While automakers argue over tariffs on parts crossing the Canadian border, one Michigan dealer is testing a way to stop parts from getting stuck on the road entirely. Jack Demmer Ford just became the first dealership in the country to complete a drone delivery of auto parts.
Jack Demmer Automotive Group is testing drone delivery between its Ford dealership, warehouse, and service center in Wayne, Michigan, aiming to move smaller, time-sensitive parts faster while avoiding the traffic and road delays that can leave a vehicle sitting in a service bay.
🚁 The Pilot, By the Numbers
12 to 15 flights per day during the two-week initial trial
7.5 pounds max payload, small parts only, not a replacement for delivery trucks
12-mile radius targeted if the program expands to reach both Wayne and Dearborn locations
Up to 20 deliveries per day possible at full expansion
$740,000 state mobility grant backing the initiative
Why This Isn't Just a Novelty Flight
The problem this solves is one every service department has lived through.
When a critical part is delayed, a vehicle can sit in a service bay longer. That means more inconvenience for customers and more pressure on our technicians and service teams.
Traffic, road work, and physical infrastructure all slow down a truck carrying a single small part the same way they slow down a truck carrying an engine. A drone skips that constraint entirely for the parts small enough to matter, oil filters, O-rings, sensors, the stuff that stalls a repair not because it's hard to get, but because it's stuck in traffic three miles away.
What Guest Host Jim Fitzpatrick Sees Coming
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It's amazing to be living during these times, isn't it? Our mutual friend Tim Jackson is going, "I told you so." There's going to actually be a guy in that drone one day delivering those parts.
Paul's read connected it to a familiar frustration from his own time as a service writer: the moment a customer asks about their car and the honest answer is "we're waiting on a part," and nobody told them sooner. A faster parts pipeline doesn't just save technician time, it removes the single most common reason a service visit turns into a bad one.
Want the full conversation?
🎙️ Listen to today's Automotive State of the Union episode for the complete discussion.
The real story isn't the drone. It's that a dealership built the case for using one.
Amazon and Walmart have been testing drone delivery for years without fully cracking consumer logistics at scale. Jack Demmer found a use case those companies never had: a fixed, short-range delivery need between a dealership's own buildings, exactly the kind of problem drone delivery is actually good at solving today, not the one it's still trying to solve everywhere else.
