Romeo buying Whiteman Chevy

By Zander Frost, Chronicle Chief Operating Officer

The Romeo family, who operate Romeo Toyota on Broad Street and Carriage Traders in South Glens Falls, are buying Whiteman Chevrolet on Dix Avenue, The Chronicle has learned.

Mike Romeo confirmed the purchase plan. He said Tuesday completion of the sale is expected in early December, and that Chevrolet has approved transfer of the new car franchise.

Amy Whiteman Brown, the dealer-principal at Whiteman Chevrolet, told The Chronicle, “I think it’s great for the future of the dealership.”

“The Romeos are a great family. They love the automobile business. There’s generations and generations to come. I think it was a great fit. My family has known the Romeo family for probably 40 years.”

Amy said, “I think it’s going to be a great thing for the community. I think it’s going to be a great thing for the current employees. So I think it’s all positive.”

Whiteman is a long-term staple of Glens Falls. “We’ve been here since 1956,” Amy said. “My grandfather started it, and then my father and I’ve been running it [for] 20 years.”

“This wasn’t something that my father and I thought of very lightly,” she said. “It was a pretty heartfelt decision that we made, and we’re comfortable with who is purchasing it.”

The feeling is mutual. Mike said, “I think my dad’s been doing business with them for 35 years.”

“I think both parties always had in mind — and Amy said this — that ‘it was always going to be you guys.’ It was just a matter of if and when,” Mike said.

Romeo is on the grow. “We’re in expansion mode,” Mike told The Chronicle.

How many dealerships does Romeo now own? “Whiteman will be nine,” Mike said. “We say ‘rooftops.’” And it will add their third local body shop.

Beyond Toyota, Carriage Traders, and their outlet on Quaker Road, Romeo has five “rooftops” in Kingston — “Chevy, Kia, Volkswagen, Nissan and Ford.”

“We’re definitely excited about it,” Mike said. “We have great people in place.”

Mike said his sister, Lucia, will be the dealer-principal at Whiteman.

The Romeo auto business is a sibling affair. Lucia is an attorney and handles that side of the business. Their brother Joe oversees the Kingston dealerships. Sister Genese leads “business development,” across all the dealerships.

“So between the four of us, it’s really a great way to spread things out. Everyone has their roles. We do our jobs, and it works out well as we grow,” Mike said.

Whiteman “is going to be the first business that the four of us are buying together,” Mike added.

Amy emphasized that for her and her father Bob, “it wasn’t a light decision.”

“It‘ll be a great future,” she said. “We’re very thankful to all of the employees that have worked here, some of them for many, many years. I think they still have a great future with Romeo. I think it was a good fit — that’s the comfort of it.”

“It was very, very important for my father and I to secure someone that would be as considerate to the employees and to the community as we always have.”

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