Well so much for “the dealership that’s different” — at least in a bankruptcy court’s eyes. In 6½ months, tops, Royal Buick will be no more. In the wisdom of those trying to reorganize General Motors, there’s no room for a dealership that for 32 years has been the only place in Tucson one could buy a Buick.

The saddest part of this recession is that people who did right are still getting hurt through no fault of their own. And, by decisions that are at the very least, questionable.  

I first met Royal Automotive’s president, Paul Weitman, when he arrived in Tucson. It was Mother’s Day 1977. My mother-in-law and father-in-law had just met him and invited him to their house. He told us he had acquired what we knew then as Zimmerman Buick.

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Weitman had been a high school teacher and basketball coach for seven years in Georgia before he got into the car business. He runs his dealerships the way coach would. A classy coach. Salesmen aren’t paid on the traditional commission system. When it comes to service, Royal dealerships live that word.   

Although I’ve dealt with him from time-to-time over the years, Weitman eschews being in the limelight. If he reads this, he’ll not like the idea that I’ve put his name in the column.

I talked to him after he announced that GM had decided that it didn’t want to continue Royal’s franchise as a Buick dealer. He didn’t want to be a part of a story.

What bothered him most is that people working for Royal Buick would be affected.

Royal will go on. Although he didn’t tell me this, I suspect they sell far more Lexus cars than they did Buicks. After all,  there are two Lexus but there was only the one Buick dealership. There’s also Jaguar and Land Rover and Suzuki and Kia and who knows what else next year after Buick is gone?

Royal has been an award-winning dealer — just a week before receiving notification that its Buick franchise was being dropped, it won a 2008 sales and service award for excellence.

When GM decided it would get rid of the Pontiac brand, one of my thoughts was what a raw deal that could be for  the Quebedeaux family that a business now employing its third generation could be put in such jeopardy. Inside Tucson Business ran a story of my interview with Tom Quebedeaux, who at the time took a fatalistic approach saying he would wait to see what GM decided and react accordingly. He even acknowledged the Royal dealership only about a mile away on East Speedway could complicate matters.

With GM’s decision, it would appear that maybe Quebedeaux will pick up the Buick franchise. If he wants it, that’s good for him and the people who work there. 

And even though Royal Automotive will still be selling new cars, it can’t be good for consumers when a company such as GM finds there’s no room in its future for the good, honest people who were working there doing their best to sell Buicks.  

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Contact David Hatfield at dhatfield@azbiz.com or (520) 295-4237.