Car Salesmen

[DickyC]

At the end of a recent roller coaster thread regarding a car for sale in the Classifieds section, PhilT, aka The Calm Voice of Reason, replied to suggestions that Classifieds should be Read Only.

Phil said, "As far as "read only" is concerned, I think "virtual tyre kickers" have a benefit and therefore it seems reasonable for people to post relevant questions regarding the item(s) on offer. Anybody who's had their car priced by a dealer will know that this is tame in comparison."

This reminded me of an experience at the Mercedes main dealer when I had the opportunity to buy my wife an SLK. The Audi stayed at home and we went in the "Station Car," a 16V Golf I didn't mind too much about. The salesman didn't have the colour the Countess wanted but he pressed on regardless. When we got to the trade-in part of the transaction I told him he wouldn't be interested. "Let's have a look anyway," he said, "I need a fag." Nice. He hardly looked at the car while having his cigarette but eventually gave his verdict. "I'll give you fifty quid for it, but I have to say we'll drive it straight to the breakers."

When he found out on the Monday that we'd bought a car the desired colour from another garage in the group he rang me and delivered a lengthy bolleaux-king.

Nothing to do with me, but he didn't work there much longer. And I can't imagine why.

[david7m]

Why did you get a bolleaux-king? Surely it was his fault for being a foreskin? I had the same issue when I was looking for my S3. I was only 22 and no one took me serious, even going with my brother in his Z3 (about 6 years ago). Had great pleasure in going back to the Wolverhampton Audi branch to see if the idiot salesman could see me

Dave

[DickyC]

Why did you get a bolleaux-king? Surely it was his fault for being a foreskin?

Absolutely.

He was upset with me for not buying from him, completely unaware that he had driven us away.

Farzands of years ago I had enough to buy a new MG Metro but hankered after an XR3 so en route to the Austin Rover garage, pockets bulging with money, I thought I'd just pop into Ford and see if the nice people there could persaude me I could afford one.

There was one salesman on duty and he was busy at his desk so I prowled around an XR3 on a raised plinthe, y'know, reading the badge and counting the wheels. Eventually, as he showed no interest in me at all, I went and stood in front of his desk. After a while he deigned to look up. "Yes?" he said. "The XR3," I said, "I see it has different wheels."

"Look," he said, "if you want the alloys they're extra. Okay?" and went back to his paperwork.

I was very pleased with the Metro and had three, one after the other. Then a 205GTI and then on to hot VWs and Audis and didn't look back. Not one Ford.

[tartan_rob]

I had a similair occasion last new year. I turned up at BMW in the RS4 with a mate who had an E46 M3 and wanted a look over the new one. We were there in jeans and t-shirt etc and a salesman asked us what car we had, I said an RS4 and he actually said "oh okay, whatever". Then told us there was no M3 available for us to look at. I was pissed but half expected it so we wandered over to the used showroom and my mate noticed him taking a look around the car park. Well he spotted the RS4 hidden in a dimely lit corner and came into the used showroom, duly informing us that he had managed to source an M3 that would be with him in 30mins, if I gave him the keys to the RS4 he would check over it and give us a price. <My mate replied with a polite "no thanks" and said he would from another BMW dealer.

The salesman was gutted. I left them some nice black marks on their forecourt for their trouble.

We went straight from that to Ferrari and cruised around the car park, a salesman man came out and we said to one another, "here we go!". He simply said to us, if there is anything you fancy I'll be inside, come and grab and I'll get you a coffee or something.

[PhilT]

PhilT, aka The Calm Voice of Reason

LOL - Thanks.

Surely it was his fault for being a foreskin

Now that did make me laugh!!

:back_on_topic:

I've had a relatively slow car ownership history... It all started with a 1.3 Escort, then a 24v Senator (ex-police), then Audi:

S2 - I'll have been about 25 at the time and saw a lovely example at my local Audi dealership. Finalising all the documentation there seemed to be a problem with me paying by banker draft. The salesman turned round to me and said there was a delay and it was to be expected with a person my age and with that sum of cash. I simply replied that if it was a problem, then give it back and I'll rip it up. Things went a little smoother from then on.

RS4 - Having "wasted" a vast sum of money on the S2 trying to make it an RS2 Coupe, I realised that next time I should just by an RS and be done with it. It took an age to sell the S2, and Doug (pre-MRC) bought it. Anyhoo.... Back to the RS4. I walked into a dealership and simply stated I wanted an RS4, the sales guy looked at me (scruffy youth) and said "None left". Not wanting to be defeated, I suggested a £10k deposit. 2 days later they "found" the car and 2 weeks later it arrived from Germany.

I've never been good at selling my cars because I guess I'm too honest. I like to tell people exactly what is right and wrong with the item. This usually ends up with the final value taking a beating.

[Mike159]

I went to the porsche garage in leeds a while back. I had a rover 200 the mg shape with a turbo engine in that I was using as a track car and a bit of a general laugh. 300bhp in a stripped out rover is a lot of fun. And if the worst happens and it ends in a ditch who cares. Anyway back to the point. I happened to be out in it that afternoon and went to pick up some bits for my dads 911rs. I pulled up pretty near the door and being 21 and in my rover the salesman was straight outside. "Can I help" in his snotty voice. No thanks I replied and walked straight round to the parts desk.

[philipwalker]

Slightly amusing one.

Was visiting my local Audi Centre a week or so back and chatting drinking tea with the sales manager with the view to underwrite some part exchanges.

A call came through to the sales manager I was with, from the MD asking why that “mechanicâ€

[BigMo]

had a run in at a Lotus dealership a while back. Turned up in the Aygo to look at buying a used Elise for track purposes. "Afraid these car's are a beast to handle and very fast" said the sales person and left it at that without a word of goodbye. Following day I turned up in the RS6 with the Countess. The same sales person was very apologetic by which then I had lost interest.

[BigMo]

another instance, but not related to cars. Wearing ripped jeans, all stars, slightly scuffy t and camp jacket proceeded to go to my local Watches of Switzerland with the view to buying a Chanel J12 for the considerable other. As with these places one has to ring the door bell before going in. I did so only to be ignored by a suited salesman standing inside the locked front door. I therefore rang the bell again, the salesguy rolled his eyes and opened the door asking me of my intentions. I explained I wanted to look at a watch displayed in the window. He let me in but asked a male and female staff to stand either side of me whilst I looked at the watch (to which they were hesitant to give to me in the first place). All of a sudden my Brietling Crosswind appears from under my sleeve whilst reaching out to look at the Chanel. Needless to say the coffee and chocolate fingers that followed were delicious.

[DickyC]

It shouldn't be like this though, should it?

My poor bro' found the 1970-ish Lotus Elan in Gold Leaf colours he had always wanted in a classic car mag for sale at a poncy dealership in the sticks and, gawd help me, had to ring for an appointment. Considering the type of car, it's year and so on, Pete, ever the enthusiast, went down on the Saturday in his completely original 1969 Cooper 'S'.

They took one look at him and decided the guy in the old Mini wasn't for them and said he couldn't test drive the Elan because it might rain. Yes, it might have rained - in about a week's time. So he went away and took his Banker's Draft for the full amount with him. He wasn't even going to try and haggle.

Did he do a Julia Roberts and go back and rub their faces in it? No, he didn't. But he's a better man than I am.

[david7m]

Its all wrong how they judge you by what car you arrive in, or the clothes we are wearing! But, I can kinda see where they are coming from when none genuine people turn up. Still not right though!

Dave

[PaulF]

Its all wrong how they judge you by what car you arrive in, or the clothes we are wearing! But, I can kinda see where they are coming from when none genuine people turn up. Still not right though!

Dave

Peoples typical misconception is that being wealthy makes you a decent person. Money, prestige, power are outward trappings of what society identifies as success, very superficial.

[Spunbigendbearing]

Well;in my country they are about the same:

Before i bought my RS4(B5),i had a look at an M5 (E39) with low milage/full history and mint at a Mercedes-outlet.
I drove a low milage mint Lancer EVO V RS LHD(very rare over here)and wanted to trade it in,if the testdrive in the M5 had a positive outcome.
Well,the guy never heard of the EVO ,but offered me a (according to him) generous 7500 Euro's for a '98 car...
Needless to say,i walked away.

Then i contacted the EVO-specialist who maintained my EVO and also trades in performance-cars of other marks and i knew he had a few RS4's before,so i asked him to find a mint low milage RS4 with history.
After months of searching(many dodgy ones out there!),he found the great car i am driving today and offered me 20 K Euro's for the EVO as a trade in!
And guess what;the EVO was sold within a week after he put it on his site.

[Rilla]

I have to say i have never encountered any of these problems when looking for cars to buy. Im not really scruffy, more unkempt lol and 30 years old. of course turning up in my old S class merc probably helped :p
I got a million test drives in all manner of cars, from cls 63 amg's (very very very very nice, but best part of 90k with extras), range rover supercharged ( big, slow, thirsty, slow, big and slow), a porsche 911 gt3 (again very fast but felt a total prick driving it) and a ferrari 360 spider (same as porsche really, but red and bits fell off). Did i have any intention of buying any of these cars???, none what so ever, knew i wanted an RS6 and was just waiting for 1 to turn up.
Best part is they are all far to trusting here and most of the cars i got to 'test drive' over the whole weekend (ferrari excluded, only 2 hours in that, un-accompanied tho).
Was most enjoyable, apart from range rover weekend which was just bloody expensive in fuel, and gave me sea sickness on bendy bits. I think the trick to car sales men is to go in not give a sh*t, most of them talk crap anyway, and 90% of the time, a person has made up their mind what car they want, usually months before they actually get it. And any one with an iq of more than 5 will have done a bit of homework and looked things up so probably know more about the car they want than the sales man trying to sell it.