Seekins Ford-Lincoln-Mercury Inc.: driving to prosperity.

• Author: Pratt, Fred
• Position: Seekins Ford Lincoln Mercury Inc.

The owner of Fairbanks' Ford dealership credits hard-working employees with his company's growth.

Ralph Seekins sits in his expansive and cluttered office, catching up on work after closing a deal to buy a Ford dealership in Soldotna. He sizes up the transaction not in dollars, but in opportunities for what he sees as his greatest asset: a growing staff of loyal and hardworking employees.

Seekins has done well in Fairbanks since he first appeared on local television 17 years ago promising the best deals in town, "right here at Seekins Ford-Lincoln-Mercury."

That first year, the business employed 35 and earned $9 million in sales. In 1994, the car dealership employed 130 and brought in a projected $50 million in sales. In addition to owning 100 percent of the Fairbanks dealership, Seekins also owns the Budget Rent A Car franchises in Anchorage and Juneau.

"I've been lucky," he recounts. "I've had good people working for me, and I've had a lot of help. We've had a lot of people at Ford Motor Co. keep faith in us when times were tough, and it's paid off."

TOUGH EARLY TIMES

Seekins remembers those tough times well and the rocky road that has led him to success in Fairbanks.

Born in Duluth, Minn., he grew up in Cody, Wyo., and Hardin, Mont. He attended Wheaton College in Wheaton, Ill., for four years, but left school when his money ran out in 1968 and moved to Elmer City, Wash., where his parents lived. There he met his future wife, Connie, who was a student in the Seattle Pacific University nursing program. The couple married in 1969.

Seekins' career in auto sales began when Connie was finishing nursing school. "I took a temporary job in the car business but by the time she finished, I'd found out I enjoyed it," he says.

But Seekins didn't enjoy the big cities. Working for William O. McKay's Ford dealership in Seattle from 1970 to 1974 as salesman, fleet sales manager and leasing manager taught him that he was "a small-town person."

At the time, Seekins' father-in-law lived in Fairbanks, working for Green Construction Co. Moving his young family to this Interior city in 1974, Seekins got a job as a general sales manager for Jim Thompson Ford Sales.

In 1977, Thompson decided to leave the auto dealership business, and Ford Motor Co. went looking for a new Fairbanks dealer. At the time, Ford had a program called "dealer development" that allowed cash-poor business managers to buy the company's dealerships. The program turned out to be Seekins' road from...