat,” Peter Smith said. “Just to be able

to go to lunch with your dad was something special.”

Together, Mike and Peter Smith have seen changes in consumer trends

over the years. The biggest difference in customers has been in level of

education, Peter and Mike said.

“In years past, people really only had the library to go to for

information on cars,” Peter said. “Now, information comes from

everywhere. Customers walk in and they know exactly what they want, and

the challenge is to keep up at their pace.”

A trend the Smiths suspect will develop is a growing demand for the

Prius, Toyota’s hybrid vehicle, although Peter says the technology is

still too new to have much of an effect right away.

“We are definitely headed in that direction, but it probably will take

about 10 years before you’ll really see a turn toward that type of

vehicle,” he said.