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THE Von Bibra Motor Group on Queensland’s Gold Coast has emerged as the standout performer for Honda in 2018, with its Southport outlet taking out the Japanese brand’s Premier Dealership award in the second annual Honda National Dream Awards.

Presented at a gala event in Brisbane this month, Von Bibra’s top award reflects its excellence across both sales-related criteria (‘Honda Performance’) and customer service (‘Honda Way’) and comes as the Gold Coast dealership also won back-to-back awards for the metropolitan sales team category.

Group general manager and dealer principal Wade Von Bibra – grandson of Dudley Von Bibra who founded the company in Ulverstone, Tasmania, in 1935, and son of Warren Von Bibra, who oversaw the sale of its various dealerships in northern Tasmania and the relocation to the Gold Coast in 2000 – was on hand to accept the award, along with the Southport dealership’s general manger, Max Johnson.

Proud moment: Dealer principal Wade Von Bibra accepts Honda’s coveted 2018 Premium Dealership award, and receives a round of applause from the dealership’s general manager Max Johnson.

Other members of team to take the stage included general sales manager Paul Forman, sales manager Richard Sibbald, service manager Andrew Conway and sales consultants Jim Fyfe, Nathan Heron and Timothy Bowman.

The dealership was quick to acknowledge the support of customers and efforts of all staff, taking to social media to put in “a big thank you to all of our customers who have supported us along the way and congratulations to the Southport Honda team”.

It added: “This award acknowledges the best-performing dealer in customer experience through sales and service, sales volume, long-term customer loyalty and professional sales process.”

The other finalists for the Premier Dealership award were Western Highway Honda, Yarra Honda, Essendon Honda – all based in Melbourne – and Southside Honda in Brisbane.

The national dealer incentive awards program was revised for 2017 to better reflect dealers’ performance across a broader range of business benchmarks and to single out achievements in specific areas such as sales and service – and a new category has now been added: the Soichiro Honda Award.

It was won by Canberra’s Capital Honda fleet manager Ashleigh Thurlow, who was recognised for “her constant team and customer focus and leadership spirit and commitment to the Honda philosophy”.

Soichiro Honda Award winner Ashleigh Thurlow (holding trophy) with (from left) Honda Australia’s Stephen Collins, Hiroyuki Shimizu and Carolyn McMahon, and Capital Honda’s Peter Axiom and Tony Brennan

As Von Bibra snagged the metro sales team award, Honda Central in Hobart took out the provincial category.

Three service excellence awards were also handed out to Western Highway Honda (metro), Peter Roberts Honda in Toowoomba (provincial) and Auto Synergy in Mildura (rural).

Outstanding salespeople awards went to Joshua Ferguson from Astoria Honda Brighton (metro), Arden Lester from Townsville Honda (provincial) and Joshua Young from Madill Honda in Noosaville (rural).

Among the Honda Australia representatives at the presentation ceremony were managing director and CEO Hiroyuki Shimizu and directors Carolyn McMahon and Stephen Collins.

We are so proud to have such outstanding people and teams working for Honda and demonstrating the Honda philosophy in their everyday lives,” said Mr Collins.

Congratulations to all the winners and keep up the amazing work.”

By Terry Martin

Von Bibra Gold Coast Honda presentation (from left): Honda Australia director Carolyn McMahon, Richard Sibbald, Max Johnson, Andrew Conway, Jim Fyfe, Nathan Heron, Paul Forman, Timothy Bowman, Wade Von Bibra and Honda Australia director Stephen Collins

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