What do you think of this?

[Jerry Thibeau]

I mystery shopped a dealer by phone today and was checking out a vehicle. The price seemed really good and then I noticed the fine print.

"All pricing includes $3500 cash or trade."

I asked about that thinking it pertained to the payments, but it wasn't.

The advertised price was $12,977 and when you add the $3500 the true price was $16,477.

What do you think of this technique? Does it give our industry a black eye or is a creative way to make the phone ring?

 

[Billfred]

Pretty scuzzy to me. I certainly wouldn't advocate it.

 

[Christine Plunkett]

It's a don't.

 

[hlm920]

way too shady

 

[ed.brooks]

I'm thinking "Black Eye" for the industry. We've had to develop software to add the "cash or trade" figure back into the price in order to give an accurate representation of real market pricing.

Additionally, from what I understand, the major classified sites don't stand for this deception. I hear they address it as it's reported to them.

 

[NLorenzo]

Sounds an awful lot to me like it's from the people who brought us "Two for twice the price of one".

Our CJD guys tried posting their sale price including some special qualification rebates (Chrysler TDM, FFA, Military, Trade Up/Trade In) with full disclaimers on every car (including the price it was available for without - this meant I had to individually post disclaimers, which is always a blast on a 200+ new car inventory) and my goodness did it make the phone ring. It also made our salespeople spend hours and hours explaining why the customer couldn't purchase the car for thousands less than the actual price.

To my experience with the couple months we gave it a shot, it saturates your sales force in extraneous conversations that lead nowhere productive and leave them feeling drained constantly from the same explanations. Maybe over the long term it would level out for some, but to our practice it did not benefit us significantly enough to warrant the extra talking time we had to deal with.

We already have to deal with the thief in a suit image enough as it is with some customers and giving them more ammunition certainly doesn't do us any favors.

 

[Jerry Thibeau]

I have to agree with what I am hearing here. I don't like it one bit!

5% of the dealers out there give the rest of the industry a black eye.

NLorenzo, it was not your dealership I shopped.

 

[ArtMorris]

5% of the dealers out there give the rest of the industry a black eye.

Very true. Fortunately for us, those in the 5% don't seem to be active on DealerRefresh.

 

[Alex Snyder]

I'd love to be a lawyer in that dealer's town.

 

[Jeff Kershner]

See if their inventory is listed on AutoTrader and Cars.com the same way? If so - turn them in. I've done this several times in the Baltimore area and they were asked to change their pricing or be removed (so I was told).

It's disturbing to see dealers playing games like this. Only looking for the quick sale this month and paying no attention to their brand and survival.