The sale of Spokanes Camp Automotive Inc. to rapidly growing, publicly owned Lithia Motors Inc., of Medford, Ore., wrapped up in mid-October, but Phil Camp, who remains at the head of the Camp dealerships here, says changes wont be evident in the operation.


The transition is seamless, Camp says. Customers wont notice.


Camp, who has a three-year contract to continue managing the dealerships, says he doesnt expect significant changes in the 230-employee operation, although a new personnel manager is being added.


As part of a large chain, the dealerships will be better capitalized and will see some economies of scale, Camp says. Lithia Motors also is looking to add more lines of vehicles at Camp, he says.


The dealerships, which now sell the Chevrolet, BMW, Subaru, and Volvo lines, will continue to be known as Camp dealerships. The Camp name is worth something in this community, Camp says.


Camps father started the familys Chevrolet dealership in 1959, and Camp went to work there after graduating from Washington State University in 1964. He became general manager in 1973 and president of the company in 1991.


Camp says in the past year he had been talking with publicly traded companies that were interested in buying the Spokane business, and Lithia Motors origins as a family-owned Chrysler-Dodge store started in 1946 in the small town of Ashland, Ore., outside Medford, appealed to him.


Lithia Motors held an initial public stock offering in December 1996, then started on a buying spree acquiring dealerships. With the completion of the Camp sale, which was valued at about $10.8 million, Lithia Motors has 28 dealerships in four Western states and offers 25 brands of domestic and imported vehicles. It owns dealerships in Oregon, California, and Nevada, and Camp Automotive is its first acquisition in Washington.


In the third quarter of 1998, Lithia Motors also acquired two dealerships in Redding, Calif., and announced plans to buy two more dealerships in Eugene, Ore. Those sales are expected to be completed this month.