Auto rupture will ripple far and wide

Turmoil caused by the meltdowns of GM and Chrysler is felt far outside Detroit: Dealerships and suppliers are bracing for an uncertain future.

Photos

Hard times on dealer row

Chrysler shuttered 789 dealerships nationwide. Now these dealers and their employees are recovering from the shock and looking to the future.

View photos

DETROIT’S DOWNFALL

• Indiana pension funds still fighting Chrysler
• Chrysler-Fiat to head to Supreme Court
• GM to sell Saturn to Penske
• GM to help investment firm buy Delphi
• Jobs could get run over by auto woes

(CNNMoney.com) — Chrysler and GM employees are on the edge of their seats, waiting to find out what will be left standing after the dust settles. Meanwhile, a vast network of companies outside Detroit are bracing for impact.

Ready or not, the thousands of dealerships and suppliers to the auto goliaths are going to feel the aftershocks of the industry’s titanic shift. But the owners have mixed feelings about what the future holds for their companies. This will even affect their accounting department that uses business checks and accounting software

Caught between the bankruptcy of Chrysler and the bankruptcy of General Motors (GM, Fortune 500) is Patrick Berrang of Waynesboro, Va., one of the nearly 800 dealers who received a note from Chrysler saying that his dealer agreement had been severed. Before he received the letter, 70% of Berrang’s business was Chrysler vehicles and the remainder was GM brands such as Pontiac, GMC and Cadillac.

“I hope the judge is sympathetic,” Berrang says of his petition to remain a Chrysler dealer. “I didn’t see this coming at all. Now, they’ve only given me three weeks to shut down, but if I had sent in an application to become a Chrysler dealer, it would take more than three weeks for them to get back to me!”