DAYTON, Ohio — The Reynolds and Reynolds Company, a provider of software, services, and document solutions for automotive retailers in North America, has announced the results of its customer satisfaction and loyalty research conducted throughout 2008.

For dealerships using a Reynolds dealership management system (DMS) for at least one year, the company’s overall satisfaction scores for Reynolds products and services remained in the 90 percent range for the year, which is consistent with the company’s results over the past several years. Moreover, product loyalty scores – the measure of whether a customer would repurchase Reynolds solutions and recommend them to others – remained steady, with a slight increase during the last three quarters of the year.

“We are extremely pleased with how Reynolds customers have assessed our performance in 2008, particularly considering the impact of the current economic and industry crisis on automotive retailers,” said Trey Hiers, vice president of corporate marketing for Reynolds. “These results continue a long Reynolds tradition of enviable customer satisfaction scores. They also stand as another proof point that dealerships recognize the value of our solutions in helping make their businesses more efficient and profitable.”

As part of Reynolds’ research, the company also measured customer satisfaction rates for specific DMS applications. Reynolds experienced significant improvement in overall satisfaction scores for its Contact Management application, which helps dealerships better manage and improve customer relationships. The company attributes the increase in customer satisfaction to a number of development projects it completed to improve the technology infrastructure supporting Contact Management and software enhancements in response to customer feedback.

In addition, Reynolds Consulting Services, which provides business process consulting to dealerships regardless of their choice of DMS, consistently achieved satisfaction rates at or above 94 percent across more than 15 measures of customer satisfaction, consultant knowledge and performance, business value, and willingness to recommend.

The customer satisfaction and loyalty research includes more than 6,600 customers in the U.S. and Canada who were surveyed about their experiences with nearly a dozen products and services from Reynolds.

Hiers concluded, “At Reynolds, we are focused on upholding the Reynolds brand promise to deliver quality software and outstanding customer service to the dealerships that use our systems. It’s gratifying to point to quantifiable results that we are doing just that.”