Pendulum Shift – Traffic is Picking Up in Dealerships and Cars are Getting Short

This past week several people asked me, “How are your other stores doing?”

I have to be honest with them and say 5 out of my 25 dealers had a month in May of ‘09 that was GREATER in units and profit than August of ‘08 – before this thing really went in the wrong direction. Business has picked up as the public is shifted into the seasonality of summer (which always brings out a greater percent of the buyers) and quite honestly people are getting more and more immune to the bad news.

So what is the problem???
INVENTORY
Just as some predicted… we are now going to be short.

The factory and distributor will tell you help is on the way, and we know it is, but that doesn’t help right now. You can’t fill a used car lot with inventory when every other dealer has people at the sales and auctions over bidding paying out of book for ’05 & ’06 product.

What you have to do is trade for these pieces and have solid buying practices in place.

You can even feel a little better about taking a no gross new car deal if you know there is gross in the used car.