Kristopher Nielsen grew up the son of general managers at different dealerships. With his mother at a Mazda store and his dad at a Lincoln-Mercury dealership in the suburbs of Kansas City, the car business ran through his blood. But Nielsen was determined to make it on his own. “When I was growing up, I didn’t want to be the kid of the GM working at the dealership,” he said. Without telling his parents, he got his first job as a porter at a Toyota dealership. He sold cars during college summers at another store before taking an internship at Mazda North America.