Stingray Chevrolet remains in the same automotive family.
Steve Hurley has worked in the auto industry for 41 years. In 2008, he managed the highest volume Chevrolet dealership in the U.S. Stingray Chevrolet opened in Plant City in 2004, but during the 2008 financial collapse, the dealership went bankrupt. Hurley, with partner, Tom Durant, took the opportunity to buy it so Hurley could become a dealer/owner. “We got an absolutely fantastic deal on the store,” Hurley said. “That is what made it possible, because it takes exceptional times like the recession to be able to buy a dealership at a discounted price.” They opened the doors on the day after Christmas, 2008. “The early years were tough, just like any new business, because it was a completely shuttered business when we bought it. But we were able to have a lot of success. As far as my career, it is the best thing I have done.” In aggregate, for the 17 years Hurley owned Stingray, the store sold more Chevrolets than any other dealer in the Tampa-St Pete-Clearwater-Sarasota region. Stingray annually sold three to five times above the number of cars Chevrolet expected for the dealership.
“I think so much of it is our philosophy,” Hurley said. “Our support for the community, the community’s support for us, and just a different way of doing business. We truly exemplified the concept of relax and enjoy the difference, which was our tagline, and treating customers and team members with respect on a level not at all common in the industry. A lot of people said we treated them like family, but I feel like we really took it to another level.”
Nationally, Hurley was on the Chevrolet Dealer Council for five years and served as the board chair for three years. In Plant City, he is the immediate past chair of Unity in the Community, a role he also took on in 2011 and 2012. He was also chair of the Plant City Economic Development Corporation in 2019 and 2020. He will remain a board member for both organizations.
“If somebody asked me what the one thing before we did all this I didn’t anticipate is, I didn’t anticipate the connection to the community to be as strong as it has been with Stingray,” Hurley commented. “The community has supported us in an unbelievable way, and our engagement with the community has everything to do with our success. The one thing I am more proud of than all of the accolades and successes—we were blessed to have quite a few successes in many areas of the industry—none are valued more by Susan and me than the overall support of the community and the engagement with the community that supported our business.”
Despite all of this, the time to retire comes around. Hurley and his wife discussed the possibility for several months. “We weren’t in a hurry to exit, but we had an opportunity,” he said. “Tom Durant is a silent partner and a major owner in the store. He had another partner named Joel Rogers at a dealership in Houston, but they sold that store a couple of years ago. Rather than completely sell Stingray Chevrolet, and it be called something else, we just sold our interest. It is still going to be Stingray. It is still going to have ownership from Tom Durant. It is still part of the same group. It was an opportunity for us to retire and for Joel to come in.”
The Hurleys are still engaged in the community. He is still going to be doing all that he can to raise funds for this year’s Stingray Chevrolet new vehicle raffle to benefit Unity in the Community. “I am more proud of what we have done with Unity in the Community than any accomplishment at the dealership. Plant City is an amazing community. Plant City has been very, very good to me and my family, and it is like nowhere else. The community has been a boon to me and my family. It has been more than I ever could have anticipated.”
