Stories from the Sales Frontlines

driver100

thx for the info. Do you have a link?

Not yet. I just mastered how to copy and paste. Maybe a link will be my next project.

My brother in Norway just took delivery of the car in your post (loaded Octavia wagon).

I wonder if they buy cars like we do. Clubbing like a baby seal or is it just one price.

compares quite well to my loaded Passat wagon.

It sounds like a Skoda is a very carefully made VW. They sound like a natural to be imported to North America.....they are dependable and affordable with very sensible designs, and with good handling.

isellhondas

My wife's uncle survived the Bataan Death March.

He could never understand how any American could ever buy an inported car.

sterlingdog

Sure I did. The book title was A Non-Traditional Suicide. :P

Richard

driver100

He could never understand how any American could ever buy an inported car

After an experience like he went through it is understandable.

Since you are selling an import (and a Japanese one at that) does he talk to you?

sterlingdog

The Skoda is a beautiful wagon. It reminds me of the old ones that were once made in this country. Any idea of the price? Wish they would import them.

Richard

sterlingdog

That was an interesting article about the shut-off devices. I would imagine that it keeps people making their car payments. It was interesting to note that a device has been developed that enables the police to slow a fleeting car to a stop. That would certainly help avoid those dangerous high speed chases.

Another interesting fact was that 300,000 people a month are dropping from A credit status to B credit status. That is a sad state of affairs.

Richard

sterlingdog

"The clay bar strips the paint sealant off..."

Would a person really want to do this? The clay bar must be for older cars, right?

Richard

sterlingdog

I don't mind appearing in court if ordered. I would consider it "poetic' justice. :P

Richard

sterlingdog

"...not a willing participant."

Excellent point!

Richard

sterlingdog

"...30 minutes with a microfiber cloth..."

You did THAT in 30 minutes?! I need you here at my garage right away.

Richard

oldfarmer50

"...They sound like a natural to be imported..."

Even the American big 3 have European models that they are not bringing across the pond. I wonder why that is? Is there a problem with emissions or safety?

snakeweasel

Now I get e-mails from pretty young radicals asking me to take them to this meeting or that protest. I figure if I showed up in a Prius I might get lucky even at my age.

Sorry a Prius for that crowd will only get you lectures about the underpaid workers in some third world country earning $2 a week making the batteries for your symbol of capitalistic over indulgence,

A 'Free Mumia" or Che Guevara T-shirt will be a much better bet (better yet tell the young lady you once met Che).

snakeweasel

The Skoda arms works was the main supplier for Hitler's war machine in WW 2.

Well then what about Benz and Audi, not to mention the beginnings of VW?

Hey didn't Dr. Porsche spend time in jail for war crimes?

driver100

Even the American big 3 have European models that they are not bringing across the pond. I wonder why that is? Is there a problem with emissions or safety?

Those reasons and a few more. First, the station wagon models that are very popular in Europe don't sell in the US, where people would choose a minivan instead.
Many of the Euro models are just smaller....based on gas prices of about $8 a gallon, and people are not as large. A lot of the smaller cars are hatchback designs which makes sense if you have smaller cars. Hatchbacks just don't sell in the U.S.

Emission controls and safety standards are costly too.

Here is just one of many Toyota models we don't get here but they look great, especially as a wagon.



Then in wagon form:



And one more....remember it is a Toyota, and not available in North America.....

jmonroe

Wow! You're as good as jmonroe.

IMPOSSIBLE !!! :mad:

jmonroe

sterlingdog

"IMPOSSIBLE!!!"

Now, now. Remember---"Imitation is the most sincere form of flattery". :P

Richard

sterlingdog

We love your pictures, but be careful. The large ones are causing the posts to run off the screen. We're having trouble reading each other.

Richard

jmonroe

Actually, Skodas are referred to as the poor man's Audi. rightly so. Not expensive, similar looks, and good quality.

A European wanna be. Kinda like an American Hyundai I suppose. :confuse:

jmonroe

imidazol97

>Judge judy would throw the book at her

Nah. Judy mostly dislikes men.

imidazol97

The clay bar uses a liquid that's like a polish sprayed on as a lube. You drag the piece of clay in it with light pressure and it removes the minutes stuff sticking up above the paint layer.

Now when the car is clean, run your hand over the paint now. After the clay bar is used it will be smooth as a mirror. I doubt your dealer did a complete prep with clay bar when they got it ready. I suggest spending the $16 $18 for a box with a bar of clay and a bottle of detailing spray and clean a part of your car. Then use the clay bar on one part of it and run your hand over the fender that wasn't processed and the part you just used the clay bar on. I did my new Buick 4 months after I got it. I became a believer.

roadburner

You did THAT in 30 minutes?! I need you here at my garage right away.

Well, I did hose it off the day before. The engine was my favorite view:



500 bhp. Can you say 186 mph executive express?

verdugo

I wonder if they buy cars like we do. Clubbing like a baby seal or is it just one price.

I know the dealer was after him to buy (not quite as bad as Richard's courtship by his salesman). They gave him a big discount, and threw in snow tires and wheels. Oh, and it was a factory order too.

driver100

We love your pictures, but be careful. The large ones are causing the posts to run off the screen

Yeh, I really messed up the screen. But remember, I only had 2 lessons. Though they are excellent teachers, I may have to go back to summer school to improve....Imaging 101!

Can't wait until we can start a new page :sick:

driver100

The engine was my favorite view:

Even the engine compartment is a work of art. It is magnifique!

driver100

They gave him a big discount, and threw in snow tires and wheels. Oh, and it was a factory order too.

That is interesting. I imagined people waiting in line like they did in Russia for toilet paper. Or like the soup [non-permissible content removed] on Seinfeld.....you get what you're given.
America has influenced these countries in a good way in many respects. I wonder if they offered mop n glo? Or 108 months to pay it off?

driver100

This is a Ford Mondeo. Wouldn't this sell better than a 500 or a Fusion?

<img src="

Why not just bring these over by the boatload? Guess the unions wouldn't like it and Ford could get rid of their US management team.

driver100

One of my favorite cars here are Peugots. They take a convertible and made it look like it would be a fun car to have;

imidazol97

Driver100, you're doing a great job posting. We've created a picture-posting monster, grin....

Your Mondeo post has an extra Img start and Img conclude marker set and some text was in between. The text was "Why not just bring these over by the boatload? Guess the unions wouldn't like it and Ford could get rid of their US management team"

If you use edit to look at the raw post for the picture, you should be able to see what I mean...

If you're ready for Img Posting 501, let me know.

sterlingdog

What have I done?! When I encouraged him to send back pictures from England, I unleashed a learning curve unmatched in the halls of vacation photo albums. :P There are times when we get what we asked for, right?

Richard

sterlingdog

Thanks for that info. I'm taking notes.

Richard

sterlingdog

I LOVE that red Peugots convertible! What a car! It puts the Bimmer to shame. :shades: :P

Richard

imidazol97

501.

The picture in post #41982 is too big. It blocks the assist windows and some ads from showing on the page. So it needs to be reduced.

Currently it is 1280 pixels wide and 853 pixels tall (the property window showed me that). So let's multiply each of those by 0.4. Width will be 512 and height 341.

So modify the picture source that you used the IMG command on. It looks like this:



We will modify it to this:



by inserting the width and height text between the last quote mark and the greater than sign. The quotes around numbers are required; use spaces just like the example shows.

Now the picture looks like

sterlingdog

Just curious. If a person wanted to hire you or another detail person to make their car look like this, how much would it cost them? Let me just guess---$300 or is that an insult? My wife says that I live in the Dark Ages when it comes to the price of things. I think that is just her way of trying to get what she wants.

Richard

driver100

Sorry, but yes you have created a copy and pasting monster. I will stop unless it is something really special but I had to show you the cutest car. It is a Nissan Figuro and the hardtop roof peels back in the middle - that part is cloth, to make it a convertible.

driver100

I LOVE that red Peugots convertible! What a car! It puts the Bimmer to shame.

Not to mention a Chrysler Sebring :P

graphicguy

Richard....I used to be one of the detailing fanatics. Started in college when I detailed cars to keep my "poor posterior" supplied with beer.

Anyway, believe it or not, I used to wash cars with a mix of water and kerosene back then. The kerosene stripped off old wax and left a "shine" (at least until the first rain). Then the customer would come back for a proper wax job.

More recently, I use synthetic waxes. And NO, using a clay bar on a car does not strip off any clearcoat or paint. It does take away some of the imbedded nasties that can adhere to paint. The purpose of clay is to get the surface as clean and "slick" as possible before you wax. It's a good way to get rid of dried "bugs" and light tar, too.

A boutique wax called "Zaino" started the whole synthetic wax movement. Synthetics last longer than carnubas. And, synthetics don't leave buildup on plastic parts and seams.

Now, just about every wax manufacturer has some sort of synthetic on the market.

I can wash, clay, wax and detail an average sized sedan in about two hours. I do it twice/year....once in the spring (which I just did to my Tahoe...but had a pro-detailer do the interior). And once in the Fall.

A proper detail runs about $100-$150 (including claying). If they have to use a buffer to get rid of swirl marks, the price goes up from there.

If you don't want to do it yourself, go to your dealership's body shop and ask one of their "detail guys" if he wants to do a side job. Give him the wax to use and slip him a $50 bill. Bet he'll do it for you.

Don't ask me how I know that...... :P

driver100

The picture in post #41982 is too big. It blocks the assist windows and some ads from showing on the page. So it needs to be reduced.

Excellent instructions. Sorry about blocking out the advertising too, and a thank you to the Hosts for letting me experiment with these new found skills. As a business owner I feel bad about messing up the page and the ads. Driver did a bad..

I think I could do that downsizing, with your excellent instructions, but I'll leave it for awhile so I am not overdoing it, and going over my allotted quota for the month (unless I get the gold plan with higher dues next year).

houdini1

Wow, that little car is gorgeous. I love it. Is it new or an older model?

sterlingdog

You are such a good student. Your picture here is just the right size. That is a cute car---bet it gets 50mpg. That would be a really neat run-about car in town. I'm amazed at all of the wonderful car designs in Europe. I wish our designers here would take notes. Thanks for sharing. This has been great fun.

Richard

driver100

I have more information about the Figaro soon. I think they are 1991s In the meantime, if you love the car, you will really enjoy this ad;
Nissan Figuro ad

sterlingdog

A friend had mentioned the Zaino to me. Until I asked the wax question here, I never realized how much information there is on car waxing. Some of you guys are real experts on this. I like the idea of buying the wax and giving the detail guy $50. I'm getting so lazy in my old age. I cleaned out the garage yesterday and then swept it and mopped it. Would you believe that I had to come in and take a nap? The idiot who called this the Golden Years must have been 20 years old at the time. :mad:

Richard

driver100

Just a little more background information about the Figgy, as owners like to call it;

The Nissan Figaro is a small retro car manufactured by Nissan. The car was originally sold only in Japan. Despite this, the Nissan Figaro has become popular with celebrity owners in the UK, given the popularity of second-hand Japanese import cars.

The Figaro was introduced at the 1989 Tokyo Motor Show under the slogan "Back to the Future". It was built by a Nissan special projects group called Pike Factory, who also produced other niche automobiles such as the Be-1, Pao and S-Cargo. Only four colours were available: Topaz Mist, Emerald Green, Pale Aqua and Lapis Grey. Each colour symbolised a season of the year. When the car was launched, topaz mist was the least popular colour. There were only 2,000 produced in Topaz mist hence they have become increasingly rare.

The Figaro was equipped with leather seats, air conditioning, CD player and a open roof. It was designed by Shoji Takahashi, who won a design competition with the car.

The engine was Nissan's MA10ET, a turbocharged 1.0 L (987 cc) I4.

Only 8,000 were originally available with an additional 12,000 added to production numbers to meet demand. Prospective purchasers had to enter a lottery to be able to buy one of these cars

boomchek

There's many Figaros roaming the streets of Vancouver. Cool cars.

sterlingdog

Love the ad! They use much more imagination in their advertising. That is such a neat little car. Weren't the legs tires nice?

Richard

jimbres

My wife's uncle survived the Bataan Death March.

He could never understand how any American could ever buy an inported car.

My best friend's father was a Marine platoon leader who hit the beach on Saipan with the 1st wave & was badly wounded by Japanese machine gun fire. When I bought a Honda Civic in 1974, his language was understandably pungent. We had to agree not to talk about cars.

Years later - the late 1980s - I spotted him climbing out of a brand new Accord. His explanation: "It's the best car I've ever owned, & it's made in Ohio."

driver100

. I'm amazed at all of the wonderful car designs in Europe. I wish our designers here would take notes.

There was a time when Europeans fell way behind in design and in sophistication. But, for the last 2 decades they are on a real push to get it right. Generally, things are done in a simple logical way, and so the design only gets better with time. That Figuro is of course a Japanese car, but it is a good copy of some retro Euro-cars.

driver100

Love the ad! They use much more imagination in their advertising.

Yes, the ads are good here, and same with the TV ads. They are actually fun to watch and can be very creative.

I think you should drive the Sebring and your lovely wife would probably love a little Figaro.

sterlingdog

And give up my wonderful Explorer?

Richard

chikoo

This Ford Mondeo would kill every car in the category if it was available here!

jmonroe

OK, this is the final chapter in the jmonroe purchase of the Genny.

I checked the Ohio Dept. of Public Safety web site (thank you &#145;imid&#146; for the link) and they finally showed the selling price of the near perfect 06&#146; Sonata LX with 12,800 miles on it when I traded it in for the Genny. The only thing the dealer had to do was replace the passenger side mirror. The price I got to do this a couple years ago from a dealer was $264. The dealer I bought from in Ohio gave me $9,600 for the Sonata but his first offer was $9,000 which he gave me over the phone based on my description of the car. His first offer was not going to get the deal done. When I went to Real-World Trade-In Values just for a sanity check before I decided to drive to Ohio, Volvomax said $9,400 would be a great price but I felt it was worth more and I was right.

The dealer had my trade-in listed for $12,997 for two days and it sold just that fast. I checked their web site for that info but it took until today for it to show as being sold to a &#145;Private Owner&#148; for a &#147;Total Purchase Price of $14,045&#148;. I have to assume that price included tax otherwise the guy that bought it had to buy some stuff in the F&I office. Even if the price included tax the guy paid full pop for the car. Talk about being &#147;clubbed like a baby seal&#148;. This has to be the type of customer that dealers dream about.

We all know that used cars are where the money is and this sale proves that once again. Don&#146;t get me wrong I&#146;m not crying about what they sold the car for because I was happy with both ends of the deal I made. Maybe I should feel honored that the car was so nice that the dealer didn&#146;t have to back off from his price. I&#146;m just surprised by the actual selling price of the car.

Now, if that price did not include tax that must have been one slick F&I guy. I don&#146;t think we have any around here that are close to being that good.

jmonroe