The Reynolds and Reynolds Co. named five finalists in its 2026 Automotive Amplifiers Contest.

Each finalist will present details of his or her innovative best practice to the judges and guests of Amplify on Aug. 10 to Aug. 11 at the Park Hyatt Aviara Resort in Carlsbad, Calif.

“Every year, the judges have a very difficult task selecting five finalists. Every best practice submitted has the potential to make a difference across the industry in a meaningful way,” said Reynolds President and acting CEO Chris Walsh. “Today, we are excited to announce which entrants will have the opportunity to make their case and take home the prize this year.”

The five finalists are:

• Chris Lasko – Lasko, of BMW of Pittsburgh, challenged the assumption that an F&I manager has to sit inside the store, building a completely remote finance department. He closed the coverage gaps caused by vacations, illness and turnover, opened a nationwide talent pool, shortened customer wait times, and lowered fixed staffing costs.
• Ken McCord – At Art Moehn Auto Group, McCord found that added maintenance and repair work uncovered during express inspections wasn’t getting completed on the same visits. He built a process to perform those additional service requests at the time of sale, growing BG Products maintenance sales by 247%.
• Daniel Wentz – Wentz, of Safford Mazda of Fredericksburg, wanted to build a shop culture of constant growth. He launched a monthly competition rewarding the technician who improved efficiency the most, helping make his store the fastest-growing in its group with record production and its best-ever customer satisfaction index scores.
• Denisse Abreu – Abreu, of Infiniti of Lynbrook, set out to fix the inconsistent lead handling, duplicate customer records, and unclear ownership of opportunities weighing down the dealership's business development center. She built a BDC Workflow Accountability Framework, with clear lead-ownership rules, response-time standards, customer relationship management system data-integrity checks, and daily accountability checkpoints, that improved accountability, sharpened daily visibility, and delivered a more consistent customer experience.
• David Glennie – Glennie, of the Ted Britt Ford Pro Elite Commercial Service Center, needed faster shop throughput to keep technicians repairing rather than diagnosing. He introduced a triage and dispatch system that delivers a diagnosis in less than 24 hours, driving a higher repair-order count, greater profitability, and happier customers.
• Judging the contest are three industry experts:
• Michael Cirillo is CEO at FlexDealer, chief of staff at More Than Cars, and founder of The Dealer Playbook.
• Chris Ponte is parts director at Scranton Chevrolet and one an Automotive Amplifiers Contest winner earning the 2025 Impact Award.
• Ulisse “Uli” de Martino is lead media/content producer at Car Dealership Guy and host/producer of "Daily Dealer Live."

Winning the contest includes a $5,000 donation to the charity of the winner’s choice, and a trophy recognizing the innovation or best practice.

“From reimagining where the finance office lives to rethinking how service departments run and how technicians are developed and rewarded, each of these individuals challenged a long-held assumption and delivered measurable results for their dealership,” Walsh said.

“We can’t wait to see which finalists stand out the most and earn a victory at Amplify, where many of their peers will be familiar with facing the same struggles and may be inspired to address them in similar fashion.”