FIXED OPS MASTERMIND
A note from Dave + something worth reading
Before I get into this week’s read — a quick note about where this newsletter is going.
I’ve been writing here on Substack for a while now. You signed up, you’ve been opening it, and I’m grateful for that. What I’m building has grown to the point where I need a better home for it — one platform where everything lives together and I can actually see what’s resonating and what isn’t.
I’m moving to Beehiiv. The newsletter gets a name — The Signal — and a same focus: fixed ops, leadership and automotive AI. What’s real, what’s working in actual dealerships, what operators in other industries figured out first, and the data behind all of it. YOU MUST CLICK THE SUBSCRIBE BUTTON TO BECOME PART OF THE LIST THAT RECIEVES THE NEW NEWSLETTER!
If you want to keep reading, the subscribe link is at the bottom. It takes about 10 seconds. If you don’t click through, no hard feelings — and thank you for being here.
One thing worth your time before you go:
The AI implementation problem
Ask most dealers how their AI tools are performing and you’ll get one of two answers. Either enthusiastic hand-waving — “it’s great, really changing things” — or a long pause followed by “honestly, I’m not sure.”
The vendors don’t want to talk about it because measurement puts them on the hook. The trade press doesn’t write about it because “dealer buys AI tool, doesn’t know if it works” isn’t a headline anyone commissions. And dealers don’t raise it publicly because admitting uncertainty about a six-figure investment is uncomfortable.
But it’s the most important conversation in automotive AI right now. Because the tools aren’t the problem — most of them do what they say they do, more or less. The problem is that nobody defined what success looked like before the contract was signed. Nobody assigned ownership. Nobody built the measurement layer.
The dealers getting real returns from AI are the ones who treated the purchase like an operational change, not a software subscription. They named an owner before go-live. They defined three specific metrics they’d check at 30, 60, and 90 days. They built the accountability structure first and then bought the tool.
That’s the framework we’ll keep coming back to in The Signal. And it’s the conversation the Automotive AI Summit at MIT is built around this September.
That’s the kind of thing The Signal covers every week.
If it sounds like something worth having in your inbox, click below. The first issue goes out soon and the welcome note will tell you exactly what to expect.
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If you’re not ready to make the switch — that’s completely fine. This Substack will stay up, the archives aren’t going anywhere. I just won’t be posting here going forward.
Thanks for reading. It genuinely means something.
Dave Foy
Founder, Automotive AI Summit & Fixed Ops Mastermind
This is the final issue of this Substack.