The Hard Sell

Yesterday was spent trolling around car dealerships down on Manchester Road, looking for potential new vehicles for Mrs Bison, on account of her old Nissan Altima being a - what's the correct term? - ah yes, piece of shit. We had some idea what would be worth looking at but the purpose of the trip was to narrow that list down. After all, everything looks great in a two-inch square photograph on your computer but unless it's a Pontiac Aztek it's not until you stand next to some of these things that you really appreciate how ugly/plasticky/crap they are.

Times are hard in the US auto market. The credit crunch has slowed down the flood of people buying cars they don't need (with money they don't have) to a trickle, and a lot of dealerships are hurting for business. This is Memorial Day weekend so a lot of them had their lots festooned with balloons, and free hot dogs for potential customers. We didn't call at all of them but when you pulled up at most you could see the salespeople gazing hungrily at you, as though you were fresh meat and they were a starving carnivore. The scene was depressing - rain-soaked asphalt with blue and red balloons blowing sadly in the wind and a smoking hot dog grill; hardly a customer to be seen. You would barely be out of your car before they'd be on you. One dealer had construction going on and their lot resembled a building site, so they were billing this as a "Special Construction Sale". Any excuse...

Of course there were exceptions - some manufacturers just do a better job of putting out good product and managing their dealer experience. At Honda, for instance, there were no tacky balloons or "Memorial Day weekend sale - everything must go!" signs, but plenty of customers.

By the end of the day we were ready to test drive a couple of things. The hungry salesman at one dealership accompanied us on the drive and when we returned he attempted to close the deal. Apparently their General Manager was there to make sure "all deals went through". In spite of my pointing out that we hadn't driven other potential options yet and therefore had not decided to buy this one, let alone to buy it from him, he continued to press us to buy it. I'm not sure whether this reflected his stupidity, or that of his usual clientele, some of whom would presumably fold at this point and buy something.

He kept pointing out features and trying to see what it would take to get us to buy. I pointed out that there was nothing he could offer that would make me buy without more reseach.

"What do you need to know?"
"If I decide to buy this I'll put it out for bids through the internet to make sure I know what the real best price is, and I'll check dealer rebates."
"Why? All the dealers get the same price so we can do anything they can do. We'll beat any price."
"Sure you can, but until I know what that price is, what's the point of negotiating?"
"We'll give you the best price."
"And how will I know that? Will I just trust you to be kind to me?"
"I'll show you the paperwork, what we paid for it and everything."
(This works on some people who don't understand about dealer incentives, holdback, etc, but I wasn't going to get into a debate about it.)
"No. If I decide to buy this I'll come back when I have the information I need and then we'll talk."

Obviously he couldn't just let us walk off.

"I'll just have to go inside and tell my boss and the General Manager"

This usually results in someone in a less cheap suit and cufflinks coming out to repeat the same sales pitch over again, so I gave the salesman some advice.

"No problem - you do what you have to do. Just understand that if they come out and try to put the hard sell on me I'm going to tell them to piss off. OK?"

Not surprisingly no-one came out. We then went to the Honda dealer and drove something nicer that didn't come with a pushy cunt attached. This morning Bison Daughter proceeded over breakfast to put the bite into us about how we needed the EX-L model with the leather. She exhibited a level of persistence and reasoning that was quite remarkable for a ten year-old; I think she picked it up from the dealers yesterday. Certainly she doesn't miss much - her closing argument was: "You may as well pay the extra for the EX-L because you said putting money in the stock market is like pissing it down the toilet." Makes you proud...

By the way, I found this Car Dealer Confessions gem today which is absoultely on the mark. In fact I actually had someone years ago ask me for my watch as a deposit when I was buying a used car. Now him I did tell to piss off.


Copyright © 2008 Edward Bison