::Barloworld ::The pre-owned vehicles dealer under pressure
The pre-owned vehicle dealer is under a lot of pressure in today’s depressed economic environment. More dealers are going out of business as they struggle to find buyers for their wares and stocks pile up and cost them money.
This has also given rise to more dishonest practices and has made the prospect of buying pre-owned somewhat daunting for the unadventurous. Bullying tactics are sometimes used by a pre-owned vehicle dealer to get rid of a car that has been sitting on the showroom floor for too long. Women are often manipulated and bamboozled with a lot of tech speak to get them to sign on the dotted line. They are being flogged vehicles and features that cost a lot of money and that they could have done without.
Used vehicle sales managers are sometimes persuaded to pay too much for a trade-in vehicle in order for the dealership to sell that new vehicle off the back of it. The used vehicle sales manager must often restore the trade-in to a condition fit for sale, and that is expensive. It could even be a brand that he would not ordinarily buy, knowing that it would be difficult to get rid of. And he still has to make a bit of money off it, lest the accountants question his business sense and wave the mortgage figures in front of his nose. In the end the cars sits on the ‘lot for three months and he has to foist it upon an unsuspecting buyer at a loss just to get rid of it.
Sometime a pre-owned vehicle dealer manages to juggle their priorities in such a way that they manage to stay afloat, but experience has shown that, in times like these, only the tough survive – and only the established brand and top-sellers sell well on the used car showroom floor.
The pre-owned vehicles dealer can be likened to a ballerina doing a pirouette with a baby grand balanced on her forehead. Get it right and business is brisk – don’t pay too much and don’t ask too little, but keep demand buoyant and assist the new vehicle salespeople with their trade-in. Not an enviable task.
