RouteOne's new CEO has big plans

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Oesterle: Dealers are better off working with their providers.

In his new role, RouteOne CEO Justin Oesterle will focus on objectives ranging from achieving operational goals to improving point-of-sale tools to retaining the culture of employee respect and customer service instilled by the company’s former leader.

Oesterle, 46, took over as CEO last Friday, replacing Mike Jurecki, 57, who left RouteOne after 14 years to become CEO at FordDirect.

RouteOne, headquartered in Farmington Hills, Mich., provides auto financing systems to dealerships, with processes that include credit applications, electronic contracting and compliance, digital retail services and desking..

The company was formed by Ally Financial, Ford Motor Credit Co., TD Auto Finance and Toyota Financial Services in 2002 to improve the finance and insurance process for automobile dealers and their customers.

Oesterle has been with RouteOne since its inception. He served most recently as chief information officer, but his RouteOne experience spans to vice president of sales, marketing and strategic alliances and vice president of operations and program management.

Before joining RouteOne, he was a senior manager at Deloitte Consulting, where he analyzed captive finance organizations.

Oesterle also has been named CEO of RouteOne Canada. He spoke with Staff Reporter Hannah Lutz.

What have been your greatest accomplishments with RouteOne so far?

There are three things that come to mind.

One is the initial launch of RouteOne’s credit platform. At first, we were an idea and then a bunch of projects. There was no operating company. I started as a program director after leaving Deloitte.

Bringing the credit platform to life was pretty exciting, so that was a big one for the organization. And I was excited to be a part of it under Mike Jurecki.

Second is working with the team to support the build and launch of our e-contracting platform. As of last year, we originated over 2 million contracts a year. And we’re going to continue working with our owners and customers to grow and enable the efficiencies of e-contracting.

Third, Mike gave me a responsibility to lead the sales organization in the middle of 2008. Although volume challenges were tough in this time period, we grew 1 percentage point in market share per month for 18 months. Volumes were what they were, but we were growing high enough that we were able to maintain healthy operations. And we were in a good position to come out of those times.

How will the skills you’ve gained help you as CEO?

I was fortunate to have a leader in Mike, who put me in every operating position in the company. Mike gave me the responsibility to sit in multiple seats.

I was responsible for all the revenue at the company when I had responsibility for sales. I had responsibility through each support function in the operations role and for the dollars we spent because we’re an IT organization. The large majority of our expenditures are IT related.

Each had its own value and importance and learning foundation. Each of them individually is important for the operations of the company. Putting them together created an enterprise view of the company.

What are your goals for your first year as CEO?

In the immediate term, one goal is to achieve the operating plan that the owners have set forth for us. Achieving our financial and operating goals is key for our organization and our owners.

RouteOne continues to be a highly reliable provider for point-of-sale systems, which means credit, compliance, e-contracting and digital retail. We are in a very narrow space but we are deep within that space that we serve.

Our near-term focus is to make point of sale tools accessible from any place, at any time and on any device. We are there with the majority of our tools but we have work remaining because we have new tools we’re bringing to market.

What are your long-term goals?

Our longer term focus is to enable owners, dealers and finance partners, along with OEMs, with tools to power the process customers want. The nuance is there are a bunch of third parties that create a deal structure, who we see as attempting to insert themselves as a layer between the customer and the OEM and by extension, the dealership. They are trying to take control of that customer and monetize it, like a middle person who wants to get paid.

We believe dealers are better off working with their providers. Working with third-party deal structuring companies will add a cost to the process that will ultimately have to get passed along to the consumer.

Another long-term goal is the retention of the values and culture that Mike created in RouteOne and on which the company is built. It is a formula for lasting success — doing the right thing, excellent customer service, and treating employees and customers with respect.

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RouteOne's new CEO has big plans