Is WHAT you stock a marketing decision?

[john.quinn]

While you think that the answer is yes, large companies that invest know that besides market data being analized a lot more that we can possible do wth one car we also need the decision maker's knowledge. If we didn;t have that, every Wall Street investor will make the same decisions. In Wall Street you have the guys that sell and buy with the market (and they never make or lose big) then you have the guys that make their own choices based on their own knowledge.

My point is that a good used car manager should know, now-in the past- and in the future, with or without vAuto, to read the market and be able to decide what cars to buy and at what price.

Yago -- your post seems absurd -- like you are arguing with yourself. On the one hand, you are saying the decision maker needs intuition first and foremost, but you say that decision makers should avail themselves of available market data, then you downplay the role of a major data providor for automotive.

You think Wall Street is just "out there" without tools and reports and analytics and CRM and that the best people bet on their gut?? Are you serious? Uncle Joe -- care to respond?

Honestly, maybe it's the translation thing, but I can't make any sense of what you just said.

 

[yagoparamo]

Yago - although you seem willing to pick apart specific points, let me just answer a few since we're headed into a holiday weekend. Anyone who invests in the stock market without doing some basic research is taking a huge risk. The reason not all investors make the same purchases, is they all have individual philosophies. But know that no smart, savvy investor with a long term record of success invests in anything without some research.

None of this will give you certainty, but it will give you better odds. I want the best odds possible on every purchase I make - backed up by my experience and knowledge, as well as hard data.

I want to shy away from assumptions (they are often incorrect). As an example you said Subaru WRXs are always in short supply. I did a dive into your market using a Redmond, WA Zip. It's just not the case. If I was looking to buy a 2009 Subaru Impreza or 2, it most likely wouldn't be a WRX. Here's why; There are currently 11 for sale in the market, but only 7 have sold in the last 45 days giving it a Market Days Supply of 71 days. Not bad at all BUT - the 2.5i might be a better choice to stock. There are 13 available but there have been 17 sold in the past 45 days giving it a Market Days Supply of only 34 days. Neither one is a poor choice but I want this data before I make a decision. These vehicles hit different price points and appeal to different buyers, but I'm convinced I'll make better decisions with the data than without it.

The last thing I want to do is get into a point-by-point argument with you, but feel free to give me a call anytime. I'd be happy to roll up my sleeves and dive into it with you.

Have a great Thanksgiving!

Ed,

I wasn't trying to pick apart the points to argue with you (it seems that every answer is either taken as a joke or an argument in this forum). I simply answered to your points without making a case for or against. Some of my answers seem irrelevant because the questions were irrelevant (no phun intended) as for example: We all know what cars sell best for the most part. Some of my answers were straight on behalf of vAuto's system: (you) How are my competitors pricing these vehicles? (me) Easy one to figure out with vAuto.

The reason to do that was to point out that there are answers to the car biz from the "old" car biz and that the new data comes from the same places the "old" data used to come.

So the truth of the matter is that the data was already there, that a lot of the data hasn't changed a lot and it will not change a lot (cars searched the most, where to buy cars, etc), and that the value of the and result is also dependent on the ability of the analist to understand the data.



As for my point on the WRX... that was just one of the 3 choices I provided. I did screw up but there are more than 17 in my market; there are 35+ AutoBase, Inc. - Used Vehicles
This database has a more precise inventory data for the Puget Sound than Autotrader and Cars.com.

 

[yagoparamo]

Yago -- your post seems absurd -- like you are arguing with yourself. On the one hand, you are saying the decision maker needs intuition first and foremost, but you say that decision makers should avail themselves of available market data, then you downplay the role of a major data providor for automotive.

You think Wall Street is just "out there" without tools and reports and analytics and CRM and that the best people bet on their gut?? Are you serious? Uncle Joe -- care to respond?

Honestly, maybe it's the translation thing, but I can't make any sense of what you just said.

I'm having a hard time expresing my thoughts on this one.

There is no answer as of go one way or the other, but a mix of things here. My argument I guess is that while vAuto has compiled a great deal of data and that it displays it in a great and useful manner there is a little bit more to the car biz than to reduce it to a probability number of what car to buy. So I'm just calling for people not to forget that and to still use and learn all the pieces of the process. Data alone will not do it.

 

[john.quinn]

There is no answer as of go one way or the other, but a mix of things here. My argument I guess is that while vAuto has compiled a great deal of data and that it displays it in a great and useful manner there is a little bit more to the car biz than to reduce it to a probability number of what car to buy. So I'm just calling for people not to forget that and to still use and learn all the pieces of the process. Data alone will not do it.

No one is saying that a 12-year old can read VAuto reports and then run the world's best Used Car operation. Of course you need experience, savvy, and intuition. But with the data available today, the BEST manager in the world would be remiss if he/she didn't avail themselves of available market intelligence. Conversely, what we too often see is the Used Car Manager who thinks they know it all already, and ignores the data.

 

[joe.pistell]

I'm having a hard time expresing my thoughts on this one.

There is no answer as of go one way or the other, but a mix of things here. My argument I guess is that while vAuto has compiled a great deal of data and that it displays it in a great and useful manner there is a little bit more to the car biz than to reduce it to a probability number of what car to buy. So I'm just calling for people not to forget that and to still use and learn all the pieces of the process. Data alone will not do it.

Really Yago? Really?

You write: "...I'm just calling for people not to forget that and to still use and learn all the pieces of the process. Data alone will not do it."

Yag, wake up! KNOW YOUR AUDIENCE. WTF! You're in DealerRefresh! Your reply has a "parent's tone" to it, yet, your preaching 3rd grade business principals.

To compound your "need to mother us all", you get overly complex and wordy. I understand you're a complex thinker, but your rush to post on topics you have experience in makes is giving you a poor reputation.

Dood, You've got to boil out all the NOISE in your posts and if you can't, DON'T POST.

LESS IS MORE.

 

[joe.pistell]

Here is Dale Pollack's entire business model, all wrapped up in a true story:


When I 1st met Dale 5 years ago, I was amazed by the parrallels of the book MoneyBall and vAuto and I suggested that he read the book. Dale laughed out loud and said he gave all of his investors a copy of the book! hahaha.

Yag, the used car buying process is just like baseball scouts looking for talent. An army of seasoned players, all arriving at conclusions from the seat of their pants.

The real challenge of vAuto isn't the data it produces, the real challenge is the THREAT that it places on the culture of our business... and NOTHING is harder to change than culture.

Dale Pollack, just like Billy Beane, are a once in a generation soul.


p.s. Yag, this post took me 45minutes to build.
Writing is easy. It's hard work to make it a short story.

 

[yagoparamo]

Really Yago? Really?

You write: "...I'm just calling for people not to forget that and to still use and learn all the pieces of the process. Data alone will not do it."

Yag, wake up! KNOW YOUR AUDIENCE. WTF! You're in DealerRefresh! Your reply has a "parent's tone" to it, yet, your preaching 3rd grade business principals.

To compound your "need to mother us all", you get overly complex and wordy. I understand you're a complex thinker, but your rush to post on topics you have experience in makes is giving you a poor reputation.

Dood, You've got to boil out all the NOISE in your posts and if you can't, DON'T POST.

LESS IS MORE.

You are correct, sometimes I think my audience are the dealers behind the scenes (people just like my clients that I personally see) and not just the few extra ordinary people like you, Quinn, Ed, etc. My answers and questions are usually focused as what would they need to know or what would they use if they knew. I tend to imagine that I own a dealership, I don't have a computer science degree, and try to angle things from there so I understand their needs.

I should have given some extra thought to this, but I was looking for answers against my dilema thru DR replies. I wasn't trying to provide an answer myself. My unfinished thought were looking for answers.

Now back to the questions at hand;

Again, with vAuto providing an excellent service and data, and the car biz being 5% people like DR and 95% people trying to learn and figure out things; I have had around 300 franchised dealers as clients for about 11 years. Many of them now use vAuto (a few use FL and a few still peeling bananas). I see everyone stocking the same vehicles they used to stock (because trade ins and what the auction has to sale is limited) as well as almost everyone keeps doing the same volume of sales that they used to do before vAuto came about.

So while vAuto has provided great wake up call as of what you should be looking at, I started to wonder if the failure of vAuto making a huge impact has been the managers for having a hard time using this data, or is it the biz that no matter what data you have you can only buy what comes at the auction lanes, etc.

vAuto is already built and I will bet that few major improvements will come in the next few years as it already offers all major data. The data that vAuto has was already around in the biz as I wrote a few blogs away in this thread. What are we missign for a better implementation for the 95% of the biz that is not a regular writter in DR?


PS: Sometimes my thoughts feel like this;

 

[ed.brooks]

...vAuto is already built and I will bet that few major improvements will come in the next few years as it already offers all major data. The data that vAuto has was already around in the biz as I wrote a few blogs away in this thread. What are we missign for a better implementation for the 95% of the biz that is not a regular writter in DR?

Thanksgiving. I feel like I have a lot to be thankful for today. I share some of these things with many of you: a great family, a job I love, good friends... and one thing that is probably unique to me. I'm thankful I waited most of the day before I wrote and posted this reply. Had I posted first thing in the morning, the response you're reading would have been much different.

First off, Yago, man I respect your passion. It shows in everything you write. I do fear that sometimes your passion leads you to post before you have all the facts. A few posts above, rather than argue point by point with you, I chose one as an example - the WRX you mentioned. It seems you had a passion to prove me wrong and did so by posting a link to an AutoBase inventory. You felt that the AutoBase database had a more precise inventory than Autotrader and Cars.com and by inference my company. We don't just look to those sources, our computers look at thousands of sources. In your haste, you failed to notice that I was speaking with some level of specificity - I was looking at 2009 vehicles only. The AutoBase database was for every year - only a few were '09s. This is a small point, but it is illustrative of a larger issue. After this response, I'm going to stop responding to you. There is nothing to be gained from one vendor questioning another endlessly. I've seen too many good threads (many that you've been on) disappear down a rabbit hole from that back and forth. So since I won't be replying to you or correcting misinformation, I ask that you please try to be factual and accurate in any future posts.

From your comments above, I think you're talking about our previous stocking tool. Provision was introduced on 11-11-11 and isn't an upgrade - it's a completely new way to look at stocking. Where you are completely correct is that our older stocking tool was under-utilized by dealers. There was a ton of good data, but it needed to be easier to understand and the tool needed to be easier to use. Some dealers made great use of the tool, but, I think, for many dealers it had too many steps, it perhaps wasn't intuitive enough and absolutely had room for improvement.

Over a year ago, we gained access to two powerful data streams - brand new information that has never been available before in the industry. So armed with triple the data previously available, Dale and the team started from scratch to develop a tool that answers 3 questions in 3 easy clicks: what to buy, what to pay, and where to find it. Multiple vehicles are suggested in every category and price point. All the suggestions are dealer-specific based on a dealer-developed Stocking Strategy. The exact auctions where these vehicles are available are a click away, complete with dates, lanes and run numbers. One more click and the dealer can have a proxy bid in place. We are very public with our innovations even with other vendors. I urge you to watch Dale's recorded webinar introducing Provision. That way, should you choose to continue discussing another vendor and their product, you'll at least be doing it armed with accurate information.

But Yago, I'd also urge you to move back to the original, non vendor-specific question of "is stocking a marketing decision". I'm convinced it is and it seems most of the community agrees. I'm not saying that every buyer and Used Car Manager should buy my product, but I do feel they should utilize as much data as they have available to them, to HELP with their decision making process, not replace it.

 

[joe.pistell]

So while vAuto has provided great wake up call as of what you should be looking at, I started to wonder if the failure of vAuto making a huge impact has been the managers for having a hard time using this data, or is it the biz that no matter what data you have you can only buy what comes at auction

Yag,

I answered your question, but, from your answer, i can see you didn't read my 45minute post to you! I wrote:

"The real challenge of vAuto isn't the data it produces, the real challenge is the THREAT that it places on the culture of our business... and NOTHING is harder to change than culture"

Re-read my post.
45 minutes I spent wording that reply for you and you IGNORE my insight...

 

[yagoparamo]

Yag,

I answered your question, but, from your answer, i can see you didn't read my 45minute post to you! I wrote:

"The real challenge of vAuto isn't the data it produces, the real challenge is the THREAT that it places on the culture of our business... and NOTHING is harder to change than culture"

Re-read my post.
45 minutes I spent wording that reply for you and you IGNORE my insight...

I read it and I think that in the end I come to the same or similar conclusion: the culture has to change to tahe full advantage of a system like vAuto.

Back to my original post to Ed, poorly expressed, but following that train of thought: we had already the data and we didn't use it, now we have the data and we still don't use it. Is it because we can't?------->read next line

The question that I have expressed and keeps getting missed and that perhaps you can answer from personal experience:

Due to the way the biz works; for example you need to buy 30 cars this week and even though you know what you should buy based on systems like vAuto you end up buying whatever is available?