Car-shopping marketplace and dealer reputation site Cars.com named the winners of its annual Dealer of the Year Awards, honoring dealers based on average star rating, total number of reviews and the dealer’s response to those reviews.

The company selected 987 winners from the more than 50,000 U.S. and Canadian auto dealers with profiles who had the best results from the more than 1 million online consumer reviews submitted in 2023.

Review statistics and winner selection is based on data from reputation management and car-dealer review platform DealerRater, part of the Cars Commerce portfolio.

“Local dealerships are central to vehicle buying, and our DOTY Awards highlight the many local retailers who take pride in their reputation, striving each and every day to provide a five-star experience for their customers,” Cars.com president of reputation Jamie Oldershaw said.

“A consumer submits a dealership review every 27 seconds on Cars.com, providing dealers with valuable real-time feedback and shoppers with first-hand information about a dealership’s customer experience.”

The winning dealers received 21 times more consumer reviews than other dealers, which Cars.com said highlights the importance of online reputation and how it helps build long-term trusted relationships between customers and dealers.

The company said 80% of DOTY winners respond to consumer reviews, compared to 41% of non-winning dealers, and about half of the winners respond to 90% or more of their reviews.

And nearly two-thirds of the honorees use employee profile pages for their dealership staff, allowing shoppers to connect directly with salespeople before visiting the lot. More than 195,000 dealership employees received more than 1.4 million individual ratings last year, up 8.5% increase from 2022.

Among the 2024 Cars.com Dealers of the Year winners are eight regional winners.

Mid-Atlantic: Mercedes-Benz of Edison – A Ray Catena dealership

Midwest: Phillips Chevrolet

New England: Herb Chambers Lexus of Sharon

Plains: Dean Team Subaru Volkswagen

Rocky Mountain: EchoPark Automotive Thornton

Southeast: Hendrick Toyota of Wilmington

Southwest: D&M Leasing – Fort Worth

West: Gosch Toyota

A full list of winners is available here.