The History of Halladay Motors, Inc.

Timothy Joannides purchased Halladay Motors from Carl Halladay Jr. in 1993.  Carl Jr.'s father, Carl Halladay Sr., opened the Cheyenne dealership in October 1944 as the Oldsmobile dealer and took on the Cadillac franchise shortly after auto production resumed after World War II, in 1945.  He acquired the GMC Truck franchise in 1950.

Prior to settling in Cheyenne, Carl Sr. had spent 20 years with General Motors Corporation.  Initially, he worked as a test engineer at the General Motors Proving Ground in Milford, Michigan, eventually becoming a top executive in the sales division of that facility.  The second half of his GM career was with the Oldsmobile division working with dealer in several Eastern and Midwestern states.

Carl Halladay Jr. joined his father full time in the dealership in 1964.  That year they also took on the Datsun/Nissan franchise after trying several other imports, including Renault, Hilman and Land Rover.  Carl Jr. worked side by side with his father until his death in 1982.  Together, they built one of the finest and most respected dealerships in the state.  They both received the coveted TIME Magazine Quality Dealer Award nomination for Wyoming.

Tim Joannides acquired the family business in 1993 and, like Carl Halladay Sr., has included his son in the dealership operations.  Christopher Joannides graduated from the National Automobile Dealers Association's Dealer Academy in Washington, D.C. in 1996 and is currently the Vice President of the dealership.

Tim was instrumental in the 1992 acquisition of the Suzuki franchise and subsequent vehicle sales that placed Halladay Motors in the top ten Suzuki dealerships in the nation.  He obtained the exclusive GMC Medium Duty Truck franchise for Wyoming in 1995 and was appointed as Wyoming's first GM Certified Pre-Owned car dealership in 1998.

Tim began his automotive career 39 years ago in Illinois where he also attended Bradley University.  He gained excellent experience working for top dealers in that state and in Arizona proper to coming to Cheyenne in 1983.  He believes strongly in employee enthusiasm as a means of delivering top-notch service.  In the words of his philosophy statement, "Customers are never an interruption to work, but the purpose of it."  Under Tim's leadership of customer friendly policies such as extended customer service hours and hassle free vehicle purchases the dealership became a Charter Member of the Suzuki's Directors club in 1992 and received the Oldsmobile Elite Award in 1997 and 1998 and also received the GMC Truck's Leaders of Distinction Award each year from 1997-2001.  Tim was selected for the distinguished TIME Magazine Quality Dealer Award and represented Wyoming at the National Auto Dealers Convention in Orlando, Florida in January 2000.  In 2003, Tim and Chris were selected as "Corporate Citizens of the Year" by the Cheyenne Chamber of Commerce.  Tim was recognized as "The Person of the Year for 2004" by the Greater Cheyenne Chamber of Commerce in January 2005.  Tim has been an active member of the Cheyenne Cowboy Chapter #211 of the AHEPA (American Hellenic Education Progressive Association).  In June 2005, Time was selected as AHEPAN of the Year at the District #17's 70th convention in Denver, Colorado.  On October 27, 2005, in New York City, Tim was inducted into the Order of St. Andrew as the Archon of the Ecumenical Patriarchate, the highest honor bestowed upon a layman of the Greek Orthodox Church.

 

Tim is very proud of his Greek heritage as indicated by the gold pin he wears daily.  His father, who was a successful insurance businessman, emigrated from Cyprus in 1928 and settled in the Illinois Quad Cities where he married an American-born Greek.  Jennie Joannides, Tim's mother, currently lives in Cheyenne.  Tim is active in the community and has served as a board member for both the Chamber of Commerce and Leads.  He has served as Chairman on the Wyoming Department of Transportation for six years and is currently on the board of the Wyoming Auto Dealers Association as past president.  He recently served on the Animal Shelter Fund Raising Committee and the Progress and Prosperity II and UMC Hospice Capital Campaigns.  Tim helped establish and chaired the annual Greek Festival in Cheyenne for a number of years and currently chairs the Planning and Future Projects Committee for Saints Constantine and Helen Greek Orthodox Church.  Tim became a contributing member of the Archbishop Iakovos Leadership 100 Endowment Fund in 2003 and he and his wife Kathy are sustaining donors of the Metropolis of Denver Advocates 100.  He and his family have supported the community in numerous other ways including numerous cash donations to deserving individuals and organizations in the Cheyenne area.  Tim, his wife Kathy and three of their children Christopher, Angela and Andrew all live in Cheyenne and their other son, Nickolas, lives in Newport Beach, CA.  They all wholeheartedly support the exciting growth that the community and their business has experienced!

 

The dealership moved to its modern 10 acre facility on Westland Road in Cheyenne in 1978.  Previously, it had operated at four different downtown locations:  Central Avenue in 1944; 18th Street and Capitol Avenue in 1945; and two East Lincolnway addresses beginning in 1947 and 1955 respectively.  Halladay Motors opened their Bargain Corner Used Car and Truck Sales Outlet on the corner of Westland Road and Lincolnway in Cheyenne in January of 1997.  In late 2001, Halladay Motors introduced their Import Sales Center featuring Nissan and Suzuki vehicles located just south of the new vehicle showroom.  At the same time Halladay Motors GM Certified Pre-owned Sales Center was relocated just to the north of the new vehicle showroom.  In August of 2003, Halladay Motors purchased the Buick and Pontiac franchises from Dinneen Motors in Cheyenne.  With these additions, the GM new car showroom became a "premier lines" General Motors dealership and showroom featuring Cadillac, Buick, Pontiac and GMC trucks.  The new state of the art Nissan showroom and service facility was completed in mid 2005, located at 1880 Westland Road, just a half block south of the GM store.  Also in May of 2005, Halladay Motors purchased the Subaru franchise from Dinneen Motors and moved it with Suzuki which was located at a temporary Import Sales Center just to the south of the GM Store near our GMC Truck, Fleet an Commercial Center with a new building completed in November 2006 at the corner of Westland Road and West Lincolnway with dual design build showrooms for Suzuki and Subaru and a common parts and service area.  In the spring of 2005, Halladay Motors Paint and Collision Center moved downtown to 16th and Maxwell, a previous Halladay Motors facility in the 1950's and 1960's.  Windshield and auto glass repair and replacement and spray in bed liners were introduced at the new Paint & Collision Center in 2006.  The area previously occupied by the Paint and Collision Center in the GM dealership, was converted to additional stalls for service concentrating on RV's, Commercial and Medium Duty truck repair.  Halladay Auto Detail Center moved into the previous body shop paint booth area.  Accessories are offered at all three dealerships and are now installed at the Nissan dealership, where customers can choose from all types of accessories for their cars, trucks and SUV's  including custom wheels, window tinting and pin stripe.  

In September 2009, our management team decided to terminate our Suzuki franchise due to declining sales and service revenues of the Suzuki brand.  Therefore, that dealership became an exclusive Subaru dealership site with the previous Suzuki showroom becoming a Subaru Certified Pre-owned sales center.

In May of 2009, General Motors announced they were going to downsize their number of dealers, makes and models of vehicles.  As a result the Hummer, Saturn, SAAB, Pontiac, GMC Medium Duty Truck (not light duty) to be phased out.  They also announced the termination of approximately 2,000 "non-performing" dealers based on their poor new vehicle sales history and customer satisfaction (CSI) scores.  We were disappointed to hear that our Pontiac & GMC Medium Duty products were being discontinued but we were very excited that we made the cut as one of the new GM's key dealerships for Buick & GMC Light Duty vehicles based on our excellent new vehicle sales and high CSI scores!

In June 2009, GM announced their new marketing plans for the Cadillac brand.  Their plans were to only have new Cadillac franchises in major metro cities where they would compelte with Lexus, BMW and Mercedes, (our State of Wyoming doesn't have any of thoses brands) which would reduce their Cadillac dealer count from 1,600 dealers to only 400 dealers and would be put in wind-down status until October 2010.  We are therefore still officially a Cadillac dealer, selling and servicing new Cadillac's.  We have filed for arbitration hoping that GM will change their minds about our Capitol City of Cheyenne, Wyoming retaining the Cadillac brand.

 

Effective January 2, 2002, Christopher Joannides was promoted to Vice President of Halladay Motors, taking over the day to day operations of the dealership.  This allowed Tim Joannides to focus on his duties as company President, especially long term strategic planning and the continued growth of Halladay Motors and also have more time to devote to his family, church and community.  Chris came to Halladay Motors in August of 1989 as a salesperson and worked in many different management positions.  He attended the NADA Dealer Academy and graduated in December of 1996.  Chris is also very active in the Cheyenne community and participated in the Leadership Cheyenne program, graduating in June of 1999.  After voluntarily participating in a 30-day drug and alcohol abuse recovery program in the summer of 2007, Chris continued to participate as a volunteer, one day per week, helping others while still working at Halladay's.  Realizing this was his God given gift, Chris decided in January 2009, after working at Halladay Motors for 19 years, to leave the auto business and pursue his new dream and passion and enrolled in LCCC to get an education in counseling drug and alcohol clients, so he can assist others with their addictions and hopefully successful recoveries as he's experienced.

Mr. Jim Casey was promoted to General Manager in January 2010, he had been the General Sales Manager since January 2007.  Jim attended the National Auto Dealer Academy 12 month program and graduated in July 2008 with honors, along with over 27 years of automotive dealership experience in a number of capacities.  He oversees our variable operations; the new and used sales, F&I departments along with our fixed operations; the service, parts and paint and collision shop departments.

 

Halladay Motors, Inc. has been a successful family owned and operated business since 1944 and their continued company philosophy "...to provide our customers with products and services of the greatest value, that exceed their needs and expectation, attaining the highest possible levels of customer satisfaction, while at the same time maintain sales leadership in the marketplaces, assuring continued company profitability and growth, creating a positive employee environment and fulfilling our obligations to our community."

 

This will assure the company team members, the various manufacturer business partners and their customers the continuation of this lasting legacy for many years to come!

 

~March 2010~