WINTER PARK, FL, July 07, 2025 /24-7PressRelease/ -- Will Graves has been selected for inclusion in Marquis Who's Who. As in all Marquis Who's Who biographical volumes, individuals profiled are selected on the basis of current reference value. Factors such as position, noteworthy accomplishments, visibility, and prominence in a field are all taken into account during the selection process.

When Mr. Graves was a teenager serving as an acolyte, server, Crucifer and reader in his family's log chapel, his mother asked him what he wanted to be when he grew up.

"A Humanitarian," was his instant reply. The young Mr. Graves and his beloved mother knew that he was only half-joking.

Mr. Graves has earned many accolades for his contributions. In 2019, the former Electrolux vacuum cleaner salesperson, used car salesperson, Chrysler dealership sole owner, international management consultant, graduate marketing instructor, and undergraduate business ethics instructor was surprised with the Florida Trust's 2019 Individual Distinguished Service Award, bestowed upon him by Florida Trust for Historic Preservation chief executive officer and President, Melissa Wyllie, and her board, based upon the decision of a six-person, statewide jury empaneled for that purpose. Soon, all major Florida media properties were in receipt of a press release announcing the Florida Trust's 2019 honoree, "National Community Activist" Will Graves. Orange County Mayor Jerry Demings handwrote a letter of congratulations, as did Rollins College president Grant Cornwell.

On February 14, 2025, the anniversary of Mr. Graves' wedding engagement, Winter Park Mayor Sheila DeCiccio proclaimed "Will Graves Day" in recognition of his decades of service to the Winter Park community and Rollins College. This includes his coining (and living) the term "National Community Activist" in the October 7, 2008, issue of Chief Executive magazine, and serving his alma mater as a 50-year Rollins volunteer. Mr. Graves has penned literally hundreds of letters, op-eds, guest columns and features, dozens of which feature Winter Park, Rollins College and Central Florida, in particular.

Mr. Graves was the youngest member of the Children's National Medical Center board in Washington, D.C. (one of the top 100 boards in the U.S., according to Worth Magazine) and the youngest member of the J.D. Power SuperDealer Roundtable. At age 33, he became the youngest dealership sole owner of any brand in a major metropolitan area in the U.S.

Named a "QIP Pioneer" in The Chrysler Times, a corporate publication, Mr. Graves put his business skill set to work by successfully contacting Mother Teresa as a surprise for his cancer-stricken fiancée, Wendy, in 1997. Mr. Graves had picked the perfect place, time, and means to tell Mother Teresa about his philanthropic efforts and those of his then-fiancée. A nun assured Mr. Graves that it would be "impossible" for Mother Teresa to make contact. Nevertheless, Jean-Michel Cousteau, Rollins' Thad Seymour, and many others have listened to the Nobel Prize Laureate's recorded message and read the letter she wrote to Mr. Graves and his then-fiancée. Mr. Graves notes that some might be surprised that an individual with job titles commonly found at the bottom of "Most Admired Professions" surveys has garnered such high praise. However, his ability to achieve great things is rooted in the lessons instilled by his beloved parents and in his faith:" My mother taught me to reach for the stars, and my father taught me to never give up!" Mr. Graves exclaims. "The signs have always been there for what I'm doing now, and God has always been in the details." Blessed with intense focus and drive from a very young age, Mr. Graves simply never gave up.

It was not always easy to persevere. In the second grade at Rye Country Day School, a young Mr. Graves watched every student in the class head home for the day as his beloved teacher, Doris Garrison, told him that he was intelligent, as she provided one-on-one tutoring to the only child left in the classroom. A year earlier, a six-year-old Mr. Graves battled profound homesickness at Vermont's Camp Abnaki. Nevertheless, he did his best to see the assembled Tamakwa Unit campers through his tears as he held a candle and a Camp Citizenship Award, along with a few other campers, at the end-of-season celebration.

Years later, the Rye Echo yearbook included the following slogan for graduating senior Will Graves: "Few Things in Life Work as Well as a Volkswagen." At a senior party, a classmate lent Mr. Graves the keys to his father's Porsche 911 to enjoy while their classmates partied. When a teenage Will Graves handed his mother a Road and Track foldout photo of a Maserati and announced that he would own one, his mother, in a very serious tone, cautioned that he needed to take care of priorities first. Years later, Mr. Graves phoned his mother with the news that he would be stocking Chrysler's TC by Maserati automobiles in the Chrysler-Plymouth-Ital Motorcars dealership he had purchased as sole owner at 33 years of age, seven miles from the White House. His mother, who had helped him with his homework throughout his schooling, let out an inimitable sigh of relief that said it all.

Mr. Graves continued to accumulate accomplishments. He explains, "I actually visualized my future biosketch and worked very hard to develop the expertise to fill in the blanks. I clearly remember thinking how a patent would be important. That led to a Service Mark registered in the U.S. Patent Office. My Rollins College professor, C. LaRue Boyd, offered me an assignment to write a feature for $15, following our class one day. A few years later, Automotive Executive magazine started paying me $400 per feature article, thanks to the shot of confidence from my Rollins mentor. You'll never guess who was reading those 10 Automotive Executive magazine features in Detroit and elsewhere!"

Just shy of 30, Mr. Graves placed a well-worded cold phone call to Dave Power (J.D. Power) that led to his membership in the J.D. Power SuperDealer Roundtable and eventually becoming the organization's youngest dealership sole owner member. Known as "The Professor" to a number of dealers, Mr. Graves appeared on the Automotive Satellite Television Network (ASTN) and was twice chosen to address National Automobile Dealers Association convention workshops. Car Dealer Insider's headline said it all: "By now, there probably aren't too many dealers who have not heard of Will Graves..." Ward's Auto Dealer's Art Spinella devoted a full page of his industry trade journal to showcase Mr. Graves' talents with "A-1 Dealer Offers Dealer Consulting Service."

Mr. Graves introduced two Chrysler vice chairmen to their future quality guru, not the other way around. At the 1986 NADA Convention in New Orleans, Mr. Graves' Automotive Executive magazine Quality Management feature sat in the laps of thousands of attendees as a Chrysler keynote speaker introduced the audience to the Quality Management methods that Mr. Graves had presented to the Chrysler C-Suite earlier. Auto Age published Mr. Graves' "The Dealer of the 1990s," included him in an NADA Convention Panel and devoted an Auto Age feature to his Quality Automotive Group Inc.

Chrysler chairmen emeriti, Lee Iacocca and Ben Bidwell, played key roles in Mr. Graves' career. He treasures the written praise received from those two Chrysler chairmen as well as that from pioneering Quality Management leader, Phil Crosby; Tom Peters; Stuttgart-based Porsche public relations head and Porsche racing head Manfred Jantke; the world's leading automotive analyst, Maryann Keller; and Larry Barnett, the "Grandfather" of The ALS Foundation.

Mr. Graves maintains that he made those connections by selling himself. He also received much support from Rollins College presidents Thad Seymour and Jack Critchfield, who recognized that he was very personable, enthusiastic, energetic, highly capable, useful and compassionate. They became his career references while he was a student president, and, later, chapter advisory board chairman of the Phi Delta Theta Fraternity, which honored him in their "Road To Greatness" series. Mr. Graves had been chosen student president a year earlier than normal. When Rollins Chapel Dean, A. Arnold Wettstein, asked Mr. Graves to deliver "Madison's Religious Realism" in his place due to a basketball game injury, Mr. Graves was so excited by the experience that he went sailing off the Rollins Waterski Jump, landing on two skis the second time, despite his fears, per The Rollins Archives. He had further reason to celebrate just a few months after graduating with a graduate marketing assistantship and a Rollins Master of Business Administration degree. In October 1978, Mr. Graves was the eleventh-ranking Electrolux branch sales manager in the United States and was inducted into The Electrolux Management Hall of Fame at 23 years of age.

Mr. Graves' Tamakwa Unit Camp Citizenship Award paled in comparison to his induction into the Rollins Circle of Algernon Sydney Sullivan Scholars, a national humanitarian honor. Moreover, his legendary Rollins rowing coach, Jim Lyden, honored him with the Rollins Crew Blazer Citizenship Award, despite his three years of rowing rather than the required four years. Coach Lyden was the protégé of the dean of southern rowing, Rollins' U.T. Bradley. Not only did Coach Lyden work for free and donate seven figures to rowing initiatives, but he also served as a career reference and even offered to back Mr. Graves in a dealership if needed, which it wasn't. Mr. Graves' contributions to Rollins College were substantial enough that The New York Times included his volunteer service to the college as part of his NYT print wedding announcement featuring The Graves Family Log Chapel in 2016.

Pamela Harriman was Mr. Graves' reference for his Columbia University Executive Program at Columbia's Arden House campus in Harriman, N.Y. He had wanted to study under John O. Whitney, and many of his graduate and undergraduate students benefited from his joyous experience.

Mr. Graves has been published in 24 publications including, but not limited to, The Wall Street Journal, Chief Executive, The Washington Times, The New York Post, Town and Country, The Winter Park-Maitland Observer, The Orlando Sentinel, The Tampa Tribune, The Florida Sun, The Orlando Times, The Palm Beach Daily News, The Naples Daily News, The Greenwich Sentinel, The East Hampton Star, The Orlando Business Journal, The Brandon News, The Rollins Sandspur, Automotive Executive, Auto Age, Ward's Auto Dealer, Automotive News, The Winter Park Voice, and Vox Populi. Mr. Graves credits these publications and others for making his volunteer career possible by shining a spotlight on his various causes.

Mr. Graves remembers that his mother tried to place him on "What's My Line?" as the unknown founder/editor/publisher of The Lake Champlain News at age seven. He used to write the copy, deliver his handwritten newspapers and collect subscription payments from cousins who kept him afloat. Mr. Graves used to count everyone from the Tampa Tribune chairman on down as friends and, in a number of cases, references. He keynoted The Tampa Tribune's Saddlebrook Resort Conference in the greatest speech he'd ever given—all for free for his newspaper buddies. When Mr. Graves was asked to stage a return engagement for The Tampa Tribune employees who hadn't been able to be at Saddlebrook, Mr. Graves filled the cavernous lobby of The Tampa Tribune headquarters and ended up receiving seven letters of praise from the chairman on down.

In his twenties, Mr. Graves walked into The Brandon News and volunteered to found "Eagles Soar Higher," a weekly self-improvement column. Several years later, when a Swiss Guard friend needed career advice, Mr. Graves forwarded his ten-part "Career Search" columns to The Vatican. What a thrill it was for Mr. Graves to learn that a Reverend Bolles had been very impressed with these columns. It turned out that Reverend Bolles had been assigned by the Vatican to assist our friend, who was being advised by the brother of Richard Nelson Bolles, author of "What Color Is Your Parachute?" Mr. Graves has always been about self-improvement for himself and others.

Mr. Graves would later become the founder of the Automotive Practice Worldwide for Philip Crosby Associates, the world's largest consulting firm specializing in Quality Management. This endeavor was met with a nod from the founder himself and from the founder of five NGOs, including Friends of Windermere, Friends of Florida's Coasts, and SAVE GRAND ISLE, who was interviewed on NPR by Dame Jane Goodall's co-author Thane Maynard. Incredibly, Jane Goodall would later agree to add her essay to Mr. Graves' feature on his cousin, Esmond Bradley Martin, the world's leading authority on the rhinoceros, whose very consequential life had been cut short in Nairobi. Regarding Friends of Florida's Coasts, Mr. Graves penned a tribute to Nat Reed, an environmental activist whose support for the organization is evidenced in this 2011 letter. (Page 2 can be found here.) Another supporter, Jean-Michel Cousteau, president of the Ocean Futures Society, collaborated with Mr. Graves to appeal to state legislators to uphold a ban on oil drilling off Florida's coast. Read about their efforts here.

There has been a common thread to the Graves approach to business, life, philanthropy, and faith. "It's all about meritocracy," exclaims Will Graves. "When I started reading The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal (which published my letter on Buffett and Investing), USA TODAY, The Orlando Sentinel, and The New York Post print editions, cover-to-cover, daily, my I.Q. jumped ten to fifteen points. Most people are too busy to really know what their country is up to without them. As a National Community Activist, I am independent, unpaid, unrecognized, impartial, and free to speak, write, and act. I'm free to do what government can't do."

On a personal note, Mr. Graves is very proud to be a Georgetown, Penn and Harvard Dad. Additionally, he has always been an eternal optimist who emphasizes how invaluable mentors, judgment calls, education and faith are to life. Mr. Graves feels very strongly that his Who's Who inclusion would have never occurred without the right mentors, judgment calls, education, and faith. "Just saying," he concludes.

About Marquis Who's Who®:
Since 1899, when A. N. Marquis printed the First Edition of Who's Who in America®, Marquis Who's Who® has chronicled the lives of the most accomplished individuals and innovators from every significant field of endeavor, including politics, business, medicine, law, education, art, religion and entertainment. Who's Who in America® remains an essential biographical source for thousands of researchers, journalists, librarians and executive search firms around the world. The suite of Marquis® publications can be viewed at the official Marquis Who's Who® website, www.marquiswhoswho.com.

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