In December of 2021, Gregg was awarded Wisconsin’s Dealer of the Year Award by Time Magazine. He was one of 47 nominees out of nearly 16,000 dealers across the country to attend the Las Vegas ceremony and represent Wisconsin. Now in its 53rd year, the TIME Dealer of the Year award is one of the auto industry’s most prestigious and highly coveted honors
Gregg was celebrated with the other nominees for the many ways auto dealers are doing it right in their industry and giving back with extraordinary contributions to their community.
Scott Kunes, COO, made the announcement to all 2,000 employees over the weekend via their employee announcement portal. “We are proud to announce that while Gregg was not Time Dealer of the Year, he was a Top Five Finalist! I know in our hearts he’s the real winner! This award goes out to all of our team members at Kunes who work so hard and give so much. He wouldn’t be here without you!”
Today, the Kunes Auto Group encompasses 29 auto dealerships and 11 RV facilities in
Illinois, Wisconsin, Iowa and Minnesota, and five of his children currently work for the
family enterprise.
“I think of being a car dealer as a way to improve people’s lives,” nominee Kunes said. “If
this was just about selling cars, I would be bored by now. We’re here to build up our
employees, customers and communities, and help make them better than when we
Arrived.”
Kunes is very proud that his dealerships have made the Automotive News Best
Dealerships to Work For list 39 times since 2012. “The award is given to only 100
dealers a year and is largely based on employee feedback,” he said. “To know that I’ve
been able to build an organization that treats their team better than most of the
competition is very gratifying.”
Kunes also gives back to the retail auto industry by serving as a district board member for
the Wisconsin Automobile & Truck Dealers Association. “I love this industry, and I’m
grateful for the opportunity to work to create a better business environment for dealers in
Wisconsin in whatever capacity I can,” Kunes said.
He shares that same willingness to help on a local level. He is dedicated to aiding
individuals with poor credit by offering them the ability to buy a car. “We do a great deal
of subprime business and strive to make sure that everyone is treated with dignity and
respect,” Kunes said.
In addition, he established the Kunes Family Foundation to facilitate charitable giving in
the United States and abroad. “We donate 10 percent of gross profits – more than $1
million per year – to charities, specifically those that help the underprivileged,” he said.
“We’ve always been dedicated to helping food pantries, homeless shelters, churches,
schools and other humanitarian services in the communities we serve. Additionally,
we’ve been able to build two orphanages in India, including funding a school and
providing an ambulance.”
He is particularly proud of his work for the Geneva National Foundation, for which he
was a board member from 2010 to 2018. This group is dedicated to improving the lives
of individuals living with developmental disabilities in Walworth County, Wisconsin.
“While on the board, we worked to fund facilities that serve our special needs community
and were able to provide a fully accessible aquatic center for the special needs school,
build a work-training facility and so much more,” Kunes said.
Kunes has also donated trucks and vans to local ministries and pantries; helped fund a
building acquisition for the Open Arms Free Clinic in Elkhorn, Wisconsin; sent his IT
team to retrofit a school in an underfunded neighborhood with working Wi-Fi and
provided computers for every classroom; stocks food pantries; and much more.
“The growth we’ve seen in the dealerships has allowed me to give beyond what I could
ever imagine,” he said. “I can only hope that we make ripples of positive impact for years
to come.”
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