My latest dealership sales experience

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Recommendation:

Just tell them you want to test drive the truck.

Don't give them any other additional information to the effect that you have any particular interest in this brand or model.

In effect you told them you couldn't live without this truck so the salesman, as is their job, was reminding you that you really should purchase it.

It is the salesman's job to "hound" you as we say here. Call it what you will but a salesman's job rests in the power of persuasion.
 
Originally Posted by MolaKule
Recommendation:

Just tell them you want to test drive the truck.

Don't give them any other additional information to the effect that you have any particular interest in this brand or model.

In effect you told them you couldn't live without this truck so the salesman, as is their job, was reminding you that you really should purchase it.

It is the salesman's job to "hound" you as we say here. Call it what you will but a salesman's job rests in the power of persuasion.



This.

I hate the 2 first questions that salesman utter as they run out, and before they even know your name.

" How much do you owe on that car?". None of your business, who said I am trading?; Is my usual answer.

2nd question" Are you going to buy today?". I don't know , I have not finished looking at, or driven the vehicle, and I don't know how much it really is. That's how I answer the second question.

Then I introduce myself.
 
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Originally Posted by Triplicate
The lost sale is 100% the fault of the first dealer's management team and not the fault of the young salesman. But.....

Didn't you tell them you were just there for a test drive/not a serious buyer? You shouldn't be flustered by the fact that they treated you accordingly. They replied to your email within 2 hours matching the deal another dealer offered. That is more than fair in terms of timeframe for a buyer who told them the day before he wasn't there to purchase a truck.

Having been on the sales side of things, albeit many years ago but still, we got more dreamers than serious buyers for top of the line models. I sold Chevy's and we got more requests to test drive LTZ Burbans and Tahoes than I can count, and yet we sold about one per month. LTs and LSs, sure, plenty of sales. You told them you weren't ready to buy and they listened. Too bad for them that they lost the sale and probably 6-7k in gross on your trade (2018 Pilot will fly off their lot, that's not going to auction) but they couldn't have known you were serious. The vast majority of people who say they're not serious are in fact, not serious.


Well while these two brainiacs were overthinking my intentions the one that took what I said at face value made the sale.
 
Originally Posted by spasm3
Originally Posted by MolaKule
Recommendation:

Just tell them you want to test drive the truck.

Don't give them any other additional information to the effect that you have any particular interest in this brand or model.

In effect you told them you couldn't live without this truck so the salesman, as is their job, was reminding you that you really should purchase it.

It is the salesman's job to "hound" you as we say here. Call it what you will but a salesman's job rests in the power of persuasion.



This.

I hate the 2 first questions that salesman utter as they run out, and before they even know your name.

" How much do you owe on that car?". None of your business, who said I am trading?; Is my usual answer.

2nd question" Are you going to buy today?". I don't know , I have not finished looking at, or driven the vehicle, and I don't know how much it really is. That's how I answer the second question.

Then I introduce myself.


In all fairness that was his fourth question and my answer was, "Don't know" - yes, I knew exactly the exact amount.
 
My experience with Toyota dealerships says that they are mostly arrogant - One of the places I went in, they refuted my counter-offer by saying, "We're not Ford - we don't have to give discounts to sell cars"

Of course, in Seattle there is so much off-shore money that they know they can sell the same truck to someone else who won't even know to haggle from MSRP.
 
Email negotiation is the only way to go, I also use it to feel out the dealer. If the dealer is difficult over email or phone, it's not going to get any better in person!
 
Originally Posted by spasm3
Originally Posted by MolaKule
Recommendation:

Just tell them you want to test drive the truck.

Don't give them any other additional information to the effect that you have any particular interest in this brand or model.

In effect you told them you couldn't live without this truck so the salesman, as is their job, was reminding you that you really should purchase it.

It is the salesman's job to "hound" you as we say here. Call it what you will but a salesman's job rests in the power of persuasion.



This.

I hate the 2 first questions that salesman utter as they run out, and before they even know your name.

" How much do you owe on that car?". None of your business, who said I am trading?; Is my usual answer.

2nd question" Are you going to buy today?". I don't know , I have not finished looking at, or driven the vehicle, and I don't know how much it really is. That's how I answer the second question.

Then I introduce myself.



I would state and have stated: "You are making many unfounded assumptions. Is there a more mature salesman I can talk to?"
shocked2.gif
 
Originally Posted by spavel6
My experience with Toyota dealerships says that they are mostly arrogant - One of the places I went in, they refuted my counter-offer by saying, "We're not Ford - we don't have to give discounts to sell cars"

Of course, in Seattle there is so much off-shore money that they know they can sell the same truck to someone else who won't even know to haggle from MSRP.



I see this a lot here as well with Toyota and Honda. They aren't wrong though, people walk in and pay full MSRP for them.
 
Originally Posted by PWMDMD
Originally Posted by hallstevenson
Originally Posted by PWMDMD
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.

Not sure what you expected by doing this. Know what happened with that email ? They deleted it and moved on.... Remember, "I was only test driving that day" and "I was not prepared to make a deal at that moment".

At the end of the day though, you got a deal that you're happy with. Leave it at that. Why give that first dealer another second of your time ?


A small FU for wasting my time. Not expecting it to make any difference other than it felt good for a moment after sending it. Poor salesman just emailed that he was off yesterday and he's soooo sorry about what happened. Honestly, all the sales manager needed to do was tell me he's off or assign someone who was in and I would've accepted either.



You can't take this stuff so personally. If they didn't sell the truck to you yesterday, they'll sell it to someone else tomorrow.
 
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.
 
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. I have a lot of sympathy for them. Their commission rate is so small and it has to come in much more frequently as compared to Commercial Real Estate which I sold.

Once you get really hungry, your priorities change. Most of us have no idea what "that" hunger is like.
 
I've been looking for the past year, taken a few test drives.

When I made the decision to bite, I emailed a dealership, told them what I was looking for indicating email contact. First thing he does is schedules an appt and then follows up with a price quote. The price worked for me.

I show up and the salesman isn't even at work and didn't bother passing me off to his 'team'. I shot an email back saying I left, when I got home. Within a minute his manager calls me and asks me what happened. This manager then says I'll be working with him and I get scheduled for another appt. Then I get a text saying I'll be working with the original guy. I show up and get another text saying I'll be working with somebody else, and that guy wasn't even there. So I fire off a text to the manager, he passes me off to another sales manager who finds another salesman. So I'm talking to him, told him what I was looking for, he checks inventory and says they don't have one on the lot. But it'll take 48 hours to get one.

I haven't heard from him and it's been over a week now. No follow up on their part.

You can't make this stuff up. And they wonder why they have bad reputations.
 
Agreed on the email. I researched a vehicle for weeks, so I knew what I could buy it for.

I made the mistake of taking a sales flyer into the dealership that bought the ad space. I learned a lot on how slimy and untruthful some dealerships can be. That one is on me. I will never do that again.

I bought the exact same make, model, color car at a very good price in six emails (three each way) from a place 15 miles away. So easy. Even with the salesman's in office leg work, he probably spent no more than half an hour of his time getting me that price.

Same vehicle, two different "best offer' prices, and two totally different experiences. One sale.
 
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.
 
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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.
 
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.


You sound like the car salesman I've dealt now for 30 years
He's low key no pressure makes you feel comfortable and he's the number 1 salesman year after year.
 
Originally Posted by SevenBizzos
Agreed on the email. I researched a vehicle for weeks, so I knew what I could buy it for.

I made the mistake of taking a sales flyer into the dealership that bought the ad space. I learned a lot on how slimy and untruthful some dealerships can be. That one is on me. I will never do that again.

I bought the exact same make, model, color car at a very good price in six emails (three each way) from a place 15 miles away. So easy. Even with the salesman's in office leg work, he probably spent no more than half an hour of his time getting me that price.

Same vehicle, two different "best offer' prices, and two totally different experiences. One sale.


When we bought the Caliber, I had found it online listed for $10k at a Nissan dealership. They find it and pull it around, had a big "$13,999" listed on the window... test drove it and all was good, so I tell them I'll pay $10k for it. "Oh we can't do that on it, lowest we can do is 12!" So I show them their own ad, complete with matching vin, and told them I'll go to Carmax if they won't honor their ad price.

They agreed to 10K, but then tried slapping me with 8% interest. Told them I'll be back tomorrow with a check from my bank because I had a significantly lower interest rate of 3%, that 8% instantly dropped to 3%, which I declined because I'd rather deal with my own bank, so they dropped it further to 2.65%. That's how I learned EVERYTHING is negotiable.
 
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.
 
A few months ago I wanted to get a thank you gift for my father's home care giver of 5 years; a Honda CR-V EXL 2wd.
There are a bazillion Honda dealers in Silicon Valley; they all want your business.
I emailed 'em all and told them what I wanted and that I was including all the local dealers.
Several had a black/black CR-V, which was what Mani wanted. Or so they said.

After a couple of days I told everyone still in the game I was buying today. Cash deal.
So I settled on the Palo Alto store and told the others I was done.
Well, Palo Alto told me the car was in transit and it would be a few days. Then the Honda factory money would be over.
So the price did not hold... It was only good for a vehicle in stock.

Later that day, a Stevens Creek Honda manager called me to see how I was doing; how I liked the new CR-V, etc.
I told him Palo Alto did not have the right car in stock. He checked prices again and knocked a little off his price.
Off to the dealership Mani and I went. She got her new CR-V and loves it.
I was so happy that day; I did the right thing.
 
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some random comments: as much as i hate the car dealership song and dance there is nothing worse than a salesperson whose sales pitch is inversely related to his/her knowledge about the product or knows less than what i know. i do my homework, do you? to salespersons who want my sympathy (along with my hard earned money) because theirs is a "tough" job: get a grip or get a new job. every job is tough, i don't expect sympathy from you because of my job. i have trouble buying any product from a salesperson who looks, acts and conducts him/herself as if he/she cannot afford that same product. finally, don't be surprised that many smart customers shop for decent vehicles that are inversely related in price to their strong financial situation. my own rules: never set foot in a dealership that adds pinstripes, nitrogen filled tires or reconditioning fees, and never drive out of one with dealer stickers or license plate holders on your new purchase.
 
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