I listened to this podcast the other day and it was one of the more compelling This American Life episodes I've listened to recently. I say that as a pretty big fan of TAL.
They spend the episode interviewing car salespeople and managers at one particular dealership over the course of a week (IIRC), where the salespeople are trying to rack up a certain number of sales to qualify for a bonus payout that means the difference between being in the red vs being in the black. They clear up some myths about car sales and generally get to the heart of what it's like to be a salesperson.
The things that were interesting to me were the various mindsets and tactics the salespeople use to sell a car, especially when they're desperate. The way the salespeople negotiate between two different parties – on one side with the customer, on the other side with their manager – was also something I hadn't thought about.
That's about the gist of it: a week in sales during a somewhat desperate situation from a car dealership's perspective. As a semi-regular podcast listener who really likes TAL but feels like they have some hits and some misses, this one is definitely a hit.
"The way the salespeople negotiate between two different parties – on one side with the customer, on the other side with their manager"
This is what really struck at me. I was really surprise at how isolated a car sales guy is, even within the same dealership. It truly is every guy for themselves.
> I listened to this podcast the other day and it was one of the more compelling This American Life episodes I've listened to recently.
Agree. Rarely have I felt so riveted to what was going on. I attribute it to the pace and the chronology. Unlike many TAL shows which are told in retrospect and/or are multi-parters, this one is a single storyline with the actors right there, on air, dealing with the conflict and resolution before our ears.
A quite enjoyable and interesting piece by TAL. One aspect that I found interesting is that Manny, the guy inspired by Sun Tzu and without much inherent interest in the cars themselves, actually fared poorly in sales [1].
This sort of salesman is exactly the sort of person I always want to avoid when I am looking at purchasing something, so I am glad to see his techniques were not all that effective.
Overall, the piece doesn't paint the dealership model in a very positive light. While it makes one sympathetic to some of the individual salesmen (at least, to some extent), it also largely reinforces many peoples' assumptions that, mostly, they are prey when they arrive at a dealership, unless they know what they are doing (or, if they happen to arrive at the end of the month during a poor sales month and happen to be slightly stubborn).
A related note: I'd love to see more car sales go the way of Tesla and Saturn [2] (yes, Saturn), where pricing is much more transparent/fixed. Basically, I find the current dealership model's incentives to be largely mismatched to the actual needs of consumers.
> Basically, I find the current dealership model's incentives to be largely mismatched to the actual needs of consumers.
Agreed... the current negotiation model seems guaranteed to ensure that the customer walks away feeling screwed. If you buy, there's always that lingering worry that there was money left on the table.
That was so intense... I was stressed from the very beginning.
There's a lot to be said for a stable paycheck.
Personally, I only buy used cars and pay cash. But if I didn't, I know that I'd be buying my car at the end of the month...
If you listen to this, don't forget to to look at the photo gallery. I waited till after I'd finished listening to look at it, I think that worked out well.
This episode was definitely very well done. Made me think about how Tesla is subverting the traditional dealership model by opening up their own salesrooms, despite strong opposition from these dealers. I wonder who will prevail in a world where price comparisons are instantly done over the internet. The podcast even highlights the fact that profit margins have been squeezed because of this.
My Dad has sold cars for as long as I've known him. He was a top salesmaster for GM for several years in Canada.
The interesting thing I found each this podcast is how consistent it was with the stories he'd tell us over dinner. We always thought he was just having a tough time with poor management, but it seems that he's not alone. Since moving to fleet many years ago, the dealer would often sell cars at a loss so they could not only hit numbers to be ranked #1, but also for the incentives from the manufacturer.
One thing the show left out is the unbelievable amount of paperwork involved in quoting someone an accurate price. Also, the amazing shuffling of cars that goes on between dealers. With certain models only being built for a short period of time, the custom orders take hours and hours of hunting and pecking. On the consumer side it feels like I ask for a bunch of stuff for my car and a week later it shows up as expected.
As others have noted, this is an industry primed for a major disruption. The tools most car salesman use on a daily basis haven't really progressed since they left typewriters.
The other major struggle for the industry is that a lot of salesmen have been salesmen their whole lives and don't want to retire. Thus, there's an office full of 70 to 80 year old hanging around while the other half runs ragged to make a few hundred bucks.
Car salesmen can be interesting people if you get them to drop their guard a bit and chat. A surprising number of them are simply transiting through car sales to make ends meet between their main career. In a rough economy, car sales is almost always a way to get a short-term job.
Of course the negotiation part is annoying and time-wasting. I suppose for every person that gets a good deal, 10 get a bad one and that's why it lasts. It's also one of the reasons why CarMax and Costco Auto are extremely popular even if the price you pay isn't necessarily the best possible you can negotiate. Buying a new car can literally take an entire day, and not dealing with the negotiation bullshit can save hours off of the purchase experience.
Also, negotiations don't end with the salesman, you can negotiate quite a bit during financing. You can usually get a lower rate if you buy all sorts of warranties and other cancelable agreements. Then go home and cancel those agreements immediately (it's not easy, they make it very hard to figure out how to do it). Over the lifetime of the car loan it can save you thousands of dollars in interest payments.
I grew up around (mostly large, high volume) car dealerships. Dad was a mechanic and was friends with the sales folks. Car sales people come in two flavors, the career guys. These are the guys that know cars and what gets people to buy them. They make good money(knew one guy that was over 300k/yr, he was an extremely rare dude.). This is the vast majority of the guys you'll see in large dealerships now days. The sales person competition has simply weeded out the less than stellar sales people, dealers can't afford to have them around the sales floor.
The second is the transients you're talking about that just move through dealerships because they think it's quick money. Now days these guys are mostly at the buy-here-pay-here places and lower end dealers.
As for negotiation....it's just not like it used to be. Used to be the sales guy could get you a ton off and various other perks like warranties and detail jobs and shit. Now days the sales guy can do some of that, but in the end the big saving for consumers is in the financing office. If you're willing to spend the time you can save big big money by working with/against the financing agent. Note; paying cash is almost always a bad idea when buying a car. The rebates banks offer are HUGE and you're not going to get them by paying cash.
Certainly. One simple example would be a teacher who wanted to share an excerpt with her classroom. Listening to the standard bleeped version on the radio and then accidentally sharing a version with profanity to the students could cause a lot of trouble.
I bought a car recently and I can tell you if I've gone through all that paperwork and haggling, I want my car that night. There's no way I'm waiting until the next day to get my car just so some dealership can get a head start on its quota.
When you go to your sales team and the new goal is 7 rather than 9, morale gets a boost and you try a bit harder to sell those cars. The goal is closer and within reach.
It humanizes car dealers and translates their specific life lessons into generalized experiences the listener can internalize.
It discusses the life of a a Chrysler/Dodge/Jeep new and used sales shop through shadowed interviews of almost the entire staff. It discusses the lives and approach to work of the sales managers and many of the sales people, as well as the struggles and realities of how much a dealership actually makes, the pressures from the manufacturers, and how hard they work to both provide a fair price to customers and a life for their families.
This sounds awesome, but I cannot for the life of me understand why the Podcast feed for This American Life only contains one goddamn entry. Who uses this shit? What is the point of a podcast if I can't download it in my podcast software of choice on my home Wi-Fi network and listen to it at my leisure?
Am I missing something with a typical podcast workflow? Because this makes zero sense.
Buy their app and you can stream any episode whenever you want.
My podcast client fetches new episodes as they become available in the feed and then stores them for me to play whenever I like.
Your response is overly harsh. Consider there are political and financial challenges they might be dealing with as a non-profit that don't allow them to be as accommodating as you demand.
[+] [-] johnthedebs|12 years ago|reply
They spend the episode interviewing car salespeople and managers at one particular dealership over the course of a week (IIRC), where the salespeople are trying to rack up a certain number of sales to qualify for a bonus payout that means the difference between being in the red vs being in the black. They clear up some myths about car sales and generally get to the heart of what it's like to be a salesperson.
The things that were interesting to me were the various mindsets and tactics the salespeople use to sell a car, especially when they're desperate. The way the salespeople negotiate between two different parties – on one side with the customer, on the other side with their manager – was also something I hadn't thought about.
That's about the gist of it: a week in sales during a somewhat desperate situation from a car dealership's perspective. As a semi-regular podcast listener who really likes TAL but feels like they have some hits and some misses, this one is definitely a hit.
[+] [-] yitchelle|12 years ago|reply
This is what really struck at me. I was really surprise at how isolated a car sales guy is, even within the same dealership. It truly is every guy for themselves.
Is this situation ripe for a disruption?
[+] [-] hoprocker|12 years ago|reply
Agree. Rarely have I felt so riveted to what was going on. I attribute it to the pace and the chronology. Unlike many TAL shows which are told in retrospect and/or are multi-parters, this one is a single storyline with the actors right there, on air, dealing with the conflict and resolution before our ears.
[+] [-] rjtavares|12 years ago|reply
I think it was a month (129 was their monthly quota). But the amazing stuff comes from the last couple of days. Damn, that was tense...
[+] [-] rallison|12 years ago|reply
This sort of salesman is exactly the sort of person I always want to avoid when I am looking at purchasing something, so I am glad to see his techniques were not all that effective.
Overall, the piece doesn't paint the dealership model in a very positive light. While it makes one sympathetic to some of the individual salesmen (at least, to some extent), it also largely reinforces many peoples' assumptions that, mostly, they are prey when they arrive at a dealership, unless they know what they are doing (or, if they happen to arrive at the end of the month during a poor sales month and happen to be slightly stubborn).
A related note: I'd love to see more car sales go the way of Tesla and Saturn [2] (yes, Saturn), where pricing is much more transparent/fixed. Basically, I find the current dealership model's incentives to be largely mismatched to the actual needs of consumers.
[1] (~10 cars per month) http://www.thisamericanlife.org/at-the-car-lot/
[2] http://knowledge.wharton.upenn.edu/article/saturn-a-wealth-o...
[+] [-] mschaef|12 years ago|reply
Agreed... the current negotiation model seems guaranteed to ensure that the customer walks away feeling screwed. If you buy, there's always that lingering worry that there was money left on the table.
[+] [-] rosser|12 years ago|reply
[+] [-] larrydag|12 years ago|reply
[+] [-] snorkel|12 years ago|reply
[+] [-] canadev|12 years ago|reply
There's a lot to be said for a stable paycheck.
Personally, I only buy used cars and pay cash. But if I didn't, I know that I'd be buying my car at the end of the month...
If you listen to this, don't forget to to look at the photo gallery. I waited till after I'd finished listening to look at it, I think that worked out well.
[+] [-] anonu|12 years ago|reply
[+] [-] stevewillows|12 years ago|reply
The interesting thing I found each this podcast is how consistent it was with the stories he'd tell us over dinner. We always thought he was just having a tough time with poor management, but it seems that he's not alone. Since moving to fleet many years ago, the dealer would often sell cars at a loss so they could not only hit numbers to be ranked #1, but also for the incentives from the manufacturer.
One thing the show left out is the unbelievable amount of paperwork involved in quoting someone an accurate price. Also, the amazing shuffling of cars that goes on between dealers. With certain models only being built for a short period of time, the custom orders take hours and hours of hunting and pecking. On the consumer side it feels like I ask for a bunch of stuff for my car and a week later it shows up as expected.
As others have noted, this is an industry primed for a major disruption. The tools most car salesman use on a daily basis haven't really progressed since they left typewriters.
The other major struggle for the industry is that a lot of salesmen have been salesmen their whole lives and don't want to retire. Thus, there's an office full of 70 to 80 year old hanging around while the other half runs ragged to make a few hundred bucks.
[+] [-] Maven911|12 years ago|reply
[+] [-] bane|12 years ago|reply
Of course the negotiation part is annoying and time-wasting. I suppose for every person that gets a good deal, 10 get a bad one and that's why it lasts. It's also one of the reasons why CarMax and Costco Auto are extremely popular even if the price you pay isn't necessarily the best possible you can negotiate. Buying a new car can literally take an entire day, and not dealing with the negotiation bullshit can save hours off of the purchase experience.
Also, negotiations don't end with the salesman, you can negotiate quite a bit during financing. You can usually get a lower rate if you buy all sorts of warranties and other cancelable agreements. Then go home and cancel those agreements immediately (it's not easy, they make it very hard to figure out how to do it). Over the lifetime of the car loan it can save you thousands of dollars in interest payments.
[+] [-] mitchell_h|12 years ago|reply
The second is the transients you're talking about that just move through dealerships because they think it's quick money. Now days these guys are mostly at the buy-here-pay-here places and lower end dealers.
As for negotiation....it's just not like it used to be. Used to be the sales guy could get you a ton off and various other perks like warranties and detail jobs and shit. Now days the sales guy can do some of that, but in the end the big saving for consumers is in the financing office. If you're willing to spend the time you can save big big money by working with/against the financing agent. Note; paying cash is almost always a bad idea when buying a car. The rebates banks offer are HUGE and you're not going to get them by paying cash.
[+] [-] rokhayakebe|12 years ago|reply
HIM: $13,999
ME: $9,500
HIM: Oh no no no no.(click click click - on his computer). Ok ok, this is what I can do for you $13,499. I take blah blah
.... 5 minutes later ...
HIM: Ok $10,000 and that is my final.
ME: $9,500.
In the end I didn't buy it. It's just amazing how we shaved $4000 off in less than 5 minutes. This industry needs to be regulated.
[+] [-] fsckin|12 years ago|reply
[+] [-] bicknergseng|12 years ago|reply
Ask Tesla how that's going for them.
[+] [-] sejje|12 years ago|reply
Maybe you took all his play out of it, and he really needed the $500 to make the deal.
[+] [-] unknown|12 years ago|reply
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[+] [-] Aardwolf|12 years ago|reply
Are there really people who care?
[+] [-] harpastum|12 years ago|reply
[+] [-] aganders3|12 years ago|reply
[+] [-] unknown|12 years ago|reply
[deleted]
[+] [-] peterjancelis|12 years ago|reply
2. Why didn't they push delivery of the 130th vehicle to the 1st of next month?
[+] [-] dangson|12 years ago|reply
[+] [-] jap|12 years ago|reply
[+] [-] giarc|12 years ago|reply
[+] [-] yread|12 years ago|reply
[+] [-] mattlutze|12 years ago|reply
It discusses the life of a a Chrysler/Dodge/Jeep new and used sales shop through shadowed interviews of almost the entire staff. It discusses the lives and approach to work of the sales managers and many of the sales people, as well as the struggles and realities of how much a dealership actually makes, the pressures from the manufacturers, and how hard they work to both provide a fair price to customers and a life for their families.
[+] [-] AVTizzle|12 years ago|reply
https://twitter.com/patio11/status/418879954894340096
[+] [-] jpswade|12 years ago|reply
[+] [-] Maven911|12 years ago|reply
[+] [-] natural219|12 years ago|reply
Am I missing something with a typical podcast workflow? Because this makes zero sense.
[+] [-] johns|12 years ago|reply
My podcast client fetches new episodes as they become available in the feed and then stores them for me to play whenever I like.
Your response is overly harsh. Consider there are political and financial challenges they might be dealing with as a non-profit that don't allow them to be as accommodating as you demand.
[+] [-] ientropic|12 years ago|reply
[+] [-] lazyant|12 years ago|reply
[+] [-] o0-0o|12 years ago|reply
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