Over the more than 40 years in the business, I was involved with some really good sales organizations. Our competitors said our success came from giving cars away while the manufacturers complained that we would sell even more cars if we didn't hold so much gross.
In their darkest hour, Lee Iacocca was responsible for turning Chrysler around, He said, "The future of Chrysler will be determined at point of sale". Chrysler wasn't going to survive due to what happened in their board room or their production line but on the dealership sales floor.
What I'm seeing are dealerships chasing F&I profits and factory volume bonuses at the expense of ANY gross. That isn't a sales organization but a brothel. Walk-around-presentations are non existent and even demo drives seem gratuitous. The store I'm thinking about is profitable and are the volume dealer in a large market. So, WTF do I know? A good friend is just waiting to retire. In less than four years he'll be off like a prom dress. He hates what the business has become but says, "It's like that everywhere". He has been in several stores since he worked for me.
When I was active on DealerRefresh, I talked about guys that sold 30 cars a month and how challenging it was to manage them. People told me they would rather have three that sold ten. This led to some rather heated exchanges. When the recession hits, those ten unit guys will be gone. They aren't making any money now and surely won't then. I'm still a champion of talented sales professionals.
Chris, I agree there will be a dramatic change. The market is still decent and anyone can whore out cars. I don't think many have the talent.
Alex, I'm sure the groups will still be around and they might even become somewhat of a monopoly.