McLarty Daniel CDJR Employee Spotlight: Sales Team Member Robert Pratt

There’s two things that make McLarty Daniel Chrysler Dodge Jeep Ram of Bentonville sales team member Robert Pratt hard to miss. The first is his height. At over 6’5″, he’s a towering presence in any room. The other thing is his car: a screaming yellow 2012 Dodge Charger Superbee with a rumbling 392 cubic inch Hemi under the hood.

“It’s not a playtoy,” he said, laughing. “Of course, my wife told me that if I get a speeding ticket, the car has to sit in the driveway.”

Robert has long been all about muscle cars, which makes it a great time to work at McLarty Daniel CDJR, what with the SRT and Hellcat Challenger, Charger and Durango muscle that has come roaring back into the dealership in recent years. He said the horsepower bug bit when he was four years old, when he helped his dad rebuilt a hot rod Lincoln: a 1967 Mark IV.

An employee of the dealership since December 2015, Robert said that he loves being in sales, mainly because it lets him help customers find the perfect vehicle. “I like meeting different people, and getting to see the new technology come about,” he said. “The new models are always exciting, and it’s great being able to see and drive the newest cars first. I have a lot of fun with it.”

Robert said that there’s no great secret to selling vehicles, other than the stuff your parents probably taught you: be kind, be honest and treat others the way you’d want to be treated.  

“You just have to treat everybody like they’re family and treat them with respect,” he said. “If you do that and build those relationships, you can be successful at this. You’re constantly building those contacts… I have clients who will just call me out of the blue and say: ‘Hey Robert, I need a car.’ I have families that only go through me. I’ve sold numerous cars to families like that. They’ve got my personal cell phone and they call me.”

In addition to the latest and greatest Mopar muscle from Dodge, Robert said that the vehicle he’s most excited about right now is the impending release of the 2020 Jeep Gladiator pickup, the first truck for the Jeep brand since 1996. He said he already has three clients who call him regularly, asking when they’ll be on the lot. “I’m excited about it,” he said. “I’m still learning about them, but they look really amazing. I think we’re going to sell a lot of them. We have a line of people beating down the door when we get them.”

A father of three children ranging in age from 22 to three years old, Robert said most of his spare time is spent with his family, and occasionally taking his car out to a twisty back road near Bentonville and letting the bright yellow Bee spread its wings. He said that he loves auto sales, and really can’t imagine doing anything else with his life from a career standpoint.

“I’ve always been in the automotive industry in one form or the other,” he said. “So I probably will always will be.”  

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