SANFORD, FLA. · SEPTEMBER 29, 2026
Dealer Funnel, the communications platform built for car dealerships, today announced that co-founder Troy Spring has been named Chief Executive Officer. Spring, who recently sold Dealer World — the automotive marketing company he founded in 2009 — will now devote his full energy to growing Dealer Funnel and its all-in-one platform for dealership sales and service teams.
A fixture in retail automotive for more than 30 years, Spring built Dealer Funnel’s roadmap alongside the founding team from the start. He grew Dealer World from a single direct-mail idea during the 2009 recession into a full-service marketing and technology company serving dealerships across the country, and became one of the industry’s most recognizable voices along the way — a frequent speaker, podcast guest, and writer on dealership marketing and ROI. Stepping into the CEO seat, he plans to pour that experience into scaling the product dealers already love.
Dealer Funnel unifies every customer conversation — text, phone, chat, and email — into one team inbox, with AI that answers leads in seconds around the clock, an AI receptionist that picks up the phones, a built-in soft phone, automated follow-up, reviews, video, and reporting that runs from the first text through to the sold deal. Under Spring’s leadership, the company plans to deepen its investment in AI and put the platform in front of dealerships of every size.
“With the world changing this quickly, we’ve realized we can connect many new offerings to the stack we’ve already built — and replace multiple tools dealers are paying for today, inside one platform. I couldn’t be prouder of this team, and we’re just getting started.”
About Dealer Funnel
Dealer Funnel is the communications platform for car dealerships. It brings every lead source and every channel — text, calls, chat, and email — into one team inbox, with AI answering customers in seconds day or night, an AI receptionist on the phones, a built-in soft phone, automated follow-up, reviews, video, and reporting that follows every conversation through to the sold deal. It works alongside the CRM a store already runs, with published pricing, month to month, and no long-term contracts. Learn more at dealerfunnel.com.
About Troy Spring
Troy “Turbo” Spring has spent more than three decades in automotive marketing and advertising. He founded Dealer World in 2009 and built it into a full-service marketing and technology company for dealerships before its recent sale, and is a co-founder of Dealer Funnel. A longtime speaker and voice in the retail-automotive community, he now serves as Dealer Funnel’s Chief Executive Officer.