Inside Automotive with Jim Fitzpatrick, powered by CBT News

Lotlinx Leaders on the Future of Dealer AI

• Jim Fitzpatrick • Season 1 • Episode 34

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AI is rapidly transforming dealership operations, and on this episode of Inside Automotive, Lance Schafer (EVP & GM of Product & Technology at Lotlinx) and Len Short (Executive Chairman) break down how LotGPT—a new AI tool built exclusively for car dealers—is reshaping inventory management, pricing strategy, and daily decision-making.

In this conversation, Schafer and Short discuss:

  • Why dealers need an AI platform designed specifically for proprietary data
  • Insights from 150,000+ dealer queries during LotGPT’s pilot phase
  • How the tool consolidates dealer data with market intelligence for precise inventory and pricing recommendations
  • Popular use cases like seven-day move-it plans, optimized markdowns, and inventory risk prediction
  • How free access and simple integrations support broad dealership adoption
  • Future expansion into training, incentives, and OEM-level decision support

The guests highlight how AI-driven insights can help operators make faster, smarter decisions—turning complex data into actionable strategies that strengthen performance across the dealership.

Inside Automotive with Jim Fitzpatrick is powered by CBT News, your go-to source for the latest news, trends, and insights in retail automotive. Subscribe for more interviews with top industry leaders, dealership innovators, and experts shaping the future of automotive.

For more content, visit CBTNews.com and follow us on your favorite podcast platform.

Announcer:

Welcome to Inside Automotive with Jim Fitzpatrick.

Jim Fitzpatrick:

Hey everyone, Jim Fitzpatrick. Welcome into another edition of Inside Automotive right here at the CBT Automotive Network. Lotlinks has launched an AI advisor specifically for dealerships called Lot GPT. How cool is that name? Joining us today to break down how LotGPT works and what it means for dealerships is Lance Schaefer, who's LotLinks EVP and general manager of product and technology. And Len Short, you've seen him here before on CBT News. He's the LotLinks Executive Chairman. Gentlemen, thank you so much for joining me for this big announcement here on LotGPT. I gotta hand it to you, Len. You're always knocking the cover up the ball from a marketing standpoint. That's a great name.

Len Short:

Well thank you, sir. I uh glad to be here. And I brought my uh my partner, Lance Schafer, who is the genius behind this product. You know, and I I I think you've noticed, you know, uh all the geniuses have wild hair, and Lance is a

Jim Fitzpatrick:

The wilder the hair, the greater the genius, right?

Len Short:

It's true. What does that make me? You know, it must uh say something about me. Anyway.

Jim Fitzpatrick:

That's exactly right. So so for those that are hearing about uh lot GPT for the first time, um, what exactly is it and why is it important for uh you know an important development, I should say, for dealers today.

Len Short:

Yeah, as you know, we've been deep into machine decisioning and machine models for way before anybody else.

Jim Fitzpatrick:

Yeah, you were doing it when it wasn't cool.

Len Short:

I know, and everybody thought I was uh, you know, telling it windmills here. Exactly. It was really Lance, you know. Um and you know, we have this massive data set.

Jim Fitzpatrick:

Yeah.

Len Short:

And we also have, you know, we we hold the the data of our dealers, our dealer partners. So we built this very secure way of hosting their data and making it accessible and activating it on their behalf. And, you know, we sorry, we all um I Lance was telling me, hey, you texted me that the minute ChatGPT launched, and he was showing me the text exchange back. This was a couple years ago. And um, you know, we did this because we could, and because there's a fundamental need for dealers, Chat GPT good is good at general information. But when you're when you need a tool for a specific application, it falls apart. As a matter of fact, I'd encourage your viewer viewers to ask ChatGPT what it thinks of Lot GPT. Because when we run the same question side by side on Chat GPT and Gemini and LotGPT, and then we ask them all to rate it, they all say Lot GPT is much, much better for the for the dealer. Because it's very specific, it gives dealers a very clear view of their you know, their inventory situation, any question they really want to ask it, and and actionable you know, decisions that they can make from that information. Puts it all in one place, makes it makes it easily accessible. And um you know, we think that's a big value. It's you know, we've got we've had a couple of hundred, about 400 dealers, you know, hacking away at it in data. And today we open it up to another couple hundred of you know principles, and we'll continue to let more and more people in on this. And you know, we've had, you know, I think we're up to over 150,000 queries, and you know, they're using it, you know, most people are using it every day, and most of those are using it multiple times a day. Wow, because it's you know, it gives them what they need, you know, information at their fingertips.

Jim Fitzpatrick:

Sure, sure. Lance, I see you shaking your head. Did you want to add to that?

Lance Schafer:

Yeah, 100%. And just to add to that, you know, the these broader uh chatbots like ChatG PT, et cetera, do not really uh aren't they're helpful, obviously. Dealers are using them every day. We know that. What we think is they need a safe place that they can have their data uh stored with with us. Um it's not that safe necessarily to load all your, especially private data or upload your data into these large models. They could be used for training and even they advise against that. So having, you know, we've had got decades of experience of of housing dealers' data, uh, you know, we were sock to compliant on you know from uh from that side of it. And data is the fuel of getting the proper responses. And if you don't have all your data and and in an automated way that that's updated several times a day, uh that that really allows for much, much better answers, like and you know, alongside all the other things, like Lotlinx's is data alongside that, and and and really just giving dealers exactly and then also fine-tuning that the models uh on the actual for for dealers, so that it's actually made for dealers. So those those are the kind of three kind of things that we realized fairly early on that without those three things, dealers were not we're not gonna be able to get the most out of AI. So that was really where we focused here over the last uh uh year here.

Jim Fitzpatrick:

Yeah, for for sure. Um during the pilot phase, you mentioned dealers submitted over um a hundred and fifty thousand queries. What were some of the most common or insightful that you use uh that you use for case studies

Len Short:

You know, Jim, uh the the product has a feature which is today's hot prompts? So you can just see it feeding what people are asking it in real time. And deals get a lot of you know nourishment from that because it gives them ideas about how they can do it for themselves. So I'm just looking here at today's hot prompts, and you know, the one at the top right now is you know, create a seven-day move it plan for my uh slow movers. The next one is uh what's a markdown playbook that doesn't teach consumers to wait? You know, optimize uh uh price tests over seven days. You know, they're they're using her for very tactical you know decisions. And as you know, as a former operator, there are hundreds, if not thousands, of decisions to make every day.

Jim Fitzpatrick:

Oh, yeah, no question of that.

Len Short:

And you know, and and we all know that information is power, yep. And frankly, the right information is profit for a car dealer.

Jim Fitzpatrick:

That's right.

Len Short:

Right. So you know, I was talking to when we uh announced this, uh, the president of one of the largest groups called me, a guy I didn't know, and was very excited about this. You know, they have all the resources. They said, listen, we've got all the resources, we've got you know endless reporting and data platforms. I can't get information, I can't pull it together. Right. I mean, it's all right there, but it's and and you know what they really need is a machine to do that for them, just digest it, you know, you know, look at the whole situation, make a very concise recommendation, and that's how they're using it. They're using it to make you know to basically call their next play on the dealership. Uh, you know, and it has incredible power. It can predict cars that are gonna be a problem, so you don't have to wait until after the fact. It can, it can, you know, if you just go to the tool and just look at the hot hot prompts, you'll see how dealers are using this as a operating tool for their dealership. That's us, you know, it's just you know, how can we take all the stuff we have and make it available to dealers so they can you know run their dealerships better? Sure. And you know, and and one one point about this, everybody's talking about well, AI is gonna come along and destroy a lot of jobs. I don't see it in the car business. I think what it's gonna do with the car business is make every operator better.

Jim Fitzpatrick:

Yeah, yeah.

Len Short:

You know, I I had lunch with an owner, 23 stores, northern Florida, and he was telling me he's a really great operator. I mean, a magnificent, magnificently successful guy, and was telling me, listen, I've got 23 stores, I have two guys. He came up through used. So I have two guys that are like really solid youth. The rest, you know, and he wasn't putting him down, he's just he's saying that's the fact of the business. Yeah, and he said, even those guys take vacations and make mistakes and go down rabbit holes for, you know, and and so he was just very excited about listen, how can you give me a tool that makes my really good people consistently better?

Jim Fitzpatrick:

Yep, that's the truth.

Len Short:

We don't know- That's what machines do.

Jim Fitzpatrick:

That's right.

Len Short:

Machines, you know, just consistently deliver, and you know, they have heavy lifting capacity.

Jim Fitzpatrick:

That's right.

Len Short:

And you know, that's what the dealers need. So I think it's just gonna make car dealers more profitable, more effective. Everybody's gonna be an expert.

Jim Fitzpatrick:

Yeah, you mentioned some of them, but Lance, how does Lot GPT use VIN level and market data to help the uh dealers improve pricing, merchandising, and overall profitability?

Lance Schafer:

Yeah, so like on the VIN side, and this is where LotGPT really shines. And it, you know, once uh our beta testers realized what they could do at the VIN level, it became probably one of the most popular features. Or literally you can cut and paste your VIN inside of LotGP T. Now, try doing that on ChatGPT, it won't do anything. Now LotGPT, what it does is it gathers all the data and intelligence and starts recommending actions around the vehicle. And I mean, it's unbelievable the actions that are incredible that it recommends. Like, don't lower price, you've got three hot leads on this right now. It's like, really? Or or you had 25 EDP views in the last three days on it, you're probably priced right, just give it a little bit of time. So I think it's saving um operators a lot of money by providing account or or pointing out things that they just don't have time to look at every single VIN and producing that at scale. So the VIN level intelligence is really, of course, unique. And again, it's a something that's only possible with the right data set put together and the right kind of knowledge base and fine-tuning.

Jim Fitzpatrick:

That is an incredible tool-

Len Short:

So here's the catch: It's free. We've opened this.

Jim Fitzpatrick:

What do you mean it's free?

Len Short:

It's free.

Jim Fitzpatrick:

What do you mean it's free?

Len Short:

Yeah, we're we're we've decided, you know, to do to make this available to every dealer for free. So all you have to do is go to lotgpt.com, you enter your dealership URL.

Jim Fitzpatrick:

Wow.

Len Short:

You know, right now we're we've got a waiting list because we've been just swamped.

Jim Fitzpatrick:

Oh, I'm sure. I'm sure.

Len Short:

And and you know, so you gotta, you know, you might have to wait a few days and then we'll get you.

Jim Fitzpatrick:

That's no big deal.

Len Short:

You know, and and it's a free tool for dealers.

Jim Fitzpatrick:

They're don't have don't have to be a Lotlinx client? You don't have to be a Lotlinx client.

Len Short:

No, no.

Jim Fitzpatrick:

Nice.

Len Short:

No, and wow, and I you know, I uh you know, luckily, you know, we're still an independently run you know company. Sure. So we can do you know what we want to do. We don't have you know masters telling us you know everything has to be for profit. Sure. And I just felt like listen, if dealers get access to information, they'll make better decisions.

Jim Fitzpatrick:

Absolutely.

Len Short:

They'll be smarter dealers, and we tend to do very well with a smarter power dealer. We have very high penetration, the big groups, the big power stores.

Jim Fitzpatrick:

Damn, that's fantastic.

Len Short:

We're trying to bring everybody along. That's that's what we're doing here.

Jim Fitzpatrick:

Is this your way of giving back to the uh community that's been given to you?

Len Short:

We debated, you know, how should we charge for it? And we just finally said, hey, listen, you know, it's it's not it's a costly endeavor for us. Sure. But we just felt like, listen, you know, you give and you know it'll come back around to us one way or another. The power of VIN level decisioning, you know. So um, yeah, so that's what I don't want people to miss because I'm sure they're they're thinking, okay, what's the price for this?

Jim Fitzpatrick:

No, that's that's huge.

Len Short:

Yeah, yeah.

Jim Fitzpatrick:

Jeez. How quickly, how quickly can a dealership get on board? I mean, if they like you said, if they sign up, they get in line, and then in a few days or

Len Short:

Aa couple days, probably we're gonna start picking up the pace. We'll let them in. And then listen, it will do incredible things for you without even giving it any information. Then it's very simple. If you want to house your dealer completely, you know, your dealer data completely secure, only you can see it, only you can use it, it'll never get touched. SOC2 compliant, you know, you can you can open up your you know, GA and some other, you know. But for instance, like Lance tells you, hey, you know, if you put in your CRN data, it'll start making all these incredible recommendations about uh you know what's going on. Yeah. And so so the second step I would recommend for dealers is it's free, you just make a couple clicks, or people will integrate it. We do it every single day. We've done this for 15 years, you know, thousands of dealers, you know, we're um and it's uh and that's when you get you know the real power of the thing. Sure.

Jim Fitzpatrick:

And uh yeah, so it's so how do you see Lot GPT growing in the future and what's the long-term vision for its role in retail automotive?

Len Short:

Yeah, I think I think dealers right now, if you ask, I mean, I don't know a dealer who's not using Chat GPT. And you know, we uh obviously that's uh it's a great platform, it's magic, but it does, and it can do a lot of things, you know, general things for you right now. So dealers are using every day. We just felt like dealers needed a vertical application. Sure, absolutely that was built specifically for dealers that that went uh you know thousands of levels deeper, you know, and much more powerfully, you know, powerful for the for the dealer. So so you know, where it goes from here, it dealers are asking us all sorts of things, like, you know, how do I train people on this incentive plan program or this stair step? How do I, you know, it they're asking it all sorts of things. They think it's great answers, but you know, we've got a team of trainers that you know work with those queries and make sure that all of the right data is coming in and those answers just become better and better. So you know that's where it'll go. I mean, I think dealers I mean, we're seeing that right now with our user base. They're just using it for everything. They're you know, um, they're even asking it what to what to have for dinner. And you know what it tells you? It knows where your store is, it knows exactly what's around you.

Jim Fitzpatrick:

That is incredible.

Len Short:

Whether your sales are down, I actually had a response one time, so sales are down, you better make dinner quick. You know, maybe fast food is a good option for you.

Jim Fitzpatrick:

What should I do with Bobby Smith? He's the low guy in the totem pole. Do I train him? Do I fire him? What do I do?

Len Short:

I'm not joking. This is what they're using it for. And you know, that is crazy. You ask Chat GPT, and it it doesn't, you know, it knows you're a car deal. This thing knows you're a car dealer, knows exactly what you're up against.

Jim Fitzpatrick:

That's scary. That's scary. Yeah. Len, you've been like the the the father of of of AI in the we've talked about it before in retail automotive. I mean, 10, 12 years ago, you were out there pitching, let the machines do the heavy lifting, basically. And and this thing is uh it's almost like now the the the world has come to your doorstep to go, this is what you've been talking about. Oh, it does all of these things.

Len Short:

You know, sometimes it takes something like ChatGPT for people to really feel what it does, what it could do. You know, not me putting it another vendor up there telling you this is a great thing, but you kind of feel it. And I can tell you, you know, we're seeing it in our business. I mean, we're you know, our I mean it's skyrocketing because dealers are coming around to hey, listen, you know, in this competitive world, I need an edge, I need to make smarter decisions, you know, and we all know that it's all in the inches. That's right. You know, as a car dealer, it's in every inch.

Jim Fitzpatrick:

That's right.

Len Short:

And you know, if you get a machine, I always tell dealers this thing would does exactly what you and I would do. Yeah, you know, if we're quality operators, yeah. If we had all the information all day to learn it.

Jim Fitzpatrick:

That's right.

Len Short:

It's not it's not doing wild stuff, it's just doing exactly what you would do, just that with such precision and clarity. That's the most important thing about it. It's just the clarity of the recommendations.

Jim Fitzpatrick:

Yeah. If it as a dealer today, if you can get your hands around data and and technology, you win. You win the game, right? Yeah. I mean, the the old school-

Len Short:

And that's why we're making it free. We're trying to make that accessible to everybody.

Jim Fitzpatrick:

Yeah, yeah, no question about it. For sure.

Len Short:

You know, the deal. And you know, Lance and his team have been just incredible. I mean, when this thing was hard for us, Lance is the one that said, no, man, we have to do this. I was looking at wow, it's a heavy, you know, but here we are.

Jim Fitzpatrick:

That's right.

Len Short:

I would strongly recommend everybody just go to lotgpt.com or lotlinx.com/lotgpt. There's a little video that'll tell you more about it.

Jim Fitzpatrick:

We'll show all the information on the screen here. Dealers, man, I would be I'd be clicking right now to get on that thing if I were you. This is a no-brainer.

Len Short:

I have had dealers doing everything to cut the line and get me to let them in. I have had all sorts of people coming at me.

Jim Fitzpatrick:

Right, it's free, but I'll go ahead and pay you if I could just get in there sooner. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Len Short:

So they'll get in, just you know, it's moving pretty quickly, and we just wanted to make sure that everybody has a great experience, you know, that it's uh so we're just kind of staging it out.

Jim Fitzpatrick:

That's right. Lance, you were you had the vision there. I gotta I gotta hand it to you. Did you realize at the time when you were coming on this that you said, okay, the the time has come, we got to put this thing together?

Lance Schafer:

You know, not really. I I would say I, you know, kind of the vision was there that dealers would be using AIs like conversationally to help run their businesses. Sure. Over the last year, we've every two weeks we interview dealers who are using but uh like in that beta group, and they're the ones who really told us what they wanted. Yeah. And and so that's really the feedback we've got, you know, these 150,000 prompts become really obvious what dealers want. Yeah. Um, and and so it became really clear about six months ago exactly what dealers wanted. And and so we kind of had a vision of it for sure. We knew we could do something, but uh, you know, really dealers are the ones who told us what exactly what they wanted, which is why it really is built for them. And so I'd I'd like to think we have it all figured out early on. We didn't, uh, but but I think we're on to something now, and it's because of that.

Jim Fitzpatrick:

For sure. There's no question about it. Yeah, I I would imagine too, the the OEMs are gonna jump in on this at some point in time, right? And go, okay, what kind of a play do we have in all of this with our dealers when you've got this kind of technology?

Len Short:

Yeah, we're we're doing a lot with the OEMs to help them manage their inventory and use power of AI. And you know, that's probably the fastest growing piece of our business. You know, and and you know, those are big resourceful companies that need scale. And you know, we have, you know, we um, as I always say, we're not, you know, we're not a sales company, we're a product and technology company. We have a you know a long history of a real, you know, very sturdy, broad foundation. It's taken us a long time, a lot of money. We've you know, we've built something that that you know stands up and can you know serve all the way up to the you know big groups in the OEMs.

Jim Fitzpatrick:

So sure. That's fantastic. Congratulations on all of that. Len, I'd be remiss if I didn't ask you because I know that you've got your hand on the pulse of the auto industry, working with thousands of uh your of your client partners all over the country and uh getting all of this data in. What say you about uh how we will finish 2025 and then what's your forecast for 2026 as it relates to the auto industry?

Len Short:

I think I think you know 2025 was a great year. I was just in a GMC store trading in my truck, again, a new one, and talking to the GM, you know, they're power operators. And yeah, you know, he was saying listen is surprisingly strong all year long and still is.

Jim Fitzpatrick:

Yeah.

Len Short:

You know, so so it's the American consumer is resilient. We know they're up against you know affordability issues, but there's a lot of you know replacement demand. Yeah. I think you know, we'll probably go into you know a little bit of a headwind of flatter market. You know, it's all seasonal. So, you know, we're anticipating what happens in the first quarter, see how much of a pullback there is there. But I think we've got a strong market. Never more important for dealers, though, to be you know very precise with how they're managing their inventory. Yeah, watching the basics and and not missing a trick. That's what's going to keep you know PDR up and gross is up for the dealership. That's right. So I always say it's anything over 14.5 million SARS is a essentially good car business, right? Yeah. So I think we'll be well above that. And but you know, the the smart operators always win. Even yeah, and the tougher it gets, the more they win.

Jim Fitzpatrick:

And you know what I mean? That's right. And the tougher it gets, the more they need technologies like the one you've got here. I mean, that this is it it dealers have no longer, they they they don't have the luxury of putting it to the side. They have to address and embrace the technology that's out there, especially in the area of AI, right?

Len Short:

It's so hard to do. And that's really what I think the big breakthrough here is. I mean, you know, think about asking a complicated question to Chat GPT. Everybody's done it, right?

Jim Fitzpatrick:

Yeah.

Len Short:

I mean, just think about how it grinds through and just pulls everything together with great clarity. And that I think is the big breakthrough here. There's sea, there's a sea of data. You know, I have a very specific question, but how do I get a clear answer, a clear direction? And that's what the machine can do for these dealers. And I think we all operate better when the decisions are clear.

Jim Fitzpatrick:

Oh, no question about it.

Len Short:

And that's that I think is the big promise.

Jim Fitzpatrick:

And the fact that you've made this free to everybody, uh, dealers, uh, I don't know if you heard that we said free, but we're gonna show all the information on the screen here. I wouldn't wait a second after you watch this video to get in line and sign up for this if I were you. I'm just saying, and I've run dealerships.

Len Short:

But uh, I am I am sure that no good deed goes unpunished. So there must be enough time for being some agreement.

Jim Fitzpatrick:

That's right. That's right. You got to tell me how this all works out, but uh something tells me you you got a plan here. So that's fantastic. So, Lance Schafer, Lotlinx's Executive Vice President, General Manager of Product and Technology, and of course the star behind all of this, and Len Short, Lotlinx's executive chairman. Thank thank you to both of you for coming in and sharing this with our viewers. Uh, I think we're really giving them some great information and a phenomenal tool that you've built. So thanks again. Really appreciate it.

Len Short:

Oh, thank you, sir. Good to see you. Thank you so much.

Announcer:

Yep. Thanks for watching Inside Automotive with Jim Fitzpatrick.