‘Why Jayco?’ Walters Answers at Las Vegas Dealer Meeting – RVBusiness – Breaking RV Industry News
LAS VEGAS – The clear message from Jayco executives Monday was that, given the current challenging market, the company’s mix of people, quality and dealer relationships offer a compelling and competitive answer to “Why Jayco?”
Ken Walters, president of the Middlebury, Ind.-based THOR Industries subsidiary, peppered that message throughout his keynote presentation, which helped kick off the 2024 Dealer Homecoming event that runs through Thursday, at The Palazzo at The Venetian Resort.
“Our biggest asset is our people,” Walters told the several hundred dealers in attendance. To support that statement, Jayco featured posters of its key employees and their families throughout the venue, where several dozen 2025 motorized and towable products were on display.
Later, Walters sat down with RVBusiness to address some of the points he made during his presentation. An edited account of that conversation follows.
RVBusiness: Ken, peppered throughout your presentation, you had a consistent message of how important the people are at Jayco. You then highlighted the long tenure and low turnover among your directors, managers and others on the leadership team, as well as the employee benefits such as the Jayco Medical Clinic and Fitness Center, among other things.
Walters: We think it’s people and people and people, and we think that drives everything.
Consistency matters. Consistency of culture matters. Consistency doesn’t come in place of excellence; it always has to be striving for excellence.
We think we have really talented people, and we indoctrinate them into the culture – the way we want to show up for dealers, and the way we want to develop product, and the way we want to lead through customer experience. We have a group of leaders – and next-level leaders and their teams – that understand and has bought into that culture.
If you have a turnover rate that some of these other companies have, it’d be really hard to retain that culture. But it’s through the consistency of the culture, and the relationships, and interacting with the same people all the time, that you build trust. That’s why it matters. It’s really important.
RVB: Another consistent message in your presentation was asking dealers whether Jayco’s mix of people, quality and relationships – and the details you highlighted in each – made a difference for their business.
Walters: Well, part of the challenge for us is, for three years in a row, I’ve talked about the same initiatives – people, quality and dealer relationships.
So, the challenge is, one, are we working on the right stuff? And we think, through constant feedback – which I said over and over and over and over again – through our people and our dealers and our customers, that we are working on the right stuff.
And then we look at measurables – and we wholly believe that if you don’t measure it, you can’t improve it. So, the measurables tell us that, in a really tough market – again, we’re 20 months into a tough market, – our measurables versus our THOR peers and the competitors through market share and everything else, that what we’re working on is the right stuff.
As we continue through a tough fall and winter market, with inventory costs being unbelievably high dealers need to make buying decisions on which product are they going to bring on the lot because they want a stock less inventory.
So, why Jayco? I think we’re separating ourselves – and we have a compelling story of what makes us different – but I want them to give me their feedback. We think it adds value to dealers. But is it showing up for them and their metrics the same way it’s showing up for us?
RVB: All of which has led to the market share gains you touted, which certainly were impressive.
Walters: We hear consistently from our dealers that we’re the best turning product on their lot. That we’re their highest margin product in the segments that we’re represented.
Again, we genuinely believe, and I think everybody would agree, that the market’s going to continue to be tough and dealers are going to be even more particular on the amount of inventory they carry and which inventory they carry.
Coming out of the last 12 months is the measuring tool that we use the most, and this week we gained share in every segment that’s important. But it’s important that it’s also working for the dealer. Shipments through May of outpaced retail. That’s not the case at Jayco. We’ve retailed more than we’ve shipped. We’re measuring it daily. We’re using that as a tool of what we build every day. Nic (Martin, Jayco’s vice president of sales) said it: everybody’s inventory is lower than it was a year ago, but what’s their days on hand? Retail’s also way lower for a lot of brands than it was a year ago. We track ourselves versus the market, versus our peers, and we’re gaining share. That’s a bigger piece of pie in a shrinking tough market. I think that matters.
RVB: It’s safe to say that the Dealer Homecoming event itself is always a highlight for the company year after year.
Walters: Yeah, it’s something that’s been going on at Jayco for a really long time. One, I think the timing is important. We get the opportunity to get our dealers first. They do, in a lot of cases, carry other brands. Open House won’t be until the third or fourth week of September. And so we’ve got a 6-, 7-, 8-week head start on our competitors. It gives us the opportunity – with still some selling season left – to present our inventory plan, to show them our new model year stuff.
And, again, it’s breaking bread. We think fellowship is a huge part of this thing and it’s why we have a welcome reception. It’s why we have snacks and drinks throughout the course of the day. Make no mistake – and I said we’re here to sell stuff and we’re asking people to buy stuff – but it’s what drives the relationship. Our guys, every single person who works at Jayco, was out with a dealer last night, breaking bread, and they’ll do that through the course of the whole event.
So, yes, it’s about fellowship, the opportunity to see old friends that maybe we don’t get the opportunity to get out and about in front of every day and even interact with. We had ops directors, guys that have never been to this event here this week and it’san awesome thing to watch happen.
