Ford CEO Wants to Abolish the Dealership Experience as We Know It

[JEDI]

https://jalopnik.com/ford-ceo-wants-to-abolish-the-dealership-experience-as-1849007700

Jim Farley wants to sell Ford EVs online, getting rid of dealer inventory and turning existing dealerships into high-quality service centers.


didnt Tesla do this already years ago? (except high quality service centers)

 

[Torn Mind]

Carvana is a dying stock as well....

 

[IronWing]

Ford better get cracking on bribing state legislators then because the dealers have paid those folks handsomely to keep the franchise laws on the books.

 

[waffleironhead]

Lets dump the middle man dealership and move on. I was/am interested in getting a new car, and the two local toyota dealers are worthless. At this point id rather go to a website and just plunk in my order and have it delivered.
Would remove the hard sell of those extended warranties and other addons i have no need for.

 

[Zeze]

Hey man, this isn't buzzfeed. Your title is quite misleading. No dealership for EVs only.

 

[JEDI]

Carvana is a dying stock as well....

wonder why?
my neighbor used them and loved it for his new car

 

[JEDI]

Hey man, this isn't buzzfeed. Your title is quite misleading. No dealership for EVs only.

i just copy pasta the title from the article.
shrug

 

[BoomerD]

Hey man, this isn't buzzfeed. Your title is quite misleading. No dealership for EVs only.

It wouldn't surprise me to see it go this way for the rest of the lineup.

 

[JulesMaximus]

Good riddance. I hate car dealerships and domestic brand dealerships are the worst of the bunch.

 

[ch33zw1z]

Lets dump the middle man dealership and move on. I was/am interested in getting a new car, and the two local toyota dealers are worthless. At this point id rather go to a website and just plunk in my order and have it delivered.
Would remove the hard sell of those extended warranties and other addons i have no need for.

Ok, how’s the process go if something isn’t correct?

 

[lxskllr]

Stihl only sells saws through authorized dealers. They've gotten a little lax with it over the years, having some stores stock a cut down selection of homeowner stuff, but the real saws come from real dealers. It isn't a perfect system, but it helps ensure you'll have support after buying your stuff. Better than Husqvarna, where you're on your own as soon as you walk out the door after buying from some random bigbox store. It's not an apples-apples comparison, but a local dealer provides value. IOW, careful what you wish for. It could end up biting you in the ass.

 

[IronWing]

Stihl only sells saws through authorized dealers. They've gotten a little lax with it over the years, having some stores stock a cut down selection of homeowner stuff, but the real saws come from real dealers. It isn't a perfect system, but it helps ensure you'll have support after buying your stuff. Better than Husqvarna, where you're on your own as soon as you walk out the door after buying from some random bigbox store. It's not an apples-apples comparison, but a local dealer provides value. IOW, careful what you wish for. It could end up biting you in the ass.

Get rid of the franchise laws and let the market figure it out. The current system is crony capitalism.

 

[Greenman]

I hope Farley is successful.

 

[Red Squirrel]

Could be interesting. As long as the dealerships still stay around as service centres and maybe a place to go look at cars. When buying something that can cost many 10's of thousands I kind of want to go see it first. I also want a place to bring it for service. But if this is done right, it will be a good experience I think.

Just don't do like Tesla where they only have a few service centres down south and if you don't live in that area you're screwed. Or at very least respect the right to repair, and sell parts,so that 3rd party shops can fix it too. That's the only thing that does worry me about EVs is right to repair, since lot of them don't seem to really help you much if there is a battery fault, they want to replace the entire pack. They need to make them serviceable, just like you'd service an engine. You don't throw away the whole engine if one cylinder is misfiring.

 

[BoomerD]

I've bought several new cars (and trucks) over the years...and a multitude of used ones. Car salesmen are a bunch of whores. They'll lie to you to get your name on the contract, then deny ever saying whatever it was, (If it ain't in writhing, it never happened) and unless they're VERY good, they bounce from one dealership to the next. I only ever developed an actual "relationship" with one salesman at one dealership...and that was in the 70's.
The rest, I just treated like the whores they are...use them and walk away. Find a different one next time If there was anything I didn't like about them or the way they did business.
I couldn't care less if Ford goes to the all on-line sales model. I really only "depend" on their service departments...and if one tries to screw me over, I go to the next.

 

[Ajay]

I don’t hate dealerships and think they are helpful for certain post purchases follow up. Most car salesmen are just terrible.. it’s a battle of wits against time tested well rehearsed pitches. It completely sucked when I was younger and thought they were being mostly genuine. Fortunately, I learned their stupid tricks - but they still try to make you run the gauntlet. Last car we bought from a dealership with cash - they still insisted on sending us to the 'finance officer' for his sign-off where he tried to upswell us on pointless protection programs. It’s just a waste off time.

Still, if the car companies can sell cars online and find a way to provide good post purchase support - I’d be pretty chuffed. Only problem is having the opportunity for a test drive if no one I know owns the car I’m interested in.

 

[Torn Mind]

I don’t hate dealerships and think they are helpful for certain post purchases follow up. Most car salesmen are just terrible.. it’s a battle of wits against time tested well rehearsed pitches. It completely sucked when I was younger and thought they were being mostly genuine. Fortunately, I learned their stupid tricks - but they still try to make you run the gauntlet. Last car we bought from a dealership with cash - they still insisted on sending us to the 'finance officer' for his sign-off where he tried to upswell us on pointless protection programs. It’s just a waste off time.

Still, if the car companies can sell cars online and find a way to provide good post purchase support - I’d be pretty chuffed. Only problem is having the opportunity for a test drive if no one I know owns the car I’m interested in.

I think one vid I saw stated that one should go to finance first and then pay in cash to get a lower price.

 

[Brainonska511]

Could be interesting. As long as the dealerships still stay around as service centres and maybe a place to go look at cars. When buying something that can cost many 10's of thousands I kind of want to go see it first. I also want a place to bring it for service. But if this is done right, it will be a good experience I think.

Going to a dealership for service is a good way to get ripped off. The only reason I "want" to bring my vehicle to a dealership is for a warranty repair or a recall repair.

 

[BoomerD]

Going to a dealership for service is a good way to get ripped off. The only reason I "want" to bring my vehicle to a dealership is for a warranty repair or a recall repair.

I get the oil in my rigs changed at the dealership while they're under warranty, and yes, any needed warranty repairs.
We had a good independent shop that did my non-warranty work when we were in CA, but since we've moved here, everything has been done by the various dealers. (don't know of any indy that I'd trust)

 

[darkswordsman17]

Don't be fooled by this. They actually won't move to direct sales nearly as much as they're making it out to be. It'll end up much more like cell phones, where you'll be able to buy one all over (with the car being delivered directly to you but probably from a local fleet, so in many ways, it'll be like them making fleet sales consumer facing).

And I hope you people know the car industry is really planning on going into subscription models that will make cell phone plans seem almost sensible in comparison. The good news is that will probably mean the majority of each car will have most of the options. The bad news is the features will be restricted (sure the car might have dual motors and 500hp, but unless you pony up, its only gonna have single motor and probably 150hp). Several of the car companies have already started offering up guidance to investors that they expect subscriptions to bring in billions per year over what they're already making (which to me is troubling as it basically sounds like you're going to have to both pay for the package/tech, then pay subscription on top of it for it to even work).

Plus imagine all the car companies now being tasked with software. Which actually most likely means they'll partner with the major tech companies.

Which honestly, the overall subscription plan (where you just pay a monthly fee to a car company and then can choose different cars and change up every so often if you need to so if you need a minivan for a bit, you can get that, or if you're just single driving a commute you can have a smaller lighter more efficient car, or if you need a pickup, etc) I think makes more sense.

It will be interesting to see how that changes behavior. Will more people get cars since they no longer have to afford either a large payment or qualify for a loan, or will people realize they don't need cars as much and so just subscribe when they need it. I think it'll probably even out, some of each. But its going to radically alter major things, and it'll happen quicker than I think people realize.

 

[Spacehead]

And I hope you people know the car industry is really planning on going into subscription models that will make cell phone plans seem almost sensible in comparison.

Which honestly, the overall subscription plan (where you just pay a monthly fee to a car company and then can choose different cars and change up every so often if you need to so if you need a minivan for a bit, you can get that, or if you're just single driving a commute you can have a smaller lighter more efficient car, or if you need a pickup, etc) I think makes more sense.

How would that work with insurance, possibly changing cars/trucks several times a year?

Only problem is having the opportunity for a test drive if no one I know owns the car I’m interested in.

I think it would be odd to buy a car solely online & that's one of the reasons right there. Plus, i've never bought a new car either. Used cars online? What could possibly go wrong?

Luckily, since all the local shops that i liked around here have closed over the years i've been dealing with the dealership where i've bought my last couple cars & i like them a lot. Just had some warrenty work done, so just pay the small deductible. Need new tires... their prices are right in line with other tire shops. Needed some body work done... their prices are right in line with other body shops. I even have them change my oil as it's only about $10 more than if i do it myself & i don't have to find someone that will take used oil.

 

[AdamK47]

The traditional dealership model is very much unnecessary. They are more of a hinderance to the consumer. The world has evolved past where the sales side presence of a dealership is necessssary. The past year has proven them to be the roadblock between the car manufacturer and the consumer. Parasitic dealer markups and the general money siphoning games they play only enriches them.

 

[Zorba]

The traditional dealership model is very much unnecessary. They are more of a hinderance to the consumer. The world has evolved past where the sales side presence of a dealership is necessssary. The past year has proven them to be the roadblock between the car manufacturer and the consumer. Parasitic dealer markups and the general money siphoning games they play only enriches them.

Not just with cars either. Last year I bought a new Wave Runner. I ended up talking to about 20 different dealerships trying to get one. It's amazing how many would straight lie and then nearly all of them were slapping $1000-2000 "paperwork" fees on them and charging $1800 for a $900 trailer. Luckily I finally found one that had no extra markups and didn't lie about availability.

The honest dealerships would tell you exactly how delivery worked, which was they had a list of units and delivery months from Yamaha for the entire model year. The dates could slip, but no way they were coming earlier. The dishonest ones were like "Yeah, you'll probably get it by summer, but there is no way of really knowing when Yamaha will ship." I.e. they had delivery slots in August and were just going to lie to you until it came in.

 

[Red Squirrel]

Going to a dealership for service is a good way to get ripped off. The only reason I "want" to bring my vehicle to a dealership is for a warranty repair or a recall repair.

For EVs it may be the only option though. They don't really sell parts to 3rd parties or offer much as far as any kind of help, especially with battery pack issues. Some garages may simply refuse to work on them either way. That is one downside I do see with EVs, it's not strictly an EV issue but the manufacturers themselves. Also when buying new it's better to get it repaired at the dealership anyway since it's usually free for a while depending on what the issue is.

 

[Brainonska511]

For EVs it may be the only option though. They don't really sell parts to 3rd parties or offer much as far as any kind of help, especially with battery pack issues. Some garages may simply refuse to work on them either way. That is one downside I do see with EVs, it's not strictly an EV issue but the manufacturers themselves.

That's why it is important to support right to repair laws.

And as EVs get more widely adopted, more independent shops will learn how to support them, so I don't think you have much to worry on that front.

Also when buying new it's better to get it repaired at the dealership anyway since it's usually free for a while depending on what the issue is.

Depends on what the issue is. It may be free if it is covered under a warranty or if you paid for some upfront service package, but if it's not, you'll be paying out the nose.