MIDDLEBURY — Cory Quenneville is living a dream, but slumber has been a challenge.

It’s part of the excitement of returning home to Addison County to take over the vehicle dealership at which he got his start.

“It’s still surreal,” said Quenneville, 35, the new general manager of McGee Chevrolet Middlebury (formerly Mackey Chevrolet) at 510 Route 7 South. “Between being so excited and not sleeping, and then sleeping so well because I’m so tired — it’s messed up my schedule.”

Not to worry, Quenneville will work through it — as he has a number of different jobs during his young life.

He was born and raised in Leicester and is a 2006 graduate of Otter Valley Union High School. He got his first taste of hard work at the Quenneville Bros. Farm, a dairy operation in Whiting that the family owned until 2004.

“I spent my summers there and have fond memories,” he said of the farm, where he hayed and did a bunch of other chores.

Farm work gave him an introduction to machinery, which fascinated him.

“I fell in love with the equipment side of things, more than the cow side of things,” he conceded.

A passion for learning how things worked prompted a then 16-year-old Quenneville to take a job at the Hendy Brothers John Deere dealership at 1197 Route 7 in Middlebury (now United Ag & Turf). That, in turn, led to a partial scholarship to the University of New York College of Agriculture and Technology at Cobleskill. There, he enrolled in the John Deere Tech Program and earned a degree in agricultural engineering in 2008.

Degree in hand, Quenneville returned to Addison County to, as he put it, “turn wrenches” for Hendy’s for a short while, before moving to a job as service department manager at Yandow Sales & Service in North Ferrisburgh.

He enjoyed the work and touted the Yandows as “a great family to work for,” but he confessed, “the (daily commute) was killing me. At that point, when you’re a young man, driving an hour one way is a long time.”

So his employment odyssey continued, leading to a stint as farm manager at Binding Site Vt. Inc. in Benson. It’s a major sheep farm associated with a UK-based medical diagnostic company.

But just when it appeared his career was taking an ag trajectory, Quenneville received a call from Scott Brace, a manager at what was then Denecker Chevrolet.

“He said I should try my hand at selling cars,” he recalled.

It seemed like a natural fit for Quenneville, a gregarious man with a quick smile, a vise-like handshake and a gift for gab. So, he said goodbye to the Binding Site Vt. sheep and tuned up his sales pitch.

Quenneville joined Denecker on Feb. 22, 2015. It proved to be a successful career switch, one that now seems destined to stick after a nomadic employment cycle of turning wrenches, troubleshooting ag equipment and herding sheep. 

“I sold cars for three or four years for Tom (Denecker) and climbed the ranks (to manager),” he said.

That is, until the summer of 2020, when Denecker sold the dealership to the Mackey Auto Group of Saratoga Springs, N.Y. That’s when Quenneville decided to try his hand at selling vehicles at a different venue. He landed at McGee Chrysler Dodge Jeep RAM of Springfield, Vt.

“I was the general manager there for two years, and was then promoted to director of operations, overseeing two (McGee) Toyota stores, a Mazda store and another Chrysler Dodge Jeep RAM store in Brattleboro,” he said.

Quenneville was happy being based out of Springfield. But being an Addison County boy, he yearned to return to his roots.

You never know what can happen if you wish hard enough.

BACK TO ADDISON CO.

“I’d been ribbing Rob McGee to buy the Chevy store in Middlebury,” said Quenneville. “I got the phone call around 90 days ago that my dream was coming true.”

And it was turbo-charged, as dreams go.

Quenneville learned he’d not only be returning to his old stamping grounds as general manager, but was also granted an ownership stake in the Middlebury dealership.

Robert McGee and his father started with a single Toyota dealership in Hanover, Mass. The company took off from there, growing to their current 19 stores throughout New England.

While 19 dealerships could be deemed an empire, McGee has been able to keep the individual businesses in sync, with corporate managers in constant communication with one another, according to Quenneville.

“Rob does a fantastic job of keeping in touch with all of us,” he said. “All the owner-operators are on the phone all the time, in weekly meetings. We transfer inventory and really get along exceptionally well. We all support each other. The biggest fear of mine was going into ‘corporate America.’ That’s not who I am, not how I was raised. But for the size of this group, it’s not corporate America; it’s as family as it comes.”

McGee Chevrolet Middlebury now counts 13 full- and part-time employees. It’s a number Quenneville hopes to ramp up to 30, based on his sales targets.

“I’m going to be discounting cars again. I have a volume-based mindset,” he said. “I have huge plans.”

His overriding aim is to “bring the dealership back to being part of the community.” To that end, he wants to make the dealership’s name more visible in the county. Quenneville promised McGee will become a sponsor of Devil’s Bowl Speedway, as well as of local sports teams.

“I have a little girl (Charleigh) who turns 4 in February and a 6-year-old boy (Maverick). I can’t wait to see the local teams around here with ‘McGee’ on their back,” he said.

The Quennevilles are about cars and trucks right now, but they maintain a link to their agricultural past. Cory’s wife Jessica is the driving force behind a small, family-owned beef operation called River’s Edge Farm in the town of Chester, where the clan currently lives.

Chester is roughly 60 miles from Middlebury, and we already know Cory isn’t crazy about long commutes. So his motto right now is, “Coming home soon.” He plans to relocate his family to Addison County next spring.

Asked to describe his business philosophy, Quenneville immediately replied “transparency.”

“I don’t think that buying a car should be hard,” he said. “I think in today’s world, you should be able to see the price, understand the fees and not wonder what happened after a car deal. That’s old-school practices.”

He wants people to know that they, and their pups, are welcome at the dealership even if they’re not in the market for a car.

“I look forward to bringing the dealership back to where people want to do business here, and more importantly to stop by for a cup of coffee and say ‘Hi,’” he said. “I love the people, the community and the relationships I’ve been able to build and maintain. It’s a ‘people’ business for me.”

For information about McGee Chevrolet Middlebury vehicles and other business details, go to middleburychevrolet.com.

Quenneville began his new job on Dec. 11, and he’s still pinching himself. He recently posted the news on social media and was bowled over by the reaction.

“The outcry from the community that they’re excited I was coming home was so humbling and heartwarming,” he said. “I can’t really put words to it.”

Reporter John Flowers is at [email protected].