Nickel auto dealership closes

Nickel Auto Group, the budget car dealership on the west end of Libby located on U.S. Highway 2, has closed.

Manager Tom Lyons said he was called at 2:30 p.m. Wednesday and told that the business would close  Friday.

“That was it. That was all the notice I was given. I wish I could have been given more (notice) to find a job, but that was it,” said Lyons, who has been at the dealership since April 2011.

Lyons was the business’ only employee.

Regional Manager J.J. Johnston, who was born and raised in Libby, said the closure is a matter of economics.

“We held on as long as we could. They were only selling one or two cars there a month. We had to downsize,” Johnston said.

Johnston said the company has no plans to sell the lot, and if the economy improves, they would consider reopening a branch in Libby.

“We kind of held on as long as we could thinking the (Montanore) mine would open, but we just couldn’t do it any longer,” Johnston said.

The dealership previously has been known Nickel Auto Group, Nickel Cars and Loomis Cars. 

Other locations include Kalispell and two locations in Missoula. Last May, the group closed a dealership in Polson, and the Libby location was the only location closed Friday.

By Friday afternoon, two tractor-trailer semis arrived to transport the vehicles to the Kalispell location. In all, about 14 vehicles were loaded onto the transports and two others were driven to the Kalispell dealership.

“We’re doing fine here in Kalispell. We just weren’t selling enough cars in Libby,” Johnston said.

Lyons said he doesn’t understand the decision to close the dealership.

“From my perspective, it was a poor choice timing-wise because of tax season coming up,” Lyons said. “It makes more sense to close it down in November or to close it down after tax season. But, hey, I’m not the owner, so he may have a perfectly logical reason for closing it down when he did.”

Milton Nickel is the owner of all Nickel Auto dealerships in Montana. 

The home office for Nickel Auto Group is Abilene, Texas.