Cars.com Buys DealerRater Website

Cars.com, a Chicago-based car-shopping website, is acquiring DealerRater, an online dealership review platform. The deal will give Cars.com the largest such service in the industry, with more than 4 million consumer-submitted reviews, according to the companies.

The transaction is expected to close next month. Terms weren’t disclosed.

DealerRater users have posted more than 2.5 million sales and service reviews covering 41,000 U.S. and Canadian dealerships since the platform was launched in 2002. More than 14 million consumers access the content every month, according to the company. It launched a new CustomerConnect tool in April to help match and facilitate communications between potential buyers and sales personnel.

Cars.com, which is an 18-year-old unit of media company Tegna Inc., features new and used vehicle listings, pricing tools and editorial content. It launched its own dealership review database in 2011.

DealerRater CEO Gary Tucker is expected to remain with the company, reporting to Cars.com CEO Alex Vetter, after the acquisition. Cars.com also plans to maintain the DealerRater name for the review service.

Citing a recent study conducted by Digital Airstrike, Cars.com says 79% of car buyers and 68% of service customers rate review sites to be among the “most helpful” resources when choosing a dealership.