Runde Auto Chat

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The newest addition to Runde's proud family of upstanding sales professionals is Kaylin Seffrood! Kaylin has great experience from other automotive shops and has now found her way to Runde's where she is enjoying selling new Chevrolet's. You'll find Kaylin always smiling, willing to help, and brightening up whichever room she may be in. We sat down with Kaylin to get to know more about her.

Where are you from? Monroe, WI.

Born and raised? Born and raised.

Where do you live now? We just bought a house in Hazel Green, Wisconsin. We moved there during the 4th of July Weekend.

What brought you to Hazel Green? Initially, my fiancé and I came to Hazel Green to work for Dubuque Harley Davidson so we would avoid the hour and a half drive to get there from Monroe. We tried to find a place that would let us live with our pets but didn't have much luck so we bought a house.

What made you want to work for Runde Chevrolet? I've always wanted to sell vehicles. I stopped in here one day to get warranty work on my truck and asked if you guys were hiring and it just happened that you were.

How do you like your experience so far? I love it.

What do you like to do around the Hazel Green Area? There isn't much to do... unfortunately with our hours we've been just mostly staying at home and playing with the pets or going back and forth to Monroe or Freeport, WI (where his family is from) to visit family. We go out to dinner and stuff like that as well.

What do you drive? An '08 Chevy Avalanche.

What's your favorite car? A '59 Chevy Parkwood. My dad has one, I love it.

What kind of pets do you have? A dog (boxer), a cat, and a hedgehog.

How did you come about getting the hedgehog? I saw an ad on Craigslist and I went about an hour to pick her up. It was totally worth it.

How old is she and what's her name? She's a year-and-a-half and she's named Eseme. I have no idea what it means, it's what the previous owners named her.

Do you... pet... hedgehogs? Yeah, you can. When she calms down and her quills are back she is fine to pet but she can puff up her quills anytime and that hurts. She's even drawn blood on my fiancé.

Do all the animals get along? The cat runs the house. She's the boss. You could say she's literally insane. One second she'll be loving you and the next second she'll claw at your arm.

Did you have her from a kitten? She just turned 10; I've only had her for about four years. I got her from the humane society and she was named "sweetheart". That doesn't quite fit her personality.

I hear your engaged, when's the wedding? 06/09/2012. We've got so much stuff done already; it kind of takes half the fun out of it.

Going to be a big wedding? It's going to be a very small ceremony and whoever shows up to the reception, shows up.

Big family on both of your sides? My family is small, I'm an only child. But Ryan's [Kaylin's fiancé] family is huge. We go over to his side of the family for Thanksgiving, Christmas and Easter. And every time there's always over 25 people there.

Your fiancé works here now, how's he liking the gig? Yes, he just started here as a mechanic, he says he's loving it.

You guys watch any movies? We watch all kinds of movies. We just bought The Smurfs and we just watched that the other night.

What was the last theater movie you've seen? I think it was the last Transformers movie: Dark of the Moon.

What do you guys like to do? Any events you go to? During the summer months we ride our motorcycles and during the winter we ride our snowmobiles. Not really big partiers really. We are kind of in the middle of re-modeling the house.

What kind of bikes do you guys have? Right now we only have Ryan's Harley Road Glide. We have two of my dad’s bikes in our basement, a Road Glide and a Heritage and my friend has her Road glide and an Ultra-Classic stored there as well.

Where do you ride to? We've been up to Canada and to Georgia.

How long did that take? Both trips took about a week total, we took our time. The bike I road back then was a Buell Blast and I road it from Monroe to Sturgis Motorcycle Rally and anyone who knows that bike knows that's not a bike that you take that far.

Any future trips planned? I'd like to go to the Oregon/Washington area. Any trip outside of North America is fun.

Any plans for the holidays? It depends on what day, but yes. We'll be going to Rockford to Ryan’s Grandma's house for the biggest gathering with 25-30 people. We also go to Freeport to see his parents as well as to Monroe to see my family. We generally just eat dinner, talk and exchange gifts.

Why should customers come to see you when they want to buy a vehicle? I have a little different perspective on things since I'm a woman. And I always treat people right. They should come in and speak with me because like Runde's, they will like my attitude.

What's the strangest thing that ever happened to you? It was at the 105th anniversary for Harley Davidson in Milwaukee when I was living there working at the Harley dealership. We were so swamped that this lady who just bought a pair of boots came up and asked if we had any socks for sale, which we didn't. So she literally bought the socks from my feet. So I gave them to her and she gave me 10 dollars.

Ever play an instrument? I used to play the trombone for about two years.

What's your favorite band? I don't really have a favorite.

What's in the CD player of your car right now? I have six cd's in my car right now. I have Adel, Lincoln Park and I forget the rest.

Do you like Rap? As long as I can understand it, I like it.

So you don't like Rap? Not usually.

Favorite movie? That's tough... I love the Transformers movies; I like Over the Hedge and the Cars movies as well.

You said you had some service work done here. How did you like being a customer of Runde's? I loved it, it was the best service that I've ever gotten. Many of the dealerships I went to, just because I'm a girl, treated me like I don't know anything about vehicles and ignore me. It’s nice here that I'm not treated that way, I can chat with the guys here and be treated as an equal.

Welcome to the crew Kaylin! Stay tuned for an interview with Kaylin's Fiancé - Ryan Kerchner!

Tim Meyer of Dubuque is an old bird when it come to selling new Chevrolet vehicles.  ( By "old bird", we mean someone who has experience ... a multitude of experience).  He recently came on board at Runde's and has already had the pleasure of helping several wonderful people purchase new vehicles here. Tim has an extensive sales past and has a great appreciation for local business, arts and music. Sit down with Tim for two minutes and you will feel like he's been your lifelong friend. 

How long have you been in the car business? 26 years.

Are you familiar with automotive industry? Absolutely, I come from pretty humble beginnings. I’m from an automobile parts family from here in Dubuque Iowa. My father ran an auto parts company called Sieg Dubuque Company. So I’ve been fed and clothed by the automobile, almost all my life.

What is your favorite part about the business? My customers, definitely my customers. I have about four thousand sales in my career and maybe about 2,000 - 2,500 customers. I enjoy the customers very much.

What can a customer look forward to when they come to work with you? I think they would like my kind and polite approach to the automobile sales process and also my product knowledge for all different kinds of cars and trucks. I have financing and leasing backgrounds and schooling over the years in Michigan so I think that I would be a big help to them for calculating payments or making a car affordable and finding the right product.

Kind of the whole package in one then? Yeah, hopefully.

Do you have any kids? Yes I do. I adopted two children years ago. Jesse and Meghan and I have four wonderful grandchildren from my daughter Meghan.

Do you do a lot of activities with them? I have them over for Sunday dinners usually once a month or so.

Do you have any pets? I had a Black Lab, Golden Retriever named Shadow that my son gave to me. Unfortunately Shadow passed away in ’07 but I may get another pet, I love dogs and animals.

What are your past times or hobbies? I like art and music. Right now I have an art project going on working with photograph art. I have an old, old photograph of my grandmother in 1918 with hair down to her knees that I really appreciate and am trying to publish. Otherwise I enjoy poster art from the 60’s and 70’s. 

Who’s your favorite artist or where do you grab inspiration from? I really don’t have a favorite artist. My hero in life is Ray Davies. He’s the song writer for the old rock and roll band The Kinks. He is what I consider “the poet of our time”. So I would say that he would be one of my heroes.

What’s your favorite Chevy Vehicle? I’ve been eye-balling a new Silverado. I drove one previously as a demonstrator for 20 years or so, so that’s definitely my vehicle. I like to work around my home, so it’s a very versatile vehicle, four wheel drive. Pretty much a big part of my business, so a silver 2011 Silverado four wheel drive with a Z-71 package would be my perfect vehicle.

What’s your favorite restaurant in the Tri-State area? I like Marco’s and Mario’s. I do like some of the other restaurants, like down at the casino. I think it’s called the Wood Fire Grill. I do like that, they have a good Salmon there. I visit many different restaurants. The food’s great around the Dubuque area.

Apple or Microsoft? I like Microsoft. Well, I should correct myself there. I really like my Ipod and I like the new forward ways of the Apple Company. So, I probably like Apple a little better even though I initially said Microsoft because I’ve used just a regular HP computer for years. But I plan on going to Apple in the near future as soon as I sell a few more Chevrolet's.

Dogs or cats? Dogs, definitely.

Starbucks or Seattle’s best coffee? I like Starbucks quite a bit.

I know you’re an avid coffee drinker; do you have a favorite kind of roast? I kind of like a light Colombian coffee. I like to go to the Kwik Star Gas Station by K-Mart to buy my Coffee.

What’s your most memorable experience in a car or truck? My trip to California in 1970 after I got out of high school with two of my high school pals. We went to California for 3 months in a 1963 Volkswagen minibus with a roll back roof- that’s probably my most memorable experience in an automobile.

What did you guys end up doing there? Well, first we went to Omaha and stayed with some relatives and one of my friends. Then, we went to Albuquerque, New Mexico -- the first time I have ever seen the mountains and that was neat. We stopped at Colorado, going through the desert and heading to California. We traveled all the way from San Diego to San Francisco before I came home in November. Great experience.

Sounds like a very epic trip. It was. It was very expanding for my mind.

What’s your favorite movie? I’m not a real big movie buff but I did always like the old movie The Big Chill, and some of the movies of the 60’s. Kind of like Bullet, the car movie of Steve Mcqueen.

What’s in the CD player of your car right now? Pink Floyd. I like a lot of old English rock and roll from the 60’s and 70’s.

Do you consider the glass half empty or half full? Half full - definitely half full.

Where is the first place you will travel if you win the lottery? I’ve never been to Hawaii. I’d probably go to Europe too, after that.

Is there anything you’d like to say to your customers? Yes, I’d like to welcome them here to my new position at Runde Auto Group. My office is here right in the Runde Chevrolet building at the top of the hill in East Dubuque on Highway 35 North. I’m here everyday but Wednesdays and Sundays. I look forward to seeing you all!

We had the pleasure of getting a hold of Loras Link this week. Loras bought a vehicle from our Manchester Store recently and has been loving the vehicle. He was more than willing to share his pleasant experience with us.

What brought you into Runde's.
One day we were just driving around and we've been kind of looking around for a new vehicle. While driving we saw an Acadia sitting in your your lot and decided to stop and look at it. The next day I inquired about it, then we went there and fell in love with it during our test drive and bought it.

How did you like your salesperson?
Oh he was great. Everyone was really good there.

On a scale of 1-10 what would you rank your experience at Runde's?
Oh I'd definitely have to give it a 10, no complaints.

Are you from around the Manchester area?
Actually we live between Balltown and Rickardsville in Dubuque County, we just happened to be in Manchester passing through, more or less. We were actually going to stop and eat at the Pizza Ranch and noticed your lot of cars and that's when we decided to check it out.

Found some gold on your seemingly routine journey, huh?
Haha, yep.

What are you going to use the Acadia for?
It's going to be our main, personal, vehicle just for errands and whatnot.

Do you have any kids?
We have a daughter that goes to Loras and one that goes to Beckman High School in Dyersville.

Kind of a coincidence that your daughter is named Loras, same as your last name, huh?
Yeah, actually we talked about that over at Loras because the Loras website is now called the Loras Link!

Sounds pretty much like destiny that she goes there.

Are you married?
Yes. I've been married for 21 years.

Remember your first date?
Oh yeah, I remember we met at a party in Holy Cross, IA. She wasn't planning on coming but her friend convinced her to go.

What do you guys like to do as a family?
My daughters are really into softball and music, so were pretty much chasing them down trying to catch up with all of their events.

Sounds like a pretty close-knit family.
Yeah, we try to be anyway. This is actually the second vehicle we bought from Runde's. We bought a truck from them in 1996 and we actually still have it and it still gets the job done. And when I have to replace that I know that I will look at Runde's for a new truck.

Thank you very much for your time and kind words. All of us at Runde's wish you and your family the best!

I remember watching the show “Hey Dude!” as a kid. It was a country life kind of show - riding around on horses, roping calf’s, tying all sorts of knots that would just leave me wrapped up if I attempted to try them. To me it was a different life, I was used to a city life, but the country activities I saw always interested me. What better way to satisfy these interests than to see the best of the best in our very own community compete in a rodeo, live!?

The 8^th Annual Wisconsin Regional High School Rodeo will gather kids from the 6^th – 12^th grade to compete in the rodeo which will be held at the Dubuque County Fairgrounds from May 20^th – May 22^nd. So it’s local, teaches kids great life skills and offers a good time for all the viewers which make this an event not to miss.

We got a chance to interview Karen Schilling, one of the founding members of the River Rodeo Committee which puts together the rodeo, to get to know a little more about the event…

Hello Karen, what is your association with the event?
I am on the River Rodeo Committee, we are a group of parents from Eastern Iowa that banded together to put on the rodeo here in Dubuque for the Wisconsin High School Rodeo Association. We are a regional rodeo.

How long has the committee been together?
This is our 8^th year. About eight families and myself, are the founding members.

What makes you keep doing these events every year? We do it for the kids. They really enjoy having places to rodeo. Dubuque has great facilities and the kids love coming to the fairgrounds. It really is all for the kids.

How did the Rodeo come about?
My business partner, Ginny Henneberry, has a son that was competing in the Wisconsin High School Rodeo and my daughter was about to start competing. We both thought it would be convenient to have a rodeo in Dubuque. From there we had the first meeting in her house, and we thought we could do it so we gave it a try and we are still going.

How many participants enter the rodeo?
There are usually around 150 contestants for the weekend. We do not have a limit to the number of contestants, though.

What are the requirements to enter the rodeo?
It’s open to anybody that is a member of the Wisconsin High School Association that is between the 6^th and 12^th grade.

How does someone become a member of the Wisconsin High School Association?
They can go to the website: http://www.cowboycalendar.com/WIHSRA/ where they can download the form to apply for the association.

What kind of activities goes on in the rodeo?
They do all of the regular rodeo events plus extras: Barrel Racing, Pole Bending, Breakaway Roping, Goat Tying, Calf Roping, Team Wrestling, Boys and Girls Cutting, Saddle Broncs, Bareback Broncs and Bull riding.

How long do the events usually last?
Each performance lasts approximately two hours. But we cannot get all the contestants done in that time frame so there’s what we call “slack”. Slack is when we run the extra contestants on times that aren’t during the public rodeo showtime. The Junior High rodeo is at 4:00pm Friday afternoon and a lot of the kids are rolling in during the afternoon on Friday and the High School rodeo is on Saturday and Sunday.

What do the participants get for winning?
Its two things… for the high schools it’s a “two-go” weekend so they take their scores from both go’s and average it. We have awards for the 1^st – 4^th place average winner. They also accumulate points for the year-end total which is totaled in June at the state finals in Richland Center, WI. The top person in each event wins a saddle and a buckle. 2^nd-5^th places all receive buckles as well as other gifts. The top four are qualified to go to nationals which is in Gillette, Wyoming this year in July.

Do the kids bring in their own horses?
Yes, the kids bring their own horses and keep them in the barns up on the fairground. A lot of the kids bring self-contained horse-trailers which have living quarters in the front so they can stay right on the fairgrounds the whole weekend long.

Generally a pretty good crowed for the show?
Oh yes, I would say over the course of the weekend there are 1,500-2,000 spectators. It grows every year.

What has changed over the years with the event? Over these last three years we added clowns to the event. In each of the three performances on Saturday and Sunday we have a boot race where we invite the kids, ten and under, to come into the arena. We take off one of their boots and they have to race to go get their boot and bring it back. It gets the little kids in the arena with the clown, the kids love it.

Every year there are improvements to the facility. We went through the years having a new fence put in and making the arena bigger and making improvements to the announcer’s facility. Every year we try to make it nicer for the participants.

Also, every year the competition keeps getting tougher and we get a lot more participants.

Can people volunteer to help out with the event?
Yes. We are looking for help with the admission and the food stand. We are always looking for volunteers.

If you are interested in volunteering for the rodeo you can call Karen Schilling at (563) 542-4791.

Location:
Dubuque County Fairgrounds Horse Arena. 14569 Old Highway Road Dubuque, IA 52002 US

Schedule/Information:
Friday, May 20^th @ 4:00p.m…….. Jr. High Rodeo
Sat. May 21^st @ 1:00p.m………….. High School Performances
Sat. May 21^st @ 7:00p.m………….. High School Performances
Sun. May 22^nd @ Noon…………….. High School Performances

Tickets available at the gate:
$7.00 for Adult (Friday admission is just $5.00)
$3.00 Ages 7-10
6 & Under: Free
Weekend Pass: $15.00

$5.00 Advance Tickets available at:
Longhorn Saddlery Theisen’s Store