In the first personal example, a proximity/vehicle selection issue was overcome not necessarily a time or convenience issue. We sell multiple cars each month to varying places, most recently a new Z06 to California. My favorite was a used Camaro to Germany this past summer.
In the second example, it sounds like the dealer went above and beyond doing an outstanding job to earn your business. If you paid by check the logistics were easy. The question is why NH? How did you find that specific dealership? Was it because they have a history of excellent customer service or was it from shopping for a specific Tahoe or price?
Maybe I'm being short sited here, what was the benefit to the dealership? They sold a Tahoe, yes; but if you bought from afar because you shopped around and got the best price from him I'm then going to assume meant little profit for them. No problem with that, we make "loser" deals all the time, but its usually to guests that live close enough to continue to do business with us in the future. For an initiative to work, like one you suggested above, there has to be a benefit for both sides. What was the benefit for them, other than moving a unit?
The third is a private party without a storefront.
As a salesman I've driven an hour to pick up a guest and bring them to our dealership to sell a car. In that case, the deal was really done way ahead of time because we did a good job with our internet presence as a dealership that help those with bad credit. I picked them up because they had no transportation.
In fact, we have done a few new Mazda deals for guests in the past where we delivered the car to their home because they lived over an hour away and was inconvenient for them to come out. We have since made it a policy not to do so any more because not only was there little benefit to us (little profit, no future service) but on the two most recent surveys we received poor marks for not doing things like walking the guest back to service. We coached them on the surveys but they filled them out honestly.
Here's a few more questions to consider: Would you invite a stranger to your home to show you a car? Would you invite them in to work numbers? If you were a female salesperson would you feel comfortable going to a strangers home regardless of the neighborhood? If I advertise the service, how do I pick and choose whose home to go to? How do I tell a customer that we won't go to their home because it looks dangerous? Would you want your deal or credit discussed in earshot of coworkers if you work at a place without access to a private area like a conference room?
There just doesn't seem to be any benefit to try and start up some initiative that advertises our willingness to bring the car buying experience to the customer. The benefit of Joe's idea is that I have the opportunity to expose our dealership to hundreds of people as word spreads that Johnny got to test drive a new Tahoe on his lunch.
There really doesn't seem to be a demand for this either as this graphic points out from Autotrader's recent report (
http://www.weworkforyou.com/files/insights/x-download/2015CarBuyerOfTheFutureBrochureFINALpdf.pdf):
I'm sorry, I hate to sound negative and closed minded but as someone that's been on the floor and been a sales manager, I just don't see it.
