How dealerships work
 

I have a quick question. If a dealer sells more cars, what is their "pat on the back from the manufacture" for this.

Do they get first pick on cars?
Faster delivery?

Just wondering.

Thanks..

We get paid holdback, which is money not shown on the invoice.

Sometimes a dealership will also give part of that away if the customer is close to the dealership because they believe that they'll earn the customer's service and parts business - both much more lucrative than car sales nowadays. This is why dealers usually try and sell/give you oil changes and other service related stuff when you first purchase your car. They want to build rapport with you.

Secondly, when a dealership sells more cars, they sometimes get a bigger allocation. This is usually done over the span of a few months - it's sometimes why a dealer will try and sell you a certain car for cheap. It's probably been on the dealership for awhile and it's screwing up their turnover rate.

Customer Service Index surveys are also very important.

That's about it. I sell Honda's and I don't mind giving cars away at little to no profit... It just pisses me off to no end when customers grind on price for hours, then once you agree to everything they become rude and are unhappy despite getting the car at a good price. At that point, I'd rather not sell the car at all because the CSI's is going to be bad and I made no money on the deal.

Sorry for the off-topic rant >_>

:iagree: I agree with you bud. I sell Nissan's...and people grind us to hard on price and take it for granite. I got grinded last week on price, on a car for a hour....than got a bad CSI report saying the whole process was to timely...even though he was in and out under 2 hours. half the time was him grinding me over couple hundred bucks on a base Altima. We have one of the most stressful Jobs...people think EVERY salesman is Satan....give us a break, were just trying to make a living.

Sorry for the off-topic rant as well.

couple good tid bits of info there. thx guys!

As a salesman, I agree. Customers seem to think that it is an unholy sin that you make a profit on anything. Sometimes I think that they don't even understand how a business works.

Every job is hard, but to us buyers, we have to try and get a good deal, most people buy new car like what once every 3-5 years ? and saleman sells cars EVERYDAY. There are a lot of people getting tricked by saleman too, so everytime I buy a car I have to be very carefully, of course I understand there are honest sale people out there but I need to save my *** first. No offence !!

I've had my ups and downs with car salesmen. And I'm sure customers can be real a-holes.I think many of these complaints hold true for any sales related industry. When it comes down to it, everyone trying to make or save a dollar.

I remember when I delivers pizzas to get through college. There was a big new car dealership (Pontiac/GMC) that I delivered pizzas to every week. The sales guys there were really condescending towards me because they saw me lower on the pecking order than them. I always felt like all the **** they put up with from their customers they offloaded on to me. And they never tipped. Needless to say, I never bought a car from them.

Having said that, I've also had great experiences at certain dealerships. When it comes to negotiating price on a car, I've learned that maybe the showroom is not the best place to do it. I always try to upfront declare my level of commitment to buy and financial position. Once I've decided on a car i prefer to use the internet or telephone. I feel like it defuses a lot of pressure from both sides and ultimately leads to the best deal. Plus, I really hate the negotiation process when the sales person has to go back and forth with the sales manager.

At the end of the day, I'm a very loyal person. And once I found someone that does business in an honest, fair, and quality fashion, I always give them first opportunity for repeat business.

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