Appointment only specialist dealers

[nct001]

All the negative comments from PH people just go to show how hard it is to sell cars.

(Reading between the lines it's a Jap Crap / Blart outfit)

But they have a business name matching their domain, a proper auto trader website - which will cost £1500 a month. And they have £100k of cars in stock and offer warranty etc. They operate by appointment as it is unjustifiable to have full time sales staff manning a premises.

I think PH people should really understand costs of running a small car sales business ie 20 cars or less, just how would you guys run it? I don't think you would be able to do many of the things you see as necessary.

[dieseluser07]

Anyone who lives in leeds heard of mps motors? Only registered the website last august but have a large stock inventory.

[DonkeyApple]

Countdown said:

My guess is that "Appointment only" means that the cars are stacked nose to tail in a warehouse with a Rizla paper sized gap between them. They want you to ring up beforehand so that they can get the car you're interested in to the front of the queue or possibly to their home address because they don't have any premises as such.

It would be interesting to understand more. I think with the high end dealers it is a case that the stock is kept in offsite storage with just a few cars actually on the small shop front, or the dealer works as agent and has to collect the car from the actual dealer who has it etc.

With these lower end ones, I've always imagined that those without premises need the time to get the car to where it needs to be and stop doing their normal day job but for the most part I think it is just a very effective filter to only spend face time with someone who is genuinely looking to buy and apply massive closing pressure on. I suspect such businesses while having much lower footfall will have much higher conversion rates than the traditional, comparable businesses?

I wonder if there is also an element that if you are in a really scuzzy area it cuts down the risk of someone robbing you as they are less anonymous than they would be if they robbed the unit next door?

[MDMA .]

dieseluser07 said:

Theres a couple of cars id like to see, in leeds both at garages that arent by appointment and ive rang both to discuss the cars and they were both honest with regards to the cars condition etc and were happy to provide me with the v5 registration number and so on. Only thing is neither have any reviews online.

Here's an idea. Drive up and go and have a look. Report back on your findings. Saves all the guessing.

[Rich_W]

gizlaroc said:

Do specialists get only the best examples of the car they specialise in, or do they simply get whatever stock they can get their hands on?

Depends.

There's a high end specialist not far from me. Most people in the know will know it. It's been on TV and been linked to on this website. ( They had a Veyron when it launched for £1.6M. Yes, they above RRP if you want to get one today. That's their business model. And they've been there for years so it's obviously OK)

The vast majority of their cars are in very good condition. Most low mileage. Saying that, did see one German Supercar which was "tired" needed probably a couple grand spending on it. Nothing catastrophic, but at the price point they were asking. Seemed a bit much. Strangest thing was it's not the most desirable spec car generally. Guess it was a trade in they decided to sell rather that trade to Auction