Coronavirus Updates

During this ever-changing situation, we are continuing to work with our team to find ways to keep them, our customers, and our community as safe and healthy as possible.

While this is subject to change as the world around us changes, at this time, we are continuing to provide the customer service and care that you know and trust from Darling's. We are proud to serve numerous emergency and first responders, healthcare practitioners, and local delivery vehicles, on a daily basis, and we feel that keeping our friends on the front line going when they have important vehicle needs is one key way we can serve our community during this situation.

To help you feel some additional peace-of-mind when you need automotive services, here are some additional measures we have put in place:

We offer no-contact service. We have early bird and night owl drop-off options, where you can leave your car for service without coming into the store. Our Team Service Managers can work with you by phone on any questions you may have on your service. When complete, you may also pay for your service over the phone and we can then leave your vehicle outside for pickup or deliver it to you. In addition, if you are unable or simply do not wish to come to the dealership, we can gladly make arrangements to pick your vehicle up from you (within 25 miles), have your service completed, and then deliver it back to you.

➡️ We offer low or no-contact sales. We have relaxed our customer greetings, and are offering warm smiles and waves instead of handshakes. We are happy to work with you to provide real photos or video walkarounds of any vehicle you may be interested in, and we can work with you to complete as much paperwork over the phone as possible to limit your time in the store. We can also arrange a time to bring your vehicle and paperwork to you to allow you to safely buy from home.

➡️ We are stepping up our cleaning game even more. Our team is disinfecting all surfaces within the store, including door handles, counters, and bathrooms. We will be working to protect your vehicle, and will be using gloves, seat covers, and steering wheel covers to help reduce touch points.

➡️ We are making it easy for our customers. We will offer no questions asked rescheduling for any sales or service appointment to any customer who is ill or has been exposed to someone with coronavirus. Please call us for assistance.

As we've all seen, this situation is changing day-to-day, and sometimes more often than that. We are monitoring it to ensure we are doing everything we can and should be doing to help our communities. If you have any questions on our Coronavirus related practices, please reach out to us at socialm@darlings.com or message our page. For any questions on service appointments, please call 877-445-9876. For any sales-related inquiries, please call 877-445-9838.

We have been proud to serve the people of Maine for over 120 years. During these turbulent times, we are grateful to be able to continue this tradition. While we don't know what will happen over the next few weeks and months, rest assured that is our honor to continue to assist you with our vehicle needs, whenever and however we best and safely can. We are all in this together!

The past week has been one of constant change and new information. There are many things happening in our state and across our nation that are necessitating changes to our everyday lives. As of yesterday, the CDC has recommended limiting gatherings of over 10 people for an estimated 8 weeks.

In light of this, and as we anticipate many of our events will be canceled, we will be postponing the start of our ice cream truck season to at least May 1st. We will re-assess the situation as we move through the next few weeks, and make a final determination on whether we will be on the road on May 1st by mid-April.

Making people smile and raising money for our community is at the core of our mission, and while we are disappointed that we can't start our season as early as we normally do this year, it is incredibly important to us to do everything within our control to keep our community as safe as possible. In lieu of any donations we may have accepted on behalf of great events and organizations during our first month on the road, we ask that you choose a local small business who may be hurting and find a way to support them - whether it's curbside takeout, a generous tip, purchasing a gift card for later use, or taking advantage of their shipping and delivery options. If you can't afford to do so, please share any measure of kindness you can, whether that's sharing some supplies with an elderly neighbor, offering to pick up items at a store for someone, making the most of extra time with your kids, thanking a healthcare professional who is doing double-duty, or simply giving a warm smile to a retail worker when you are re-stocking. In our 8 years on the road, we have seen the magic of kindness and generosity benefit those around us in need, and we are confident that if our communities come together to support those around us, we can all weather the storm.

Whenever results are communicated to us, whether they are positive or negative, whether or not it's within business hours, we plan to communicate it right away.  Any customers who have requested updates will be notified directly, as well as through updates via our primary social media channels and our website.  For all information regarding this situation, please see www.darlings.com/2020/coronavirus-updates.htm.

We are grateful for the outpouring of support we've received from our customers and our community during the past few days.  We strongly feel it's our duty to honestly and proactively communicate the facts to our team, our customers, and our community so they can make the most informed decisions for their own situation.

As we've said in a number of private messages, this is an unprecedented situation for our company, our community, and our country, and at the end of the day, we are all in this together.  We promise to be in touch as soon as we have more information.

As you are likely aware, we are monitoring the situation from yesterday at our Ellsworth stores. We have set up a central page for our ongoing updates that can be found here: www.darlings.com/2020/coronavirus-updates.htm

Here are some additional facts that we'd like to share:

✔️ This representative was on our lot when he received the call confirming that his contact had tested positively for coronavirus. As soon as he received that call, he drove directly to a local health facility for screening.

✔️ The representative was with the person who has since tested positive over the weekend. This person who has since tested positive resides outside of the state of Maine.

While we understand there is a lot of interest in our story, and we are all eagerly awaiting the results of this test, this is all of the information we currently have to share. We are expecting results from the representative who was exposed within the 24-48 hour timeframe and will communicate accordingly once we receive those results.

If you have any concerns, or visited Darling's Auto Mall in Ellsworth or Darling's Chevy in Ellsworth yesterday and wish to be notified when test results are available, please message our page (or email us at socialm@darlings.com) with your name and email or phone number. We will reach out to you directly as soon as we have updated information to share.

Out of an abundance of caution, we want to share some information with our customers who may have visited Darling's Auto Mall or Darling's Chevrolet in Ellsworth today. We were informed by one of our vendors this afternoon that a photographer of their auction company who had been on our lot had also recently been in contact with an individual who just tested positive for COVID-19. The representative is currently exhibiting no symptoms, but has since been tested for the virus and is expected to have results within 24-48 hours.

Once we were notified, we determined where this person was in our building, on our lot, and what employees they interacted with. We determined that between both stores, they had very limited contact with three employees, and visited limited locations within our stores. To the best of our determination, this representative did not have direct interaction with any customers during his visits to our stores. As the CDC has stated that this virus can live on surfaces, our team has been cleaning and sanitizing our buildings even more extensively than we had been since we were notified, particularly in the areas that this representative was present.

In light of this, the three employees who had contact with this representative have been sent directly home to self-quarantine until we receive the representative's test results. Our entire team has been notified of this situation. We will reassess the situation and communicate the appropriate information as soon as we receive the representative's test results.

We sincerely hope any possible transmission risk is extremely low; however, we understand that this can be a very scary and stressful situation. As such, we are keeping a close eye on CDC and public health recommendations and are exercising every measure of caution we can to keep our customers, team members, and communities safe. We are grateful to our vendor for communicating this possible risk to us as soon as they were aware, and for our team for their utmost cooperation as we work through this situation. We wish nothing but the best of health to this representative.

If you have any concerns, or visited our store today and wish to be notified when test results are available, please message our page (or email us at socialm@darlings.com) with your name and phone number. We will reach out to you directly as soon as we have updated information to share.

As we are all well aware, our country and our world is facing the spread of COVID-19, a novel coronavirus. While there have not yet been any confirmed cases in Maine, or in our local communities, we are making every effort to be conscientious and aware of the situation as it evolves. While there is a lot of seemingly conflicting information about the severity, the symptoms, the spread, and the significance of this disease, what we do know is that we take our employee and customer health seriously.

At this time, here are some of the key steps Darling's is taking at all of our locations to help keep our customers and employees healthy and well:

✔️ We are relaxing our customer greetings. While we all appreciate a strong handshake, we are temporarily suspending our traditional greetings, and we are encouraging our team to greet our customers with waves and warm smiles instead.

✔️ We are making it easy for our customers. We will offer no questions asked rescheduling for any service appointment to any customer who is ill. Please contact our Appointment Center at 877-445-9876 for assistance.

✔️ We are encouraging employees and customers to practice good hand washing hygiene. We will ensure there are fully-stocked soap dispensers in break rooms and bathrooms at all times.

✔️ We are increasing our protection measures. We are ensuring a full supply of hand sanitizer and disinfectant wipes in each workspace, as well as providing gloves to team members who interact with customer vehicles. We will be increasing our cleaning protocols and frequency and will be disinfecting regularly, particularly in high-traffic areas.

✔️ We are encouraging our team to stay home if they are sick.

We will continue to monitor all updates from our state and national health organizations, and review our plan and adjust going forward. We care about the health and safety of all of our team members and customers, and want to do our part to help prevent the spread of this disease as much as possible. Thank you for your cooperation and understanding as we navigate this ever-changing situation!