Worst sales patter
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Discussion

Grrbang

Original Poster:

755 posts

100 months

Thursday 7th November 2019
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What’s the worst/wrongest sales patter you’ve heard from a car dealer?

Or any salesperson.

hman

7,497 posts

223 months

Thursday 7th November 2019
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“nah, you won’t like that one, it’s too far down the back for me to bring it out for a test drive”


The Li-ion King

3,777 posts

93 months

Thursday 7th November 2019
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"I've had a lot of interest in this car, got someone coming down from up North in about an hour who wants to put a deposit on it..."

Writhing

651 posts

138 months

Thursday 7th November 2019
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“ are you ok there, or are you just mucking about”?

orangesrule

1,913 posts

177 months

Thursday 7th November 2019
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When buying my first house.

"How old are you? Are you sure you can afford this?"

I had around a 40% deposit.

Type R Tom

4,305 posts

178 months

Thursday 7th November 2019
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"With the automatic wipers I don't even notice its raining"

anonymous-user

83 months

Thursday 7th November 2019
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“The clutches on these will last the whole lifetime of the car!”

rek

144 posts

152 months

Thursday 7th November 2019
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“Leave it 24 hours then just claim for a new windscreen on insurance”. When looking at a 2 year old car with a heated screen that had a massive bullseye in centre of the drivers view..

kieranblenk

865 posts

163 months

Thursday 7th November 2019
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"Oh..are you sure a Mini would fit your lifestyle as it is a really premium product and very expensive? Do you just want to take a brochure for now?"

When telling a saleswoman that we (an early 20s couple) want to part ex our Swift for a new Cooper automatic.

Edited by kieranblenk on Thursday 7th November 08:10

06andiano

83 posts

94 months

Thursday 7th November 2019
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After a rather enthusiastic demonstration on the public roads of what a Fiesta ST can do from the salesman - "I rag it hard on a test drive so you don't have to,"

"I can do you a cracking deal on one of our barely used demonstrators" No thanks!

Blanchimont

4,089 posts

151 months

Thursday 7th November 2019
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This car won't hang around long. With the Ohlins dampers, Akra exhaust I don't need to budge on price at all!

Was still for sale 4 months later.

LordGrover

34,150 posts

241 months

Thursday 7th November 2019
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They all do that, Sir.

davek_964

11,211 posts

204 months

Thursday 7th November 2019
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I asked for the service history on the car (a pretty expensive one) - salesman replied with :

"Will it really make a difference to whether you buy the car?"

He followed this up with "You won't find a better one for the money".

I took great delight in telling him that actually, I'd literally driven to him after viewing another car - which was better, and £1k less - and I was therefore going back to buy that. Although technically, I suppose he was right - I didn't find a better car for the amount they wanted.

CX53

3,025 posts

139 months

Thursday 7th November 2019
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kieranblenk said:
"Oh..are you sure a Mini would fit your lifestyle as it is a really premium product and very expensive? Do you just want to take a brochure for now?"

When telling a saleswoman that we (an early 20s couple) want to part ex our Swift for a new Cooper automatic.

Edited by kieranblenk on Thursday 7th November 08:10
I hate stuff like this. It’s even worse when you know the salesperson probably earns a lot less than you.

Halmyre

12,560 posts

168 months

Thursday 7th November 2019
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My wife looking to trade her MX5 in for a new model. Saw one on sale, turned up at dealer's, salesman sat us down and promptly tried to interest her in a different model. When she asked about the actual car she was interested in he started to blather about satisfactorily matching cars to customers. It didn't help that he mostly looked at me all the time.

I once arranged a test drive and turned up only to be told that someone else had provisionally bought the car, "but if you want we can still go out, you never know, he might cancel the purchase".

Mexman

2,442 posts

113 months

Thursday 7th November 2019
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Most of these stories will have a flip side from the dealers point of view.
Obvious timewasters that have been spotted a mile off, £5000 of negative equity in the part exchange, but 'can we have a test drive Anyway?'
Not a cat in hells chance of obtaining credit but we still want to test drive half a dozen buried cars.
'Not thinking of changing cars for another year yet, but can we test drive a few?'
Decision maker not present, 'but'....
You get the picture...

Gameface

16,565 posts

106 months

Thursday 7th November 2019
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Pulled up at a Ferrari garage in a Lamborghini and when I eventually got the attention of a salesman he pretty much immediately launched into a diatribe slating everything to do with Lamborghini (and by association my choices in buying them) which is not the way to break the ice with a customer. I was not impressed.

I bought another Lamborghini in the end.

RazerSauber

2,888 posts

89 months

Thursday 7th November 2019
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"I'll be honest, I've only got £27 profit in that car"

Quick enough to knock £400 later though.

griffter

4,143 posts

284 months

Thursday 7th November 2019
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When looking an an overpriced Audi RS2 that had been on sale for months, and expressing “surprise” that it hadn’t sold yet:

“The thing is, people don’t realise how valuable they are”.

LimaDelta

8,398 posts

247 months

Thursday 7th November 2019
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Have we had 'the one about the guy who turned up at a Rolls Royce dealer naked and dripping in human faeces who was unjustly refused a test drive, only to return later to do donuts in the carpark in a different Rolls Royce (bought at double the market rate CASH as he had so much) while hanging out of the back of the first salesmans wife' yet? I like that one.