Dixie Auto Parts opened in 1957 on Military Road just behind the Columbus Brick. It has been owned and operated by Judson Littlejohn’s family for three generations.
Now that he helms the business from behind the counter and out in the scrap yard located at 6572 Hwy 50, he says changes are needed for it to survive to the next generation.
Among those changes is a move to online sales, particularly the third-party auction site eBay.
“There’s a sense of pride (here) because you always look back and want to make your grandparents proud and your mother proud,” Littlejohn said. “But I’m not so sure with business the way it is that it’ll make it another generation unless (we) make some major changes.”
Littlejohn said when his grandfather, Billy Coleman, opened the business all those years ago, he knew every scrap part in the yard, from the radios to the doors hanging on hollowed car frames. He didn’t care how old the car was or the mixture of fluids trapped inside from a recent wreck; he sold it all and quickly. There weren’t any computers to keep inventory, so the family kept track of everything and knew exactly where to look when a customer needed a part, even if it was a spark plug for a ‘68 Chevy Caprice.
“Back when my grandfather had it, it was all his memory,” Littlejohn said. “He could say, ‘Go down to that light pole and the car is sitting right there.’ Now everything’s computerized. He never wanted to do that.”
When Littlejohn started working there as a child in the early ‘80s, he scrapped cars in the yard and accompanied his grandfather on trips to purchase wrecked vehicles at auction.
“I started during the summers, spring break, any kind of vacation time at school, I would work and I really enjoyed it back then,” he said. “I was actually out in the yard daily. Whether it was working on a forklift or taking a motor apart or whatever the case may be in breaking down on tires. I just worked my way through all of it to learn every part.”
Littlejohn graduated in 1997 from Mississippi State University with a business management degree. When he returned to the scrapyard in January 1998, he did what his grandfather had refused to do for almost a decade: install a computer and digital inventory system.
Gone now are the days of motorheads and project car lovers exploring the yard for parts, pulling engines right off the cars, Littlejohn said. In fact, the yard does so little in-person business that it’s just Littlejohn working the front desk. Today, customers call ahead and request parts, and Littlejohn’s crew retrieves and packages it for them.
Parts are taken out of the cars upon their arrival to the yard, he said, and every piece of merchandise is cataloged. No vehicle frame is kept for sale for more than a year.
More than 80 percent of the yard’s business is online via a national scrap yard database called Holland Scrap and Recycle. People can see what cars are available all over the country.
But Littlejohn believes that’s not enough. In order to grow and keep up with competitors in major cities like Nashville or Memphis, he also is taking the inventory to eBay.
“You can do online and stay selling with the little stuff because it will all sell,” he said. “I mean, it’s crazy. You can get a bracket out of something you’re going to throw away and put it up on eBay or get like a gas door for people up north where everything up there rusts out. You sell a gas door off a Chevrolet truck, put the color on it and clean it up, and they’ll buy it online. Whereas if somebody walks into here, they don’t want to give you $20 for it.”
Innovations aside, the one piece of the business he never intends to move away from is its reputation – built by his grandparents and mother, Carol Littlejohn, over the last 65 years.
“My grandparents had values,” he said. “They have such a good name because they did take care of their customers back then. I still have customers now that they dealt with 30 years ago.”
You can help your community
Quality, in-depth journalism is essential to a healthy community. The Dispatch brings you the most complete reporting and insightful commentary in the Golden Triangle, but we need your help to continue our efforts. In the past week, our reporters have posted 33 articles to cdispatch.com. Please consider subscribing to our website for only $2.30 per week to help support local journalism and our community.
You can help your community
Quality, in-depth journalism is essential to a healthy community. The Dispatch brings you the most complete reporting and insightful commentary in the Golden Triangle, but we need your help to continue our efforts. In the past week, our reporters have posted 33 articles to cdispatch.com. Please consider subscribing to our website for only $2.30 per week to help support local journalism and our community.
Join the Discussion