Hammer Time: Y Tu Mama Tambien

by Steven Lang

Updated: May 16th, 2014 Published: April 17th, 2009

Nothing can truly open your eyes to the futility of a declining industry than a free market. In this respect, automotive retailing is really getting what it deserves. You literally now have tens of thousands of people wasting their lives away at dealerships. The parts guys waiting for the Pavlovian phones to ring. The service folk trying to serve the dual masters of near-term revenue and immediate customer service. And of course you have sales people. From the professional and decent to the human train wrecks. These folks are there to lubricate the American economy with everything from brilliance to bullshit. Is all of this “people power” smart?Nein. Nyet. And Hell No! It’s a waste of human intellect. We are living in an era where we literally piss away millions of good minds on the parasitic and pointless. Of course, various levels of government bureaucrats and politicians serve the same exact effect on our society . . . as they do everywhere else. But the idiocy of hawking and hocking cars in the United States is truly unique.We offer guarantees to crooks that are allowed to operate for decades with absolute impunity. Really. The courts protect them. The politicians protect them. And the stupid consumers protect them. Just type in the phrases “Bill Heard” or “Title Pawn” on Google and the reptilian elements of our society will slither onward to your screen with tongues a flickin’. But then there’s the flip side.We have dealers and other stakeholders that work their vital organs off. I literally had an employee from a BMW dealership come to my home and fix a defective shift handle for nothing. Nearby me there was a Volvo dealership that was so helpful that I would almost always buy parts from them. Even if it cost less elsewhere. They both earned my business and my referrals.Finally, there was that Toyota that I had for 12 years and 235k+ miles that didn’t give me a lick of trouble . . . no thanks to the local dealership. Those dealerships are dead with the exception of the bowel-laden Toyota joint. It’s really a shame. The customers and employees deserve better. As the modern day philosopher Ron Simmons would say, “Damn!”

Steven Lang

More by Steven Lang

Comments

Join the conversation

2 of 26 comments

Dwford on Apr 18, 2009

@tced2: "The cheap, cheap, cheap crowd just want stuff cheap to the detriment of reasonable service. It takes a dealership people to deliver service. Yes the product needs to be good but the service needs to be there." Exactly!! @NulloModo: A good dealership and salesperson can be a big help to most customers, as they really don’t know what they need, just what they need or want to be able to do. So true.. As for why we have this system of franchise dealers vs a factory direct option: There are many industries that have built up their current business models through anti-competitive legislation. Everyone has a vested interest in their particular industry, and lobby the government for protection. look at real estate agents, look at the insurance industry, look at unions. It sucks that we are stuck with so many archaic rules and regulations that make things unnecessarily complicated and expensive, but good luck undoing them.

Like Reply
Anonymous on Apr 19, 2009

"Take my local BMW dealer. They make very little off of the sale of new vehicles." Really? Do you have first hand knowledge of their actual gross profit per unit retailed? If they are even an average BMW retailer they are making a few sheckles on new car sales. And they are entitled as well...

Like Reply

Recent Comments

Jkross22 Their bet to just buy an existing platform from GM rather than build it from the ground up seems like a smart move. Building an infrastructure for EVs at this point doesn't seem like a wise choice. Perhaps they'll slow walk the development hoping that the tides change over the next 5 years. They'll probably need a longer time horizon than that.
Lou_BC Hard pass
TheEndlessEnigma These cars were bought and hooned. This is a bomb waiting to go off in an owner's driveway.
Kwik_Shift_Pro4X Thankfully I don't have to deal with GDI issues in my Frontier. These cleaners should do well for me if I win.
Theflyersfan Serious answer time...Honda used to stand for excellence in auto engineering. Their first main claim to fame was the CVCC (we don't need a catalytic converter!) engine and it sent from there. Their suspensions, their VTEC engines, slick manual transmissions, even a stowing minivan seat, all theirs. But I think they've been coasting a bit lately. Yes, the Civic Type-R has a powerful small engine, but the Honda of old would have found a way to get more revs out of it and make it feel like an i-VTEC engine of old instead of any old turbo engine that can be found in a multitude of performance small cars. Their 1.5L turbo-4...well...have they ever figured out the oil dilution problems? Very un-Honda-like. Paint issues that still linger. Cheaper feeling interior trim. All things that fly in the face of what Honda once was. The only thing that they seem to have kept have been the sales staff that treat you with utter contempt for daring to walk into their inner sanctum and wanting a deal on something that isn't a bare-bones CR-V. So Honda, beat the rest of your Japanese and Korean rivals, and plug-in hybridize everything. If you want a relatively (in an engineering way) easy way to get ahead of the curve, raise the CAFE score, and have a major point to advertise, and be able to sell to those who can't plug in easily, sell them on something that will get, for example, 35% better mileage, plug in when you get a chance, and drives like a Honda. Bring back some of the engineering skills that Honda once stood for. And then start introducing a portfolio of EVs once people are more comfortable with the idea of plugging in. People seeing that they can easily use an EV for their daily errands with the gas engine never starting will eventually sell them on a future EV because that range anxiety will be lessened. The all EV leap is still a bridge too far, especially as recent sales numbers have shown. Baby steps. That's how you win people over.