My latest dealership sales experience

[Saabist]

Originally Posted by Gebo
If you have not worked on commission, it may be hard to understand why some sales people act like they do.

The car sales people are fighting each other in the dealership, fighting the sales manager, sales manager giving his favorite sale men leads and skipping others, getting jerked around by potential buyers, etc.

For a real-life look at this, check out "129 Cars" at This American Life:

https://www.thisamericanlife.org/513/129-cars

 

[AC1DD]

No surprise here, the rare store truly knows how to sell cars and actually treat the customer with respect.

Sure there are plenty of bad customers but almost all the dealers are bad.

 

[PWMDMD]

Originally Posted by MCompact
Originally Posted by 02SE
Man do I have stories about buying vehicles...

I'll just say that if you are in sales, don't make assumptions about potential customers (you are likely wrong). Treat every customer in a manner in which you would like to be treated.


You are absolutely right. Some people might look like they don't have two nickels to rub together yet they have a FICO of 825 and a net worth over $3,000,000.


I will say with the first dealership it was my day off and I had just gone to the gym and I was still in gym clothes. That said, I'm in pediatric health care which means I wear black scrub pants with an old comfortable t-shirt (since I wear a white coat anyway) and Chuck Taylors to work (sometime my Star Wars Vans). Walked into the second dealership (minus the coat) looking like a hobo....FICO isn't quite 825 but it's not far off....they made no assumptions until I filled out my monthly income on the finance application. Reminds me of the old Cosby Show episode where where Dr. Huxtable goes to buy a car dressed in sweats and he ends up running into a patient who outs him....

As an aside, with my last three vehicles I've financed through the manufacture (Honda Financial, Lexus Financial and now Toyota Financial) and I was never asked once to verify income or even employment. Another auto financing bubble on the way?

 

[Skippy722]

Originally Posted by PWMDMD

As an aside, with my last three vehicles I've financed through the manufacture (Honda Financial, Lexus Financial and now Toyota Financial) and I was never asked once to verify income or even employment. Another auto financing bubble on the way?


Definitely. They let me roll 4K negative equity into my used 300 with 0 down no questions, on a single income. No questions/verification getting the van either. They hand loans out like candy it seems!

 

[Pew]

My friend worked at the dealer and sold me the focus that I have now. I didn't have the best credit history but he did all the bargaining for me so I got a the car is a much lower finance rate than I could [should] have gotten so that went like a breeze.

Fast forward 3 years later and I'm with a friend at a chevy dealer because I wanted to see how a manual C6 was as a potential fun car.. A younger salesman (probably around my age at the time) comes out and starts helping us. He wasn't able to let us drive the vette, but did let us drive the brand new Camaro SS and even offered to let me drive the ATS-V (it was a good thing I didn't make a lot of money at the time otherwise I would have gone home with a new car!) We ended up not buying anything but the salesman was pretty cool.

Two weeks after that my friend and I are at the Jeep/Dodge dealer looking at Durangos and Grand Cherokees. I tell the salesman what I was looking for and his reply was "you do know how much more a month that's going to be than the focus, right?" That ticked my friend and I off immediately. No wonder that dealer has a 2.5/5 star rating.

 

[ccs368]

Originally Posted by PWMDMD
I've been thinking about a 2020 Tundra Platinum for a few month. My Lexus was in for service and I had a loaner and didn't want to shlep all the way home and back so I drove to one of my many local Toyota dealerships were I was greeted by a nice if not barely pubescent-appearing young man. I explained I wanted to test drive a Tundra. He took some information, a copy of my license and fetched the one Platinum they had on the lot. Test drive went well. I explained that I was only test driving that day because while I've been thinking about this for some time I have not had time to think numbers. We returned to the dealership and knowing it was end-of-month and this Platinum has been sitting for months I expected the hard press. The sales manager comes over and states if we make a deal right now he'll take $5K off. I kindly explained (knowing if he's willing to give me $5K now he'll give me $5K tomorrow) that I was not prepared to make a deal at that moment but if he could please send me some numbers via email I will be in touch shortly. I went home and sent emails off to a couple of other dealerships and within mins got responses including really good numbers BUT none them had exactly what I want for color. I looked through the forums to see what others are paying and within 2 hours of getting home I'm ready to make a deal. The entire day goes by and I hear nothing from the dealership I visited so I send the salesman an email. Two hours later I get an email from the sales manager with good but not great numbers. I kindly reply what the best offer so far had been and if he can get close to it I'm ready to make a deal.

The next day I don't get a response until 2:30PM AND HE MATCHED the other offer! I had explained clearly that I'd likely take the 1.9% financing over the $2K rebate and of course all the numbers include the $2k rebate. I had a few more questions and by 4PM I had had enough - no response (It's the next day and still NO RESPONSE)! I contacted another dealership and within 30 mins we had a price on the new truck, by 5:30PM they appraised my Honda Pilot trade and gave me MORE than I was going to accept and by 6PM the deal is done.

I sent an email off to the first dealership sales manager and salesman just saying this deal was a home run. In my mind it should've been agree on price by 9am, financing in place by noon and take truck afterwork. They would've moved a truck that was not moving, hopefully meet some end-of-month quotas, make some money on a trade and sign one more financing contract.

JUST GIVE ME A WAY TO GIVE YOU MY $50K....PLEASE!!! In 2020 if they are not negotiating via email they are dead in the water. I know they want to force a face-to-face because it's easier to manipulate the situation on their turf but I have negotiated my past 6 vehicle purchases via email over the past TEN years with absolutely no issues and everyone willing to play. Some of these guys can't get out of their own way. It was very frustrating but in the end what do I care....got a great deal anyway.


Sounds like you got a great deal and less stressful experience on your new truck. Congratulations and how I miss driving a pickup. I might have to do email shopping for a vehicle next time too. My recent Toyota was from Boch Toyota South, Attleboro and my father bought his Tacoma at rt44 Toyota, Raynham. I also had contact with Harr, Worcester as well when I was in the market.

Yes, I did the conventional style of test driving and negotiating face to face the same day and the typical circus routine of fast talking, numbers hand scratched on napkins, guilt trips about not making money, how much they paid for the vehicle, etc taking about 45 minutes. I probably did not get an awesome deal as you did and likely lost on my '05 Tacoma 4wd access cab SR5 as the trade-in but since I knew it likely needed $1K+ of A/C work, I guess the secondary dealer that gets these vehicles wholesale in bulk from them got more of a repair vehicle than a flip.

If there's one thing I regret not doing was not using the "walk-out" card to give them another opportunity to drop the price but I was in a situation that I needed a vehicle immediately and put enough break-in miles before towing to max capacity and moving out of state several weeks later.

 

[javacontour]

I remember this from back in 2013...

Eye opening.

Originally Posted by Saabist
Originally Posted by Gebo
If you have not worked on commission, it may be hard to understand why some sales people act like they do.

The car sales people are fighting each other in the dealership, fighting the sales manager, sales manager giving his favorite sale men leads and skipping others, getting jerked around by potential buyers, etc.

For a real-life look at this, check out "129 Cars" at This American Life:

https://www.thisamericanlife.org/513/129-cars

 

[Triplicate]

Originally Posted by walterjay
Years ago I worked in car sales. I had to get out. Couldn't take all the cr-p that went with it. I was just too honest. Once I told a customer that he would be making a mistake to buy a new car to save money on gas when his existing car was relatively new and money owed on it. I was a great sales guy.

Oh man. I have some stories.

Saw a general manager hand a lot attendant a length of plastic tubing and told him to siphon the gas out of a trade-in that a customer returned to reclaim after she invoked the Lemon Law. The dealership sold her a turd of a car with issues and she knew it, and she came back for her trade. She was in the store for more than 8 hours before she got her car back.

Manager's quote was something like "She traded in that gas, that's my gas" and returned her trade-in to her with an empty tank, after a whole day of jerking her around of course.

This was not some trailer with a BHPH clientele. This was a large GM franchise that sold new Chevrolets with a huge used lot.

I have more stories. 2008-2009 was the wildest time to sell cars. It was mayhem. No access to credit, no customers paying cash, everyone upside down and trying to trade down, not up. It was so weird.

 

[john_pifer]

Originally Posted by MCompact
Again, I didn't work at a mass market store- so I never asked pre-qualifying questions. I wanted to match customers up with the right vehicle and let them test drive it before I asked about purchasing or leasing. My NCM used to say I was the "anti-salesman" in that my customers felt zero pressure.
But it worked for me and my customers.


I sold cars for a few years when I was in my mid-20s, at a Ford dealership in Memphis.

I was also somewhat of a product specialist; my favorite part of my job was actually getting to show the customers all the features of the car.

I would try to take that approach with many customers, but I learned that I needed to make an assessment pretty quickly as to "whether I had anything". Being the "Green Pea", or "FNG", I didn't have a customer base built up like many of the older salesmen who'd been there a long time. So I had to catch my customers off the lot. Many who came in wanted to buy a car or truck, but had bad credit, or no credit, or were so far upside down in the vehicle they were trying to trade, that it was hopeless.

That's why they ask you the qualifying questions. NOT pre-qualifying customers is a good way to spend hours wasting your time with someone and get absolutely nothing for your time.

Especially on the weekend, you didn't want to get stuck with a "Jack". That was a guy who was going to waste your time (jack you around) and not buy, or not be able to buy, and while you're traipsing around the lot with him, 2 or 3 or 4 customers come in who are actually there to buy, and CAN buy! There were many Saturdays while I was in the car business, when I caught a "Jack" in the morning, and, meanwhile, I watch my buddy catch a customer who actually ends up buying something!

 

[john_pifer]

Originally Posted by Triplicate
Originally Posted by walterjay
Years ago I worked in car sales. I had to get out. Couldn't take all the cr-p that went with it. I was just too honest. Once I told a customer that he would be making a mistake to buy a new car to save money on gas when his existing car was relatively new and money owed on it. I was a great sales guy.

Oh man. I have some stories.

Saw a general manager hand a lot attendant a length of plastic tubing and told him to siphon the gas out of a trade-in that a customer returned to reclaim after she invoked the Lemon Law. The dealership sold her a turd of a car with issues and she knew it, and she came back for her trade. She was in the store for more than 8 hours before she got her car back.

Manager's quote was something like "She traded in that gas, that's my gas" and returned her trade-in to her with an empty tank, after a whole day of jerking her around of course.

This was not some trailer with a BHPH clientele. This was a large GM franchise that sold new Chevrolets with a huge used lot.

I have more stories. 2008-2009 was the wildest time to sell cars. It was mayhem. No access to credit, no customers paying cash, everyone upside down and trying to trade down, not up. It was so weird.


I got out in 2008 and ended up going to school to be an aircraft mechanic a few years after that (my current gig).

 

[Triplicate]

Originally Posted by john_pifer
Originally Posted by Triplicate
Originally Posted by walterjay
Years ago I worked in car sales. I had to get out. Couldn't take all the cr-p that went with it. I was just too honest. Once I told a customer that he would be making a mistake to buy a new car to save money on gas when his existing car was relatively new and money owed on it. I was a great sales guy.

Oh man. I have some stories.

Saw a general manager hand a lot attendant a length of plastic tubing and told him to siphon the gas out of a trade-in that a customer returned to reclaim after she invoked the Lemon Law. The dealership sold her a turd of a car with issues and she knew it, and she came back for her trade. She was in the store for more than 8 hours before she got her car back.

Manager's quote was something like "She traded in that gas, that's my gas" and returned her trade-in to her with an empty tank, after a whole day of jerking her around of course.

This was not some trailer with a BHPH clientele. This was a large GM franchise that sold new Chevrolets with a huge used lot.

I have more stories. 2008-2009 was the wildest time to sell cars. It was mayhem. No access to credit, no customers paying cash, everyone upside down and trying to trade down, not up. It was so weird.


I got out in 2008 and ended up going to school to be an aircraft mechanic a few years after that (my current gig).

I got out too, still in sales (sort of). I work in govt. contracting. Good pay, and no 14 hour long Saturdays at work!

I do sort of miss being around cars all day. The days that all the Vettes arrived were always something to look forward to. Only certain people got to move the Vettes around the lot, they didn't trust any yahoo to do it. We'd get them 3-5 at a time and usually they were spoken for. GM tried to make sure that would sit indoors on the showroom floor with a "bump" so nobody would buy it haha.

I distinctly remember delivering a burnt orange C6 convertible to a doctor who bought a new Vette every few years. After it was prepped for delivery he slowly eased it out of the lot and then mashed the throttle, laid a 40 foot strip of rubber haha. Thats the right way to do it.

 

[MCompact]

One day three transporters showed up at the same time- everything from an X1 to a 750i and a 760i. I was the only person without a client so I ended up being responsible for logging them all in. I had to inspect them for damage, sign off on the delivery receipt,set up a file for each vehicle, and record the charge level of the battery. I don't know about any other marque, but BMWs are shipped in "Transport Mode"- which means only a few systems are functional. It took me something like two hours to get all of them logged. My NCM estimated that at one point I was responsible for @$1,500,000 worth of vehicles.