Showroom - New-car research • Hacker News Board

Re: Showroom - New-car research

#31

Post by adrianpike » Thu, Oct 03, 2013, 4:40 PM UTC

nicksergeant wrote: post #26

nicksergeant wrote: post #24

Lesson learned on the tagline. We've killed the "doesn't suck" part. Thanks, HN!

And a note on us calling this an MVP: we've probably used that too loosely. This is more of a proof of concept to see if there's demand in this space. We believe there is, and wanted to show what we are starting with.

There's definite and obvious demand for making the car shopping (and purchasing, especially) experience less painful. It's a sad state of affairs when getting a loan was the easiest part of the experience.

I don't think you've fully decided on the problem you're trying to solve though. Is it comparing my new car options across manufacturers? What are the key deciding factors for someone getting a new car? Who are your customers? Who _aren't_ your customers?

At this point, what you've built is providing no insight into any of those questions for you, except that what you've got so far is not the product for the HN market. :)

I'd focus on those before going further down this road, but that's just one man's unsolicited opinion. I am fairly involved in the automotive industry, however, so I've got some insight.

Re: Showroom - New-car research

#32

Post by nicksergeant » Thu, Oct 03, 2013, 4:41 PM UTC

bane wrote: post #30

A good start with lots of promise. I hope this eventually ends up with a full faceted filter system so I can dive down on any category in any order and combination I want and have it offer me a couple options.

It will, thanks!

Re: Showroom - New-car research

#33

Post by resu » Thu, Oct 03, 2013, 4:41 PM UTC

Instead of sorting by name, you need to find a better way to order the cars in each category (and allow several sorts, price, mpg, popularity, etc)

There is very little value in showing me 300k Bentleys next to 30k BMWs. It makes navigating the site a real chore, unless I know exactly the model I'm looking for, but then why would I use showroom.is in the first place, right?

Re: Showroom - New-car research

#34

Post by adrianpike » Thu, Oct 03, 2013, 4:44 PM UTC

fsckin wrote: post #27

I wanted to research the following: (manual transmission OR automatic w/ paddle shift) AND (rear-wheel drive OR all-wheel drive) AND (sedan OR coupe) Sort by options: power to weight ratio OR 1/4th mile time OR price For a very specific shopper like myself, this sucks. Can't even compare two cars.

If the OP started integrating more data sources for some of that information, things could get interesting: http://www.albeedigital.com/supercoupe/articles/0-60times.ht...

The downside is whether or not the enthusiast market would really want something like this - I know that review after review told me the new CTS was whooping on the german sport sedans, but after actually test driving all of them, there was an obvious winner on feel alone. I used a ton of online comparison tools, read through dozens of reviews, and still wound up buying against all their advice.

Re: Showroom - New-car research

#35

Post by tehwalrus » Thu, Oct 03, 2013, 4:48 PM UTC

astonished that the first page of "cars" has only one or two that push 30mpg. Anything short of 50mpg just isn't trying surely?!

(of the 20 cars listed here[1] that are except from the London congestion charge, none are lower than 134mpg.)

[1] http://www.nextgreencar.com/congestion-charge-exempt/

Re: Showroom - New-car research

#36

Post by closetgeekshow » Thu, Oct 03, 2013, 4:59 PM UTC

it looks nice but completely lacking in functionality. at a bare minimum you should be providing some level of filtering to narrow down the results beyond the vehicle category

Re: Showroom - New-car research

#37

Post by TylerE » Thu, Oct 03, 2013, 5:15 PM UTC

Some of your data is bad. For instance, your pics of the VW Golf (Also NB - synonyms...searching VW results in 0 matches) shows a leather interior...which you can't get in the US.

Re: Showroom - New-car research

#38

Post by ianstallings » Thu, Oct 03, 2013, 5:21 PM UTC

One thing you may want to add, if you're willing, is a link to a virtual test drive such as the ones done by winding road magazine on youtube. I'm sure they wouldn't mind the traffic, and it gives you a good first impression of how it drives.

But it's a good start. I would love to see something besides car.com, edmunds, or kbb to do a little research. All the info is all over the place and I've ended up having multiple tabs open with the manufacturer websites.

Re: Showroom - New-car research

#39

Post by n00j » Thu, Oct 03, 2013, 5:23 PM UTC

Other than the pretty interface, what is the added value of using this over just going directly to edmunds.com? Its seems they have much better filters, sorting, etc. edmunds.com may not be the absolution best interface, but its functional, and doesn't seem to difficult.

Re: Showroom - New-car research

#40

Post by tptacek » Thu, Oct 03, 2013, 5:39 PM UTC

I need something like this, but I don't think this is it.

I don't care at all about photos of cars. I would at some point, but I'm not sure when.

What I need is:

* Each model broken out by every trim (this is 80% of what I need right there) so I don't have to dig through flash-heavy car company websites to figure out what my engine options are

* Comparisons across cars/trims on BHP, torque, and displacement, city/hwy MPG, cabin & trunk space, &c. These are all stats that are readily available but annoying to track down

* Aggregation and summary of existing reviews

* Some notion of the "maturity" of the current model year (what's the last model year that had a major refresh)

* A metric of what the used market for each car looks like for the past couple years

* Some notion of availability and price variability across regions

If this already exists, please someone tell me, because I'm driving a car whose engine is at any moment going to fall out of its compartment and onto the street below, almost entirely because of what a galactic pain it is to narrow down my options.