Stories from the Sales Frontlines

geffen

Sounds great, I may have to start test driving some Honda's

joel0622

Nthe, yes we make several models with dual lumbar.

joel0622

Ok, I will just tell the banks that Snake said it was OK

british_rover

I would imagine it was standard on the Crown Vic right?

joel0622

My product knowledge is fuzzy, but if I memory serves me it is standard with the LX package and available if you ordered non LX with dual power seats.

lrguy44

I guess he did not see that it is not a legal issue but rather a contractual item. Hey, do you want to sign for me on a Harley Edition F-350? I promise to make the payments! :shades:

cotmc

Regarding the minidisc, I wonder how many people realize actual minidiscs were often used within Sci-Fi movies to portray some futuristic media?

For example, remember the first Matrix movie, when Neo is awakened by a knock at his apartment door? It appears he is handing some sort of illegal disc to one of the guys at his door. That was nothing more than a minidisc.

Ever see the movie "Strange Days" with Ralph Fiennes and Angela Basset? This was a lesser known James Cameron movie from the mid-90's portraying a frightening futuristic society at the end of that century. Those "SQUID" discs were nothing more than minidiscs.

I suspect the movie directors used minidiscs because the vast majority of the general public had never seen one in person.

british_rover

One of my eight deals might be falling through. The finance called me before I left and said that HE wasn't happy with the numbers and he needs to talk it over with her. HE will call me tomorrow to see if we can rework things to make HIM happy. Emphasis was his on the phone.

He got me all riled up till I remembered that he did this same thing about two years ago when they bought the first Range Rover from me. That car was ordered and took four months to come in. Within that four months I think he called me at least twice to back out of the deal and then right as the car came in they tried to back out again.

I guess this is how he negotiates. He is a general contractor so I have to wonder if he does this when he bids for jobs too. :confuse:

geffen

Oh no someone's backing out on a deal?

british_rover

Trying to. He just uses it as a negotiating technique. Not a particularly good one either since last time he did it three times and all it got him was 400 bucks in free accessories.

joel0622

Well we are down to the final hour of the month, and seeing that i am sitting here playing spades on the internet and posting here I would say it is over. It looks like it is going to turn out to be decent. We are sitting on 156 units and hit around 110% of our new car/truck OBJ. I had a good month in my office, as a matter of fact it was the best month I have had all year. But that is what you are supposed to do in July and August. July and August pay the bills in December and January.

That was a hard lesson to learn to. When I first started selling I just figured I would get a big commission check every month and never put anything back. Then February of 1995 came along and I sold 2 1/2 units. 2 mini's and a used car deal that paid me $208.52. It was a long ride home with nothing but a pay stub saying I didn't make my draw

british_rover

But that is what you are supposed to do in July and August. July and August pay the bills in December and January.

That is funny we are almost completely backwards. June, July and August are almost always dead. We rock from September right through to January.

joel0622

If possible we would cut our sales force in half for the winter months. Dec, jan, and Feb are terrible around here. That is funny how the trends are different for car lines.

Sounds like I need to go back into sales and work here in the Summer and then ask to be layed off and go to work at the Land Rover store in the fall

The two nicest dealerships in Nashville I have ever been in are Jescue's store I was in the other day and the land Rover Store across town. When you walk into that place you feel like you should be signing up to go rafting down the Colorado River instead of looking at cars.

snakeweasel

All I know is that I have seen the courts say its ok.

british_rover

Sounds like I need to go back into sales and work here in the Summer and then ask to be layed off and go to work at the Land Rover store in the fall

That was the idea behind the dual point Land Rover Jaguar stores. Jag is rocking during the summer June-August and then has an decent early fall and late spring. Land Rover rolls October-January has a decent early spring and late fall.

It was a perfect mesh of two brands sharing a lot of heritage but....

Jaguar collapsed and now Land Rover does I think double the volume of Jag in the US. A few years ago we wanted to open a dual point Jag/Land Rover store and a local Jag dealer was up for sale. It never happened though which was probably a good thing.

joel0622

All I know is that I have seen the courts say its ok.

What court? You have my curiosity peaked now. Are you saying that there is a court ruling pertaining to this? We wrote a check for $20K plus last summer to pay one off when Ford Credit discovered it.

Please tell me more.

I would have thought that with the Patriot Act it would be even a bigger taboo now then it was.

isellhondas

Why not, you've driven everything else!

geffen

You never know a Honda Accord may be in my future

british_rover

I think about two more months of shopping are in your future.

Maybe we should start a pool on what day you will actually buy a car.

jmonroe

We had a small leak in the washer tub, and because they had to take apart the entire washer, the repair bill was more than the EW for both the washer and dryer. The part was 30 bucks, but the labor was $800.

Am I missing something here? :confuse:

The repair only makes sense if the cost of repair is less than the cost of the washer, right? In the case you just described was this the case, otherwise I think those EW's state you will get your purchase price back or they will substitute an equivalent model at the time of the attempted repair.

Just a little off the subject but if any of you guys own a GE dishwasher that was built between 1997, to I think late 2006, they have a recall of 2.5 million of them due to the use of "rinse agents". I understand notices started to go out in May. We just got our notice on Saturday and since we bought in 1998 we have opted for the $150 toward the purchase of a new GE dishwasher in lieu of having it repaired. If you buy a higher end model you can get $300 toward a new purchase. Take this for what its worth.

jmonroe

snakeweasel

What court?

It was a bankruptcy court in Will County IL when a client of mine was in the same situation. His lawyer presented the situation and argued it was a lease, the court agreed.

snakeweasel

You never know a Honda Accord may be in my future

If you look both ways before crossing the street you might be able to avoid that. :P

epiney

You never know a Honda Accord may be in my future

Which one? The hybrid...

mackabee

We did buy a GE dishwasher a couple of years ago. It does not clean the dishes the first time so we have to run them again. I want it repaired. Bought a GE clothes washer and we're not too crazy about it either. I bought both on the advice of a friend who's in the appliance business and since they don't carry Whirpool which we had and worked like a champ until the washer quit working and rather than getting it fixed I opted for a new one. The dishwasher was just old and noise and the door sagged but still worked fine. But the missus wanted another one. The washer probably only had a broken belt but it happened on the weekend and I needed clean clothes pronto! Wish I would had repaired it. No more GE stuff for me.
Mackabee

i

jmonroe

We did buy a GE dishwasher a couple of years ago. It does not clean the dishes the first time so we have to run them again. I want it repaired.

If we are talking about the same thing, I would think you would want to get a new one since you're not satisfied with the one you have now rather than having it repaired.

FWIW, Mrs. jmonroe likes the GE we have now. She says she likes it better than the Kitchen Aide's and Maytag that she has had. Go figure. :surprise:

jmonroe

imidazol97

>Declined the service contract as it was about 20% of the purchase price. Have called twice since trying to sell it again. Told them to stop calling, said it's in computer and you will get called a few times again. No way to stop it

Thanks for the warning. If I buy something from Sears (not likely-my unfavorite store), I'll make sure they don't have a phone number.

lrguy44

What court? It is in the dealer agreement - contractual not a legal statute, Do you have a case number?

geffen

No not the Hybrid, just an 07 Accord EX

cotmc

"If I buy something from Sears (not likely-my unfavorite store), I'll make sure they don't have a phone number."

How are you going to find a Sears store that doesn't have a phone number??

sorry, snake isn't the only smartass here today...

isellhondas

Yeah, you can test drive them to death, then make an offer,and then reneg when they accept it just like you did before.

You are hardly a serious shopper.

snakeweasel

sorry, snake isn't the only smartass here today

Yeah and I am kicking myself for not seeing that one.

user777

with all due respect - this is a poster child for poor design and usability. it could be used in a human factors / usability engineering courses anywhere around the world (even where they don't use english) as a prototype for UI design to avoid.

mackabee

It worked fine the first year than I started noticing my coffee cups were not clean. I called my bud up and he said I had to use some liquid that goes in the small container on the door. I told him we did. I also noticed the soap was not dissolving, there were chunks in the soap dispenser. I don't want to spend more money. The washer says "Super capacity plus" as my wife told me to get the biggest tub. This tub does not compare to our Whirpool. It takes forever to fill and it only washes half the load the other one did. I should have fixed the Whirlpool!
Mackabee

mackabee

Since it's a Ford product it was probably engineered by Ford. I guess you know how to work it since you've had plenty of time to figure it out. Looks like a Chinese fire drill to me.
Mackabee

geffen

Actually I am a serious shopper, everyone has their own way of making purchases, i'm not going to get into that on the "stories from the frontlines" forums. :shades:

imidazol97

You got me.

lrguy44

Actually, our customers find it quite easy to use. It was a LR design, not Ford. Ford did not have the 4x4 expertise that LR has.

houdini1

n short your loan agreement is that you will take the money and apply it to the purchase of the car and use that car as security for the loan. It does not restrict your use of that car.

True, but where I think you may have a problem is in obtaining the loan under false pretenses. That is where the lender may get just a tad upset. Just look at all the problems in the mortgage business today.

british_rover

Land Rover designs their own products in Britain at their own facilities. The parts sharing that Land Rover partakes in is Volvo and/or Jaguar.

I would still like to hear why the terrain response knob is bad and not just that it is bad.

Here is a picture of the LR3 setup. It is even easier to use since the toggles switches are larger and set up above the surface some.

You can easily operate all of the controls by touch without having to look at the controls since they have great tactile feedback. They give you a nice resounding click when you move the knob or press the toggles.



Also every time you do something with those controls the message center in the instrument cluster reminds you what you did. A message pops up in English for 3-5 seconds and then an Icon appears in the screen to let you know what mode you are in.

epiney

Must be a regional thing. Great month for Land Rover, up 18.9% from last year. Really interesting to see the product mix with the more expensive RR and RR Sport blowing the doors off the LR2s and 3s. No wonder LRGuy had a good month with that mix! Seems that LR is one of the few bright spots in Ford's portfolio.

cdnpinhead

lrguy: Normally I don't have the bandwidth to get involved in these types of debates, but, for you, I'm willing to make an exception!

I think the best way to settle this debate is to do the following:

1) Find an available new Range Rover at your facility. You may wish to pick the one particular unit to which yesterday's shopper hesitated to place a deposit.
2) Pick a completely unbiased adult driver who has driven a wide range of automobiles, but has never driven a Range Rover. This will be your designated "Test Driver".
3) Arrange to have that Range Rover shipped to the driveway of the Test Driver immediately.
4) Allow Test Driver to experiment with all of the controls, while driving this vehicle every day for the next 6 months.
5) Also provide Test Driver with $200/week to cover gasoline costs.
6) Ask Test Driver to fill out a 1-page survey regarding the ease of use of the specific interface in question.
7) Arrange for a truck to pick up the RR from the Test Driver's driveway at the completion of this 6-month test drive.

Guess what?? This is your lucky day! It just so happens I am available to perform this test drive for you. I realize it won't be all fun and games, but I feel it is the least I can do to help resolve this debate fairly and completely. Just let me know when I should expect the delivery! :shades:

cdnpinhead

Hey! What's going on?? I (cotmc) posted #15172! :mad:

Why is this forum indicating I am "cdnpinhead"? I used the same login and password I typically use. And I'm suspecting cdnpinhead ain't too happy that somebody else is logged in with his account name. :confuse:

cotmc

Looks like this glitch is fixed?

Tidester & Kirstie: Any idea how my login was switched to somebody else's when I posted message #15172??

british_rover

July was only the LR2s third full month of sales so I don't think it has ramped all the way up yet. The LR3 needs some leasing support from Land Rover. The LR2 needs it as well actually.

lrguy44

Golly, Thanks for the offer. We came up with the same idea about 15 minutes ago and just shipped out the car. My wife is really going to give us honest feedback over the next 6 months, not to mention it looks good in my driveway. I just hope the county property adjuster doesn't see it and up my property taxes. :shades:

cotmc

Wasn't there any "fine print" somewhere, indicating relatives of employees do not qualify for this promotion?

qbrozen

The LR2 needs it as well actually.

Hold that thought for another year till the wife's current lease is up. ;b
she'd probably think it too small, though.

tayl0rd

... The rest of the world has no problem figuring out what symbols mean but Americans are stupid and can't do it.

One particular Edmunds editor complained about the electric parking brake for the Range Rover because he couldn't find it. It is a two inch wide, one inch across, chrome paddle mounted directly behind the gear shift. ...




Well, heck, man! I'd be confused, too! I've never seen a gear shift like that before. Which one of those pictographs is for Reverse and Drive. :surprise: :P

speterson1

Well, as you underlined in your post, since it says the chrome paddle is mounted BEHIND the gear shift, I imagine the gear shift is just out of the edge of the shot...you know, in FRONT of the chrome paddle!

greanpea68

Looks like this glitch is fixed?

Tidester & Kirstie: Any idea how my login was switched to somebody else's when I posted message #15172??

cotmc,

I had that happen once on my name when a sales person at another dealership in my auto group tried to create a account for himself. He was in another building, in another town. He logged on and it came up under my account. The hosts thought I was playing games. My friend called me when it was happening to let me know. The only thig we could figure out was it had to be something with logging on from the same network. It was pretty weird. Maybe you and pinhead are using the same network, the same town, the same service provider, what ever it is it's pretty weird. :confuse: