Built by the people who worked the floor.
Dealer Forge wasn't drawn up in a boardroom. It was built between deals by two people who sold the cars, desked the deals, and ran the store — then got tired of the software they were handed.
Ethan Reynolds
Ethan started selling cars in 2023 at Pinkerton Chevrolet in Lynchburg — and won Salesman of the Year his first year in the business. In April 2024, still working the floor, he founded AutoLister Pro to kill the hours he was losing to manual Facebook Marketplace listings; it grew to 618+ dealers across multiple countries.
When Jonathan took the GSM chair at Pinkerton Salem, he brought Ethan with him — as a finance manager and sales manager. Selling, desking, and running finance inside a franchise store meant living the software problem from every seat: slow websites, clunky CRMs, and tooling that never matched how a desk actually runs. Dealer Forge is the answer, built from scratch.
Every feature comes from a real store's real problem — not a product manager's guess.
Jonathan Rambo
Jonathan brings fifteen years inside dealerships — finance manager, sales manager, and general sales manager. He's run the desk, worked the funding, and owned the number. He also has an eye for talent: he hired Ethan twice — first onto the floor in Lynchburg, then into management in Salem.
As GSM at Pinkerton Salem, Jonathan took the store from 18 sales a month to a 70-per-month average in the span of two months — the kind of turnaround that comes from process, follow-up, and knowing exactly where every deal stands. That operator's eye is built into Dealer Forge: the CRM works the way a desk actually runs.
If it doesn't put deals on the board, it doesn't ship.
Time on the floor, not in a boardroom.
From the showroom floor to the platform.
The showroom floor
Jonathan — fifteen years deep in the business — hires a rookie named Ethan onto the floor at Pinkerton Chevrolet in Lynchburg. Ethan wins Salesman of the Year his first year in the business.
AutoLister Pro is born
Still working the floor, Ethan builds a tool to kill the hours lost to manual Facebook Marketplace listings. One click per vehicle, listings that manage themselves — it grows to 618+ dealers across multiple countries.
The Salem turnaround
Jonathan takes the GSM chair at Pinkerton Salem and hires Ethan a second time — as a finance manager and sales manager. The store goes from 18 sales a month to a 70-per-month average in two months.
Dealer Forge begins
Running a store by day exposes the rest of the stack: websites stuck in 2004 billed like franchise fees, CRMs that can't prove a single lead. Nobody was going to fix it — so they start building Dealer Forge between deals.
All-in
The store is bought out, and both walk away from the dealership to focus on Dealer Forge full time. Jonathan hired Ethan twice; this time, they bet on each other.
The platform grows
Real dealerships live on the stack — franchise and independent — with releases shipping every week. The roadmap is written on dealership whiteboards, not in a boardroom.
See what they built.
A 30-minute walkthrough on your own lead sources — run by the people who worked the desk.