Local RV dealer rolls into national spotlight

WINTER GARDEN  A local RV company is revving with pride after being named one of the top dealers in the country in 2015 for Newmar, a national manufacturer of high-end motor homes.

Independence RV on West Colonial Drive operates on a small, leased lot and has been in the Winter Garden community for 30 years. The dealership may be small, but its impact in the RV market is nationally recognized. It recently was ranked the fifth-largest Newmar dealer in the country based on volume for 2015, an elusive ranking to achieve without carrying the manufacturer’s highest-priced products that sell for upward of $1 million. 

“Newmar is the higher end of the motor-home market,” said Ray Douglas, Independence’s general manager. “We consider them ... the best you can buy.”

Based on sales volume and dollar volume, Independence’s No. 5 ranking — out of about 200 dealers nationwide — puts it on the national scale for RV dealers. Independence was awarded a sales-volume trophy for being a Top-10 dealer in the country and also was recognized as a platinum dealership and service center. Additionally, the dealership scored the Mahlon Miller award for service excellence — which is given once a year to only four dealers in the country — for the sixth time in the last seven years.

“We push a lot of business through a very small facility and are almost a virtual dealership to the rest of the world,” Douglas said. “We have clients that will travel 100 to 3,000 miles to do business with us.”

Contact Danielle Hendrix at [email protected].