TIME NAMES ALASKAN ITS QUALITY DEALER

January 29, 2005—Alaska state senator and dealer principal Ralph Seekins of Seekins Ford/Lincoln Mercury is the 2005 Time Magazine Quality Dealer. Seekins, who calls winning his seat in the Alaska state senate in 2002 his most satisfying accomplishment, started in the industry as a temporary sales associate at a Seattle Ford dealership 35 years ago while his wife Connie finished her nursing degree. The Seekins family moved to Alaska in 1974 and bought the current store in 1977.

Seekins told attendees that he was “honored to be in a fine field of ladies and gentlemen who made up [the 65 Time honorees].” About the business, he says, “I’ve never regretted a day—I’m very humbled today.”

Seekins and his dealership have been honored a number of times for their support of community organizations and numerous causes. The store serves a market area bigger than Texas and delivers many of its customers’ new vehicles by barge or cargo plane. Seekins’s store is also the only known Ford dealership to use a Cessna airplane for sales and service calls.

The award is cosponsored by Goodyear Tire & Rubber Co.