Lithia Motors history

His son, Sid DeBoer, the oldest child of DeBoer's six, joined Lithia in 1964 at the age of 21 to become its bookkeeper.

In 1968, Walt's son, Sidney DeBoer, took over the business and incorporated Lithia Motors Inc.

First Steps Toward Growth: 1970-90

But by 1987, DeBoer began to sour on acquisitions.

With this, Lithia's base of operation moved to Medford and grew to a total of five stores with 19 franchises by 1990.

Neill, who joined the company in 1995 and spent his first six months on the job selling cars, ran the search for an underwriter and chose the San Francisco brokerage firm of Furman Selz.

In December 1996, the company went public, trading on the New York Stock Exchange with an IPO of $11 per share.

Lithia reported impressive profits, however, of $6.0 million in 1997 on revenues of $319.9 million, up from profits of $2.6 million on revenues of $142.8 million.

By 1998, both profits and revenues had just about doubled again, totaling $10.8 million and $714.7 million, respectively.

In 1999, the company ranked first in the Seattle Times annual ranking of the Northwest's fastest growing publicly held companies.

Although new vehicle sales had begun to slow in 2000, its revenues that year increased by 33 percent to $1.66 billion and its net profits rose by 27 percent to $24.3 million.

By 2003, Lithia had revenues of $2.5 billion from its 84 dealerships while employing just over 5,500 people.

The company had increased dealerships to 88 by 2005.

Lithia was fined $500,000 by the state of Alaska in 2006 for charging car buyers illegal document preparation fees at their Alaska dealerships.

The Chrysler Jeep Dodge store moved to the auto mall in September 2007, but the project was put on hold for seven years because the recession hit shortly after.

In 2010, it was reported that with the backing of two lenders, "the Commons," a mixed-use building with Lithia Headquarters as the largest tenant, was a "go" and could proceed with construction.

The group's Toyota store, which the group had planned to move to the auto mall, instead went through a $1.5 million renovation in 2013 and stayed on their 5-acre site in downtown Medford.

In late 2014, Lithia moved their Honda, Nissan, BMW, and Volkswagen stores to the auto mall.

In September 2016, Lithia Motors announced that they were acquiring Greiner Ford-Lincoln in Casper, WY.

In August 2017, Lithia Motors acquired Downtown Los Angeles Auto Group ("DTLA"), bringing the Lithia store count to 167.

In March 2018, Lithia Motors acquired Prestige Auto Stores in Bergen County, New Jersey bringing the Lithia store count to 185.

Suburban reported revenues of $2.7 billion in 2019.