Kruse Control Inc

Name: Kruse Control Inc
Address: 3419 Via Lido Ste 484, Newport Beach, CA, 92663, US
Telephone: (714) 251-6440

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Kruse Control Inc

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Maximize resources. Secure your profit. Kruse Control Inc.

was built on 25 years inside car dealerships - as a controller, CFO, and the person owners called when the numbers stopped making sense. Founder Kathi Kruse grew up in a Los Angeles car family and spent her career managing the financial and operational realities of new car franchises in Southern California. She's seen what happens when dealerships run without real financial leadership - and she built Kruse Control to fix that. Today, Kruse Control provides fractional CFO services, accounting consulting, and hands-on training for dealership owners, controllers, and auto groups who need expertise without the full-time overhead. Our signature service, Automotive CFO To Go™, gives dealers access to senior-level financial guidance on demand. We specialize in:
Accounting assessment, cleanup & recovery | Financial performance consulting | Controller mentoring & training | Forensic accounting | Expense control | Buy/sell facilitation | Expert Witness | OEM & executive training

📩 [email protected]
📞 714-251-6440

11/03/2026

With every passing week, I find myself in conversations with dealers who say some version of, “Our expenses feel… high.” Not in a dramatic, call-the-bank kind of way. More like the slow realization that your streaming subscriptions now cost more than your first car payment and you’re not entirely sure how that happened.

If you’d prefer to avoid the cinematic experience of a “scary surprise,” the solution is not mystical. It’s a monthly financial statement review—with a focused Expense Analysis.

Here’s the 5-step version of how to do it: https://www.krusecontrolinc.com/a-simple-monthly-expense-review-every-dealership-should-be-doing/

10/30/2026

There are dealerships that view service and parts as support departments.

Then there are dealerships that understand they're the foundation of long-term profitability.

When vehicle sales become unpredictable, fixed operations shouldn't just keep the lights on. They should help carry the business.

The problem is that many service departments are quietly leaking profit through unbilled labor, excessive discounts, parts obsolescence, and warranty write-offs that often go unnoticed.

In my latest article, I share how CFO-level discipline transforms fixed operations from "busy" into consistently profitable through better reporting, accountability, and financial oversight.

If your service drive is full but your fixed absorption isn't where it should be, this one's for you.

Read it here: https://www.krusecontrolinc.com/dealership-cfo-playbook-for-high-performing-fixed-operations/

10/29/2026

What should a dealership controller actually be doing?

Ask five dealership owners and you might get five different answers.

Some expect their controller to manage the financials. Others expect them to manage just about everything, including problems that have nothing to do with accounting.

But a strong controller is more than the person who closes the books.

Financial accuracy, cash management, internal controls, team leadership, and meaningful financial reporting should be at the heart of the role.

So where should the responsibilities begin and end?

I break it down in my article, “What Should a Dealership Controller Actually Be Doing?”
Link here: https://www.krusecontrolinc.com/what-should-a-dealership-controller-actually-be-doing/

10/28/2026

Customer experience might not show up on a balance sheet, but its effects do. From top-line revenue to bottom-line profitability, the way customers feel when they interact with the store directly impacts the financials. A dealership CFO may not be managing the showroom floor, but they are managing the outcomes.

Here are six reasons a dealership CFO should care deeply about customer experience—because what customers experience on the floor ultimately shows up in the financials.
Read more: https://www.krusecontrolinc.com/why-customer-experience-belongs-on-every-dealership-cfo-radar/

10/27/2026

Let’s be honest for a second.

A lot of people in dealership leadership roles are sitting in financial meetings…
nodding along…
following just enough to keep up…

But not fully confident in what they’re looking at.

And it’s not because they’re not capable.

It’s because no one ever actually showed them how to read a dealership financial statement in a way that makes sense.

I’ve sat across from dealer principals and GMs for years as a CFO.
Smart operators. Strong businesses.

Still unsure where to look. What matters. What’s a red flag.

So I put together a plain-English guide:

👉 How to actually read your dealership financial statement
👉 What to pay attention to (and what to ignore)
👉 How to stop relying on someone else to tell you if you're doing okay

If you’ve ever had that quiet moment of “I should probably understand this better” - this is for you. https://www.krusecontrolinc.com/how-to-read-a-dealership-financial-statement-a-practical-guide-vip-ebook/

10/27/2026

There is a moment that happens in dealerships more often than anyone wants to admit.

It usually begins with a sentence like this:

“We’ve got it handled. Linda knows how to do all that.”

And for years, maybe they do.

Linda knows where every spreadsheet lives. Linda remembers which floorplan statement has to be adjusted manually. Linda knows why the receivable from three months ago is still sitting there untouched like an abandoned shopping cart in a Walmart parking lot. Linda knows which vendor always invoices incorrectly. Linda knows the payroll workaround nobody documented because “the system doesn’t do it right.”

Linda knows everything.

Which sounds comforting right up until the day Linda disappears.

Not because she did anything wrong. Sometimes people retire. Sometimes they resign. Sometimes they leave for another dealership offering twenty thousand dollars more and a nicer Keurig machine. Read more: https://www.krusecontrolinc.com/when-the-entire-dealership-accounting-office-lives-inside-one-persons-head/

10/22/2026

“It’s faster if I just do it myself.”

If I had a dollar for every time I heard a dealership controller say that, I could probably retire. Again.

And sometimes they're right. It IS faster.

Until tomorrow, when the same employee has the same question and the same problem lands back on the controller's desk.

Before long, the controller is doing everyone else's work and wondering why nobody can do anything without them.

It's a frustrating arrangement, and one that's surprisingly easy to create.

The problem with doing everything yourself is that eventually, everyone lets you.

My article, The Dealership Controller's Guide to Delegation, looks at how controllers can break that cycle and start managing the work instead of doing all of it.

Read it here: https://www.krusecontrolinc.com/the-dealership-controllers-guide-to-delegation/

10/21/2026

There are two sets of numbers in every dealership.

The ones you look at.

And the ones your OEM looks at.

They overlap, of course, but not always in the way you’d expect. You might be celebrating a strong month while your OEM quietly circles three ratios in red ink and starts wondering if you’re about to become “a conversation.”

And in the dealership world, “a conversation” is rarely casual.
Read more: https://www.krusecontrolinc.com/financial-metrics-your-oem-is-watching-and-how-a-fractional-cfo-protects-franchise-value/

10/20/2026

You can be:

Hitting your numbers
Selling cars
Running a busy store

…and still not know if you’re actually doing okay.

That’s the gap.

I put together a short, practical guide to help dealership operators:

✔ Understand their financial statement
✔ Know what to look for each month
✔ Stop relying on someone else to interpret the numbers

It’s free - grab it here: https://www.krusecontrolinc.com/how-to-read-a-dealership-financial-statement-a-practical-guide-vip-ebook/

10/20/2026

I once watched a dealership controller eat her lunch over a keyboard at 8 p.m. on the seventh of the month. She was reconciling flooring while simultaneously arguing with someone in the service department about an open internal repair order from three weeks prior. The RO, it turned out, was for a car that had already been retailed. The vehicle had been sold, delivered, and driven to Idaho. The customer had put 2,000 miles on it. And yet there it was, still open, still sitting on a schedule, still gumming up the works like a crouton in a drain.

She did not seem surprised. None of them ever do.

This is what month-end looks like in an auto group. Not one store, all of them. Simultaneously. It's a bit like hosting Thanksgiving dinner. You think you’ve got everything under control until you realize the turkey’s still frozen, the cranberry sauce is missing, and Aunt Linda has arrived two hours early asking why the table isn’t set. Now, multiply this by the number of rooftops.
Read more: https://www.krusecontrolinc.com/how-auto-groups-can-streamline-their-month-end-closing-without-burning-out-the-office/

Address

3419 Via Lido Ste 484
Newport Beach, CA
92663

Telephone

(714) 251-6440

Website

http://krusecontrolinc.com/, http://twitter.com/kathikruse, http://linkedin.com/in/krusecontrol, http://facebook.com/kat

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