I've ordered vehicles through my local Chevrolet dealer. With the market the way it's been for the past few years, they've gotten much better about ordering vehicles.
The ordering part is done at the dealer (obviously) but getting your truck depends on two things:
- Does the dealer have allotment?
- Is anything you want to order on restriction?
Either of those will stop your order dead.
Allotment is how many of a particular model a dealer is allowed to order. Corvette is the most common example of a vehicle with allotment issues, but you can run into allotment issues on other models, especially new models where the line isn't fully up to speed and they're in launch mode (like the 2023 Colorado). An example: A dealer is allotted, say, 100 Colorado for May. This is spread out among trucks they're going to put on the lot and also orders for customers. If they've exhausted their allotment for May, your order has to go into the next month where there is allotment available.
Restriction has to do with whether GM is building vehicles with the option(s) you want. This has been pretty wild over the past year or two with supply chain issues. For a while, the 6.2L was under restriction for Silverado, as was the multi-flex tailgate. If your dealer put through an order with content that's on restriction, your order just goes and sits in a black hole until whatever it is comes off restriction. At the time of order, the dealer should know what's under restriction
at that moment and can adjust the order accordingly. The problem becomes the time between when your order is placed and when it comes up for production. If something on your order goes into restriction during that period, it just goes into that black hole and nobody is notified. It usually plays out that after a while with no word, you ask your dealer where your truck's at and they have to Scooby Doo why it's taking so long. That's when they find the restriction.
If you passed those two gates, your order will go through and the next piece of info you'll receive is a VIN. That doesn't mean your truck's been built yet, but it should also come with a production week. That means your vehicle is in queue and slated to be assembled that week. Once you have your VIN in-hand, you can stop pestering the dealer for a while. Take the VIN and ask the chat-bot window at the bottom of the Chevrolet site where your order is at and they'll give you a status update.
Once your vehicle is built, it needs to be transported. More waiting. Waiting for your truck to get into a rail car and waiting for local transport when it comes off the rail car. Lots of logistical factors here but it's usually not too bad, a week or two is typical. There's another potential bump here: Build-shy. This is what GM calls it, but other manufacturers do it to. Trucks are built without all the necessary parts and are parked in a field somewhere waiting to be refit when parts are available. This isn't like when you vehicle is supposed to have a heated steering wheel but it doesn't and it'll be added later. Build-shy vehicles are missing significant components, like entire power window switches or infotainment displays, stuff you can't hand over to a customer with a promise to add it later. On your end, it'll look like your truck has been built (it has,
mostly) and is awaiting shipment, except that actual shipment date is completely unknown. This was a big deal at times for certain models but I think much of that is in the rearview mirror now. Manufacturers are on top of things and now they're being proactive with order restrictions instead of being reactive with build-shy. An example is Ford offering Bronco orders money to change their order (remove options on restriction) or continue with the order, understanding their vehicle won't be built until 2024.
From there, it's a regular dealer transaction.
