Experience is the Only Product the Customers Care About

Experience is the Only Product the Customers Care About

The New York Times recently had an article about retail pricing. The main thrust of the article was about how today's consumers think and the information available to them to make a decision. Dale Pollak in his Velocity 2.0 blog talks about the same thing. I can relate better to Dale's blog because I have been involved in the automobile industry for 30 years. The experience is the product we deliver and the only thing our customers care about. When I was a retailer, people would often ask, "What did you pay for this car?" My initial reaction was , "None of your business!" I soon learned that was the wrong reaction. The customer was trying to justify value. Value is what it's always about. Nobody ever argues that a Cadillac has more value than a Corolla, but there are a lot more Corollas on the road than Cadillacs. That indicates when it's time to write the check, more people will buy … [Read more...]

Why Don’t Dealer-Owned Vehicles Depreciate?

Dale Pollak | vAuto

by dpollak | Velocity 2.0 “It’s depreciation,” a sales manager might say when offering the customer less for a trade-in than he/she had hoped to get. Curiously, dealers aren’t quite as honest with themselves about the depreciation of their used vehicle inventories. Some dealers may write down and recognize the inventory value depreciation on a monthly or quarterly basis, but most dealers avoid the exercise altogether. These dealers seem to believe, like their customers, that depreciation affects the other guy, not themselves. The problem, of course, is that this thinking can lead dealers to believe their used vehicle departments are performing just fine, when they may well be missing the mark. Here’s what I mean: Suppose we have two stores with $1 million in inventory. Each brings a 10 percent return on the investment per month, or $300,000 after three months. The … [Read more...]