Eastern Automotive Warehousing/Auto Machinery - Autosphere

ADVERTORIAL
Shirley Brown sgbrown@xplornet.com
Eastern Automotive Warehousing/Auto Machinery
95 Years Strong!
95 years is a long time to be in business—but 95 successful
years is even better. Auto Machinery and Eastern Automotive
Warehousing have a big notch in their family business belts
due to their longevity and business acumen.
14 | CarCare Business | December 2009 | www.autosphere.ca |
The Vaughan family of Fredericton,
New Brunswick has a long history in
the automotive repair business. In
1914, W.E. Vaughan and partner started
Vaughan and Kitchen for the sale and
repair of automobiles. His brother John,
son Jack and other family members joined
him. In 1946, Jack expanded the parts
business and relocated under the name
Auto Machinery & General Supply Co. Ltd.
where sons Ronald and Carl eventually
joined the family business.
In 1965, Ron and two partners formed
Eastern Automotive Warehousing to handle
the wholesale warehousing and distribution
to jobber accounts. His son Doug came
on board in 1973 and currently Doug’s son
David has made his mark in the family business…
the fi fth generation of the Vaughan
family to do so.
Auto Machinery
Auto Machinery is one of the largest automotive
stores in the Maritimes, with over
40 employees. Longevity among several
employees marks this family run enterprise
as a good place to work and grow.
Dick Richardson joined the fi rm in 1916
and stayed until his death in 1973. Other
lifelong employees—George Tims, Stan
Barr, Judd Lutes, Laura Savage, Douglas
Spencer, Ken Harvey, Marven Briggs,
Murray Goodine, Elwood MacKay, Audrey
Goodine, and Everett Bridges—were loyal
and appreciated members of the Auto
Machinery family whose dedication and
expertise helped immensely in the early
years of growth. Claude Gilks joined in
1968 and was the driving force behind
joining Auto Value.
The Vaughan family and staff continues
to provide a valuable service to countless
service stations, parts stores, and retail
purchasers.
Enter the 5th generation
David Vaughan joined the company eight
years ago and had an interesting background
before getting involved in the
family business. He was a member of the
Canadian National Snowboard Team and
two-time junior snowboard champion before
a serious knee injury put him on the
sidelines.
David tells us how Auto Machinery/
Eastern Automotive has evolved over
the years: “From the beginning, the business
was a service centre, then went into
dealerships, and eventually into the parts
business with our first jobber store—
Auto Machinery. In the 70’s, the business
moved into the Industrial Centre where we
still are today. This 16,000 sq. ft. building
housed a jobber store at the front; the
back part became Eastern Automotive
Warehousing—the start of our warehousing
business. We had a few stores around
Atlantic Canada, but no banner program.
As jobbers, a few different buying groups
were looked at but none were a great fi t.
Ten years ago we joined the Alliance group
and became the Auto Value distribution
centre for Atlantic Canada. That’s really
where we’ve taken off!”
Customer relationships
“We at Eastern are ‘people people’ and
here in the east, business is strongly
based on relationships. We know a signifi -
cant number of our customers on a fi rst
name basis because we deal with most
of them daily. This customer relationship
is one of our biggest assets—my Dad is
one of the best PR guys in the city! The