The grand opening celebration for Bish’s RV in Calera, Alabama, last weekend was a first for the company—in more ways than one.
Calera, is the company’s first store in the state, as well as in the southeast. But the location also marked a rare occurrence in which Bish’s opened a dealership from scratch. As the company has expanded from one location with six trailers in eastern Idaho in 1989, acquisitions have allowed the dealer to grow to 22 locations.
Bish’s RV Regional Vice President Justin Walls said, “That has been the case, but we are always looking for opportunities that might be the right fit. Occasionally, one of the manufacturers that we work with will tap us on the shoulder and ask us to be a part of their plans. And we are happy to do that if it is the right fit for the company.”
Bish’s commitment to the new location included transferring two veteran employees to Alabama: General Manager Sam Bickle and Brittany Bainbridge. Brickle said he was in favor of taking on the challenge after six years at two of Bish’s locations in Montana.
“The Great Falls and Billings stores were pretty well worked out,” Bickle said. “They really did not need my help there. So, I wanted to give this a shot in Alabama. Bish’s has been wanting to get more toward the East Coast and the southeast for a while. Also, Bish’s works pretty closely with Brinkley RV and they wanted us to have a dealership in the southeast.”
Bickle was also looking to get closer to family in Pennsylvania, a goal he technically accomplished with the move despite being close to a thousand miles south of the state.
“It’s been pretty easy for me to get settled here,” he said, “but this was my first time opening a dealership, so that brought a ton of challenges.”
The company’s original location didn’t work out due to zoning issues, but Bish’s was informed of that news just two weeks before the planned May 1 opening.
“We already had 50 employees hired and suddenly had no place to do business,” Bickle said. “So myself and Justin (Walls) drove all around Calera and the surrounding area trying to find a spot. We came across this place at like 2 in the morning. We had a contract signed the next day and the whole team came in and completely renovated the place. We had our first trailer on the ground the day before we opened.”
After opening on May 1, the company instituted a huge marketing and social media effort to introduce itself and the RV brands it offers to local residents. Those brands include the company’s own Wayfinder models, as well as Brinkley and Alliance.
“It was slow at first, but we’ve been very busy the last couple of weeks,” Bickle said. “The grand opening last weekend was our big party. We gave away a Wayfinder Go Lite Cloudbreaker. We had over 1,500 applications for that giveaway.”
The new location includes a service department, but no retail parts store as space is at a premium. Bickle said he’s rented the lot next to the location as a holding area for duplicate models. The dealership has 40 units on display and another 50 ready to go in the adjacent space.
“We’re just excited to be here,” Bickle said. “We’re already getting good reviews online (for service and sales), so I think the store has been well received by the local community.”
Walls added, “The grand opening weekend was amazing. We really love the community and feel like it is going to be a great place for us to put down roots in the southeast.”
