SUN-GAZETTE FILE PHOTO Alexander Family Dealerships and community members celebrate the opening of a Muncy Township dealership in 2023.

A trust between customer and their employees puts Alexander Family Dealerships at the top of the rung in car, truck, sport utility sales and service in Greater Williamsport.

“We have a lot of trust in our employees,” said Aubrey Alexander, representing the Blaise Alexander Family Dealerships, which now has 20 dealerships in the state.

The dealerships employ nearly 1,000 skilled personnel.

“About 975 to 1,000 — it fluctuates,” Aubrey recently told members of the Williamsport/Lycoming Chamber of Commerce.

Blaise, a native of Centralia, the abandoned village with the underground mine fire, attended nearby Mount Carmel Area High School and the Indiana Institute of Technology where he studied mechanical engineering.

He grew up working with his father, Aubrey, at Alexander & Son’s in Atlas, another coal region community where hard work comes and a man’s word are foremost.

Blaise’s first professional experience outside the family business was as a used car manager for a dealership in State College.

In August 1980, Blaise moved his young family to Montoursville, where he opened the doors to his first dealership, Blaise Alexander Chevrolet.

Over the past 45 years, through economy downturns, years when the economy was in a status quo and when there were years – especially during the height of the Marcellus Shale industry natural gas well drilling boom – when Greater Williamsport experienced an economic rebound – the dealership has maintained a footprint, that has grown and spanned across the state.

Today, the dealerships extend north to south from Mansfield, and its college community and agriculture-base to as far south west as Lewistown.

The dealerships are east to west from Philipsburg, to Hazleton along bustling Interstate 81.

Today, the dealership supplies 16 vehicle brands, has five collision centers, commercial truck sales, and a car wash.

If you ask anyone of the Alexander family members – including listening to their television and social media and print advertisements – they will say they have achieved these goals by focusing on customer experience and the community.

“Blaise and the dealerships are all involved in the communities where they live,” said Merrill Smith, assistant vice president with M&T Bank. “Their support is done by making targeted contributions especially to organizations that have an outreach effect for all citizens of the community, especially children,” he said.

The dealerships care about the places in which they do business because they are a part of the communities at large.

They also contribute mightily to various charities and organizations.

Recent contributions include the St. Joseph Center of Special Learning of Pottsville and the Susquehanna Health Foundation’s “Continuing The Innovation Capital Campaign” — an expansion and renovation project for the Muncy Valley Hospital Emergency Department.

This hospital in Muncy, just off Interstate 180, is located in a grown sector for Lycoming County, based on county planning documents.

The area of eastern Lycoming County, for example, is experiencing a residential and commercial boom.

As has just occurred, Blaise and his team have once again partnered with Raise the Region, through the First Community Foundation Partnership of Pennsylvania.

One of the beneficiaries of (Blaise’s and his family and team) support was the donation of a building and land to the Bucktail Medical Center in Renovo.

He has been a leading contributor to the James V. Brown Library Children’s Wing campaign. Other beneficiaries of his and the dealerships’ contributions include Montoursville’s Indian Park, where individuals and families can hold picnics, stroll on quiet tree-lined paths, and enjoy the benefits of the urban oasis in this suburban and bedroom community.

The dealerships also contribute to the Eastern Lycoming YMCA, Hope Enterprises, Williamsport Symphony, numerous youth sports teams, fire and police departments, and families in need.

One of the bright spots anyone who knows the Alexander family can see each year and experience on a personal level is their commitment to education and educating the next generation of mechanics, sales associates and dealership specialists.

The family supports area high schools, and places a strong emphasis on Pennsylvania College of Technology’s Scholarship Fund and their automotive programs.

The Sun-Gazette has covered special events where the Alexander family and their employees teach high school students the trade, sharing what makes a professional employee at the dealership and how they can work and go to school and learn hand’s on how to become a fully employed Alexander Family Dealership employee – earning not only a liveable wage but also a career path toward success.

As such, Blaise also contributes to the Indiana Institute of Technology Study Abroad Scholarship, Zollner Engineering Center expansion and renovation project and the Theta XI Fraternity Kappa Delta Chapter Scholarship Fund.

He and his children established the Anne and Blaise Robert “BR” Alexander Memorial Scholarship Fund, in memory of his late wife, Anne, and his son, Blaise Robert. This fund awards scholarships to graduating seniors of Montoursville and Mount Carmel area high schools (BR and Anne’s alma maters) along with other high schools.

At blaisealexander.com customers can find an inventory of new, work trucks, pre-owned, certified pre-owned, cars, vehicles of all sorts, service and parts, service specials, ways to order parts and accessories and a finance center to value your trade and set up a financial plan.