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Scottsville Auto Group opening one-of-a-kind ‘passive house’ Subaru dealership later this year

Jun 5, 2018 | 2:50 PM

The Scottsville Auto Group’s 50th anniversary year is shaping up to be one of its biggest ever.

The company is in the process of building a new one-of-a-kind Subaru dealership at their north Red Deer location.

Described as a ‘Passive House’, the new certified dealership will be the only one of its kind in the world, built to a rigorous standard of energy efficiency that aims to minimize the over 14,000 square foot building’s total ecological footprint and keep its annual heating and cooling costs to under $200 per year.

 

 

Garret Scott, Owner and Chief Operating Officer for the Scottsville Group says the roughly $6 million facility will be a great marker for their Subaru niche brand to make it stand out.

“It’s something that we truly believe in,” Scott says. “I say we should build smarter. We’ve sourced a lot of these materials locally which is great, some of the stuff isn’t available but it’s a really cool project and it’s really exciting.”

Annual energy costs for the new facility are estimated to be just $200.

“With the cost of our other facilities, that’s less than a monthly total,” he states. “I think building smarter and showing that these retail facilities can be structured in a way that they’re still functional for a retail presence and also able to accommodate a nicer work environment for the teams that are inside of them and not to mention the customers as well. We hope the long-term benefits will help inspire others to possibly build similar type structures.”

Scott says the new dealership will include some unique features to ensure it still meets health and safety standards while cutting back drastically on energy costs.

“That kind of thing was a challenge but we’ve got all those nailed, so we will have what should be one of the most quiet, fresh-aired, easily working facilities out there housing all of our sales teams, all of our finance teams, anything to do with our car and parts departments, you name it, it’s all going to be there.”

If all goes well, Scott says other existing or new buildings at the Scottsville location could include some of the Subaru building’s energy saving features.

He credits the size of the new Subaru facility as one which makes a passive house-type project more feasible.

“The larger the footprint, the more air that had to get circulated around and properly distributed,” Scott explains. “It would have made it more challenging, so because of the facility’s size, we were able to jump with both feet in on a project like this. For example, our other GM store is about 40,000 square feet, it would be very difficult to build a facility of that size with these passive house fundamentals.”

Construction of the new passive house Subaru dealership began at the start of 2018 and is scheduled for completion by November.

“We want to make sure our Subaru facility and our brand always stays on the map,” concludes Scott. “I think this is a great step forward for us and I also think with the publicity that this building will generate due to the uniqueness of its build, we will be not only a great Subaru dealer for the city of Red Deer but also a great representation for the rest of the province.”