Remembering an ‘iconic figure’

DAYTONA BEACH -- Little could anyone guess in 1926 when 19-year-old J. Saxton Lloyd was hired as a mechanic's helper at a local auto dealership that he would become an influential business leader whose impacts are still felt today.

"Sax Lloyd was an iconic figure, both locally as well as nationally," said Glenn Ritchey Sr., who in 2006 purchased the dealership with business partner Ted Serbousek and subsequently renamed it Ritchey Cadillac Buick GMC.

For decades, the dealership, which will celebrate its 90th anniversary next year, was a fixture on North Beach Street in downtown Daytona Beach. Ritchey and Serbousek moved it to its present location at 932 N. Nova Road in 2008.

While Lloyd passed away in 1991, his contributions to better both his community, state and industry live on, both in the form of both the Florida Auto Dealers Association that he resurrected following World War II; the state's tourism and economic development arms, Visit Florida and Enterprise Florida; and the Civic League of the Halifax Area, the Daytona Beach group of community and business leaders he founded, whose annual award for distinguished community service is named after him.

His descendants also continue to carry on his legacy in more ways than one.

His grandson Bob W. Lloyd, 55, is executive vice president and general counsel for Brown & Brown, the national insurance agency whose 11-story headquarters is being built on the former site of Lloyd Buick Cadillac. He also is following in his grandfather's footsteps in terms of his involvement in the Daytona Regional Chamber of Commerce, where he is slated to become board chairman next year, much like Sax Lloyd who once served as board president.

Another grandson, Jim Lloyd, 57, Bob's brother, carries on the family's involvement in the car business as service and parts director for Ritchey Cadillac and Subaru of Daytona, another dealership co-owned by Ritchey and Serbousek.

Lloyd Buick Cadillac was founded in 1930 when Lloyd accepted his boss' invitation to become partners along with an equity investor in the new Buick dealership, originally called Daytona Motor Co. He initially oversaw the dealership's service department, but wound up taking over as dealer four years later when Bill Goldenburg was killed in an auto accident.

Only 27 at the time, Lloyd not only managed the keep the business going, he went on to become president of both the Florida and national automobile dealer associations. In addition to his roles in tourism and within the Daytona Regional Chamber of Commerce, he was a strong supporter of Bethune-Cookman College, now a university, and served as vice chairman of its board of trustees.

The one who got away

Arguably, one of Lloyd's most momentous acts was his decision in 1935 to hire a young newcomer as a mechanic at his dealership.

The newcomer's name was Bill France Sr., who would later go on to found NASCAR in 1948.

"He came in here, a big, tall and gangling young fella, we're about the same age," Lloyd recalled in an audio recording.

"(France) said he'd like to have a job and he'd been a mechanic in Washington, D.C., for a Buick dealer there," Lloyd said. "He was a competent mechanic and he needed work, so I said, 'Well, we need a mechanic, so fine. ... Bring your tools, come on in tomorrow morning and we'll go.'"

Lloyd said France proved to be a "top-flight mechanic" who also enjoyed racing cars in his spare time.

But when France asked to be promoted to service manager the next year following a sudden opening, Lloyd turned him down.

"I said, 'Well, Bill, I don't think you have enough experience. I don't believe you can do the job. I don't think you have that ability," Lloyd recalled.

He later came to regret that decision.

"Now here I am, talking to the man who is subsequently going to be the greatest figure in racing in the world of today, and running one of the largest enterprises in racing in the world today," Lloyd recalled, "and I didn't think he had the ability to be a service manager. He reminds me of that every time we get together."

France quit Lloyd's dealership to open a gas station/auto repair shop on the site of what is now the Main Street Station bar.

Lloyd, who remained friends with France, later played an instrumental role in helping France secure the financing needed to build Daytona International Speedway in the 1950s.

'Point of pride'

Lloyd's legacy is about to grow further next year when the new 11-story headquarters for Brown & Brown Insurance opens on the former longtime site of his auto dealership at the corner of North Beach Street and Mary McLeod Bethune Boulevard.

The new headquarters is expected to become a major catalyst in revitalizing the city's historic downtown by bringing hundreds of white-collar professionals to the area, including some whom the insurance giant is transferring from other parts of the country.

One Brown & Brown executive relocating to the new headquarters complex is Bob W. Lloyd, whose office will be several stories above the office once occupied by his grandfather.

"It's a great point of pride," the younger Lloyd said about the site his family's old dealership becoming the new home of Brown & Brown.

Learning 'on the fly'

Sax Lloyd's journey to becoming a successful businessman included narrowly dodging bankruptcy, not once but twice.

The first time was upon succeeding the late Goldenburg, when Lloyd quickly learned the dealership was nearly insolvent, owing $10,000 -- a large sum at the time -- on a loan used to finance its new building on Beach Street.

"He had to learn on the fly (how to survive in business)," recalled Bob F. Lloyd of his late father.

Also adding to the challenge was the fact that the country was still reeling from the Great Depression.

The business' equity partner, a sugar magnate based in Cuba, was out of the country and could not be reached.

"They were very difficult times, but he just persevered," Bob F. Lloyd said.

After getting his dealership back on the right foot, Sax Lloyd faced another challenge when the federal government halted all production of new cars during World War II.

When the war ended and the moratorium on new car production was lifted, the dealership began to prosper once again, allowing Lloyd to buy out the equity partner.

Expanding his sphere of influence

But he wasn't content to just grow his own business.

In the mid-'50s, then-Gov. LeRoy Collins named Lloyd to chair the newly created Florida Development Commission, a precursor to what is now the state's economic development arm, Enterprise Florida.

In a video clip found on the website for the State Library and Archives of Florida, Collins introduces Lloyd to explain the new commission's mission.

"All of us in Florida can be mighty proud of the fact that we're just about the fastest-growing state in the nation," Sax Lloyd said in the film, "(but) we must keep pace with the needs created by this great migration to our land of sunshine and plan for the even greater expansion we know is to come."

Lloyd was also appointed chairman of the Florida Advertising Commission, the predecessor to Visit Florida, as well as the Florida Racing Commission.

Helping an old friend

When Bill France Sr. ran into obstacles raising money to build Daytona International Speedway in the 1950s, he turned to his old friend and former boss for help.

Bob F. Lloyd recalled that France had "exhausted every avenue he knew to get the Speedway financed. The only way he could do it was to sell stock and the state turned it down until my dad got involved to get them to change their minds."

Sax Lloyd agreed to lead the newly formed Daytona Beach Racing & Recreational Facilities District, which signed off on the papers needed to provide additional funding support for the Speedway project, which was completed in 1959.

"Out of gratitude, Bill France (Sr.) named the (manmade) lake (in the Speedway's infield) after my dad, who said, 'It's not really a lake, it's a borrow pit!'" Bob F. Lloyd recalled.

Carrying on the family legacy

Bob F. Lloyd and his twin brother Bill were born in 1935, the year after their father took over the dealership.

As adults, they joined him in running the business and continued to operate it following their father's death until selling it to General Motors in 1998.

While Bob W. Lloyd, 55, chose to not join his family's business, opting instead to pursue a career in law, his older brother Jim, 57, still plays a key role in the auto dealership, working as the service and parts director at both Ritchey Cadillac and Subaru of Daytona, another dealership co-owned by Ritchey and Serbousek.

'Community-minded people'

Ritchey, a former Daytona Beach mayor, credits Lloyd's son Bob with getting him involved in community service by inviting him to become a Rotary Club member in the early 1980s.

"The Lloyds are all community-minded people who want nothing but the best for our community," Ritchey said.

Ritchey, who is also the longtime owner/CEO of Jon Hall Chevrolet, said Sax once invited him to a major auto dealers' conference where the elder Lloyd was scheduled to speak.

"He (Sax Lloyd) was quite a person. He wasn't afraid to speak his mind; not to tear down, but rather to tell people 'We can do better as a community,'" Ritchey recalled.

Bob F. Lloyd said he and his brother Bill were "delighted" when Ritchey and Serbousek agreed to buy the Lloyd Buick Cadillac from General Motors.

"From a business standpoint, two wonderful things have happened to us," said Bob F. Lloyd. "One, when Glenn Ritchey (and Serbousek) bought the (Buick and Cadillac) franchises, and, two, when (Brown & Brown Chairman) Hyatt Brown (and his company) decided to build their new headquarters on our old site, which is a dream come true."

The Beach Street site was sold in 2006 to a real estate development group that wound up scrapping plans to build a twin-tower condo highrise when the Great Recession hit. The property, which was lost to foreclosure in 2009, remained vacant until Brown & Brown agreed to buy it in 2017.

By then, it had become overgrown with tall weeds, mounds of trash and broken concrete left over from the demolition of the old dealership buildings in 2012.

"It sat for years with weeds growing and had become an eyesore," said Bob F. Lloyd. "It got to where I couldn't bear to drive by it."

When Bob W. Lloyd becomes chairman of the Daytona Regional Chamber of Commerce, he will likely participate in the ribbon-cutting to celebrate the opening of the new headquarters.

"If this is the start of a new era for downtown, it's a great thing," he said.

Jim Lloyd said he, too, is thrilled that the former site of Lloyd Buick Cadillac is about to play a big role in revitalizing downtown Daytona Beach as the new headquarters for Brown & Brown.

"We've been intertwined with Daytona Beach and Beach Street for generations and the fact that one of us (Bob W. Lloyd) will still be there is a great thing," Jim Lloyd said. "I like it."

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