Joe Greene has owned Budget Motors of Wisconsin INC. in Racine for over a decade and prides himself on good customer service.
“Our reputation is absolutely everything in an industry that doesn't have a good reputation to begin with,” said Greene.
When one-star reviews started flooding his business on Sunday, he was shocked and confused.
“I think we’ve gotten maybe two or three [bad reviews] in 12 years of business, so when I got three within 15 minutes I was like ‘What on earth is going on here?’”
He went on Facebook and found the viral post being shared about a Waukesha woman's ID being defaced at a Kenosha car dealership.
The woman’s post explained that she accidentally left her license at a separate auto shop in Kenosha last weekend. She called to retrieve it but the worker who answered the phone claimed he was out of the office and didn’t have her ID.
She was then sent a video from a stranger which shows the same store employee who claimed to not have her property, breaking her ID and urinating on it.
After her post went viral on social media, the Kenosha shop began receiving a flood of negative reviews, prompting them to change their name online to Budget Motors—a name already taken by Greene’s established and reputable Racine shop.
The misunderstanding caused people to review Greene's shop negatively, mistaking them for the Kenosha shop.
“I saw in some of the comments that the other dealership had changed their name to something similar to ours and we started getting even more bad reviews,” explained Greene.
Greene says he couldn't believe how the woman was treated by this other shop; that's when he decided to do something to make it right. He made a call on Facebook to get in touch with the woman.
“I just thought, ‘Hey she needs a car, she was car shopping. I have plenty of cars.’”
On Thursday, he met with her and gave her a free car off the lot.
“She is absolutely amazing,” said Greene. “She blew me away. She is so deserving, and it feels so good we were able to do this for her.”
And the feeling is mutual. The woman posted on Facebook her gratitude saying in part:
"The relationship with the city of Kenosha and I have been repaired due to Joe's heart and character; this is not because of a gift. This is because Joe decided to make my experience at Budget Motors of Wisconsin incomparable to what I experienced previously last week."
The Kenosha Police Department said it will recommend misdemeanor charges, including criminal damage to property, against the two men in the video who defaced her ID.
We stopped by the shop the woman alleges defaced her ID for comment, but no one came to the desk when we walked inside. Online, the business is listed as temporarily closed.
