Snow removal for car dealerships: inventory rows, service drives and damage claims

What makes a dealership lot different?

Inventory is parked tight: nose to tail, mirror to mirror, with aisles just wide enough for a porter to pull a car out. A plow cannot clear between cars, and a blade or snowblower near a fender is a damage claim waiting to happen. Meanwhile the service drive often opens well before the showroom, customers expect a clean path to the service desk, and the front line along the road is the dealership's display window.

Which areas come first?

1. The service drive: entrance, lanes and the apron at the service doors, before service opens.
2. Customer and accessible parking, and the walks to the service desk and showroom, treated.
3. Showroom entrances and the display pads people walk across.
4. The main drive aisles and the route from the road, including test-drive exits.
5. The front line along the road, by hand and brush.
6. Inventory aisles, then the stalls as porters move cars.
7. Employee parking, back lots and the car-carrier unloading area.

How do you plow tightly packed inventory?

Plow the aisles between rows, never into a row. Keep blades and snowblowers an agreed distance from vehicles, point blower chutes away from cars, since they throw ice chunks and grit, and clear the last few feet near bumpers by hand.

Then clean up the way an apartment complex does on cleanup day: porters move cars out of a section, the crew clears the stalls, and the cars go back. Schedule cleanup for the morning after a storm, section by section, so no row sits on packed snow for weeks.

Never stack snow against or between vehicles, on display pads, in test-drive routes, or where it blocks sight lines at the exits. Piles melt toward whatever sits downhill, and that water refreezes under the cars. Mark stacking zones on the site map before the season. See where to put snow in a parking lot.

Who brushes the cars?

Brushing inventory is not plowing, and it should be assigned in writing. Some dealerships have porters brush cars with soft snow brushes after the lot is plowed; others pay the snow contractor for it as a separate line. Either way, shovels and hard scrapers never touch paint. Set the order, too: plow first, then brush, so cleared snow is not pushed back onto brushed cars.

What does salt do to vehicle finishes?

AAA's Michigan-based Auto Club Group warns that road salt damage is easy to miss because it happens underneath a vehicle, where rust can weaken structural parts, brake lines and suspension systems, and can also discolor or chip paint. It advises washing at least every two weeks in winter, more often after heavily salted roads, with an underbody spray.

For a dealership, the lesson is to keep salt on walking routes and drive aisles and off the rows. Ask the crew to turn down the spreader or use a deflector next to inventory, use a walk-behind spreader on walks beside display cars, and keep salty snow piles away from vehicles. How often inventory is washed is the dealership's call.

Porters walk the lot all day. OSHA's walking-working surface rule names snow and ice among the hazards employers must keep off walking surfaces (29 CFR 1910.22), so treat the paths porters actually use.

How do you document damage?

Before the season, photograph the lot's fixed features and stake the ones a blade can hit: light-pole bases, bollards, curbs and islands, sign and flagpole bases, display ramps and parking blocks. Mark them on the site map.

During the season:

• The contractor's timestamped visit records show who was on the lot and when. See snow logs.
• Porters photograph rows after plowing, before cars are moved.
• Report damage promptly, the way the contract requires, with photos.
• The contractor's certificate of insurance names the dealership's entity.

Questions for the contract

1. What are the clear-by times for the service drive and customer lot?
2. What may the crew touch, and how close may equipment get to vehicles?
3. Who brushes inventory, with what, and at what price?
4. How are cleanup sections scheduled with the porters?
5. Where are the stacking zones and no-stack zones?
6. How is damage reported, and by when?

More questions are in the commercial contract checklist.