Ford CEO says EVs will be sold 100% online with nonnegotiable price • Hacker News Board

Re: Ford CEO says EVs will be sold 100% online with nonnegotiable price

#571

Post by WorldMaker » Fri, Jun 03, 2022, 5:33 PM UTC

at-fates-hands wrote: post #416

devy wrote: post #369

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Maybe going direct is the secret plan, but I don’t see how they get there. Yeah, the dealership and the state level dealership associations aren't going to go out of business without some good fight. Even though I personally don't like the markup to be paid at the dealerships, but they exist for some good reasons: educate the consumers, financing, DMV paperwork and most importantly service your vehicles. EVs need m…

>> EVs need much less service visits but when they do - it's likely harder for DIYers to tinkle with. A car handle on a Tesla that needs replacing is $1,000.

The old car saying was: if you buy from BMW you pay for BMW.

Tesla wants to be the new BMW and at least in US car sales today is the new BMW.

Re: Ford CEO says EVs will be sold 100% online with nonnegotiable price

#572

Post by Salgat » Fri, Jun 03, 2022, 5:34 PM UTC

medler wrote: post #82

This article takes an off-the-cuff comment from the CEO of Ford and reads too much into it IMO. He wasn’t saying dealerships are going away; he was actually saying the opposite. The point he was making was that Ford is going to adopt some of Tesla’s practices while using the dealership network to compete with them. Here’s the quote with more context: “I believe for retail, we have to -- it's kind of like what happene…

That's not in support of traditional dealerships, that's a direct attack on their business model while simultaneously taking advantage of them. Sounds like Ford wants to turn dealerships into physical retail stores, like a Walmart for cars, which I imagine no dealership is too fond about doing.

Re: Ford CEO says EVs will be sold 100% online with nonnegotiable price

#573

Post by WorldMaker » Fri, Jun 03, 2022, 5:41 PM UTC

bluGill wrote: post #534

cuteboy19 wrote: post #405

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If dealerships are so beloved by customers and so beneficial to them, why would they lobby so hard against customers doing business with manufacturers? They wouldn't need to if customers truly preferred them. Instead, Car salesman are despised even more than lawyers! Everything a dealer can do, a mechanic can do for cheaper. It's a ripoff and the law forces it to be a ripoff

Because customers don't know what value dealers provide. They think direct would be better because they only see the negatives of the current situation and not the positives. Which is really true for pretty much everyone in this argument on both sides.

It's the lobbies that prop up the status quo because it has become very profitable, but it is easy to forget that the status quo exists in the first place as a series of compromises designed first and foremost for consumer protection against lemons.

Re: Ford CEO says EVs will be sold 100% online with nonnegotiable price

#574

Post by tmh88j » Fri, Jun 03, 2022, 5:53 PM UTC

itsoktocry wrote: post #492

ssharp wrote: post #455

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I had a dealership quote me $2600 for a required service package. The price of the parts was $400. It’s a bit of work but the labor was effectively over $366 per hour. I could have had the job done by an independent shop for $1000. When I pushed back, the service manager said he could do it for $1500. I have a recall repair on the car as well so I think my final move is to use that as leverage to push the price down…

> I had a dealership quote me $2600 for a required service package. I don't get it. "Required" by whom? Just say no, negotiate a better price, or take the car elsewhere. > Getting the repair done by the dealer gets you a warranty by the manufacturer, which is the only additional value that I see. No, the warranty exists regardless of where the car is serviced.

> No, the warranty exists regardless of where the car is serviced.

I'm not sure if that's true for Ford, but this is in the owner's manual for the Nissan GT-R.

> OBTAINING WARRANTY SERVICE

> You must take the vehicle to an authorized Nissan GT-R Certified dealer in the United States or Canada during regular business hours at your expense in order to obtain warranty service.

> WHAT IS NOT COVERED

> Repairs performed by anyone other than a Nissan GT-R certified dealer.

See the section titled "OBTAINING WARRANTY SERVICE" on page 11 and "GENERAL EXCLUSIONS" on page 12. https://www.nissanusa.com/content/dam/Nissan/us/manuals-and-...

Re: Ford CEO says EVs will be sold 100% online with nonnegotiable price

#575

Post by WorldMaker » Fri, Jun 03, 2022, 5:56 PM UTC

compsciphd wrote: post #461

medler wrote: post #82

This article takes an off-the-cuff comment from the CEO of Ford and reads too much into it IMO. He wasn’t saying dealerships are going away; he was actually saying the opposite. The point he was making was that Ford is going to adopt some of Tesla’s practices while using the dealership network to compete with them. Here’s the quote with more context: “I believe for retail, we have to -- it's kind of like what happene…

I honestly felt that this is where Sears dropped the ball. If any company should have had the "DNA" to compete with Amazon, it should have been Sears. Which basically owned the catalog/mail order space before the internet. They could have leveraged their large stores to be showrooms / distribution hubs (that they mostly already owned, which is why the private equity people were so interested in them, due to their rea…

Sears had the DNA and definitely were the Amazon of the previous century, but they didn't have the fight left in them. By the time Amazon showed up they were already being chewed apart by vultures for being fat, old, and complacent. There was already an LBO or three from private equity firms on their books and then the bad merger with K-Mart all with the intent of breaking Sears apart for pieces/scraps/brands anyway. Sears was already a walking corpse when Amazon came to fight.

I feel like the wilder "DNA fight" that wasn't was "80's Sears/Amazon wannabe": Service Merchandise. They tried to recreate the Sears formula for the late 1980s/early 1990s and basically convergently evolved the Ikea model before Ikea grew any US presence as just big warehouses with smaller showrooms up front. They made a bunch of silly mistakes in the 90s trying to grow beyond their roots in primarily the US South region to more national regard/footprint, but if they hadn't made those mistakes they probably could have been a real interesting contender against Amazon.

Re: Ford CEO says EVs will be sold 100% online with nonnegotiable price

#576

Post by WorldMaker » Fri, Jun 03, 2022, 6:00 PM UTC

yourapostasy wrote: post #336

zorak8me wrote: post #324

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Re: bestbuy “showrooming” issues, I think they actually figured out how to make it a value driver for them, whereas it killed others. It’s a great place to look at products, and they price match so you can walk out the door with the product instead of waiting.

> ... and they price match so you can walk out the door with the product instead of waiting. I would love to see the behind-the-scenes numbers crunched on that model. I don't see how that model works long-term unless the percentage of customers in the showroom walking out the door with online price-matched goods is a relatively small group, or they're successful up- and cross-selling on gonzo margin goods and service…

Another thing to consider beyond raw COGS is "attach rate": online price matching gets you in the door and buying the big ticket items, but once you are in the door how likely are you to also pick up accessories (especially if you are saving on the base item) or even unrelated things that you saw in the store while you were there?

Re: Ford CEO says EVs will be sold 100% online with nonnegotiable price

#577

Post by Sohcahtoa82 » Fri, Jun 03, 2022, 6:28 PM UTC

kingnothing wrote: post #556

PaulDavisThe1st wrote: post #548

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Just for reference, I've had a Honda Fit for 13 years, and the only maintainance I've had done over what you no doubt had to do on your TM3 (tires, wiper blades) has been oil changes. The car has 164k miles on it. I'm not saying the EV's are not theoretically more durable and (much) less maintainance-intensive. I am saying that the best of the best ICE vehicles are not as different as your observation about your own…

You're supposed to do more maintenance than that on your Honda Fit, such as spark plugs every 30k. Granted, it isn't much compared to other ICE cars, but you're downplaying the difference. Your car also has parts that frequently break on all ICE cars, such as a water pump, which simply don't exist on BEV cars. https://www.normreeveshuntingtonbeach.com/honda-fit-maintena...

> Your car also has parts that frequently break on all ICE cars, such as a water pump, which simply don't exist on BEV cars.

This isn't true. Tesla batteries are liquid cooled. When supercharging, you can hear the fan blowing on the radiator.

Re: Ford CEO says EVs will be sold 100% online with nonnegotiable price

#578

Post by wumpus » Fri, Jun 03, 2022, 6:30 PM UTC

majewsky wrote: post #450

bhauer wrote: post #370

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Not one of them had any QC issues. Same in my experience, though it's not as extensive as yours. It's surprising how often you see negative anecdotes about quality control amplified as representative of a larger trend. It often seems there is an agenda compelling many to work so hard circulating negative opinions.

There is a much easier explanation: Disgruntled customers are always more vocal than happy ones.

On reddit, it seems the most persistent repeaters of negative Tesla stories work in the car industry, and have never owned a Tesla.

There are definitely some disgruntled customers, too.

Re: Ford CEO says EVs will be sold 100% online with nonnegotiable price

#579

Post by elif » Fri, Jun 03, 2022, 7:04 PM UTC

cevn wrote: post #475

skolos wrote: post #357

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> the company optimizes delivery numbers of cars sold by sacrificing quality control How do you know this? Did you see their internal data? There are lots of anecdotes going around about Tesla's quality. However, with all the TeslaQ it is hard to believe that there is real correlation between anecdotes and data. Here are my anecdotes - I owned 6 Teslas over last several years. Not one of them had any QC issues. I had…

I'm here to chime in on having very few QC issues on my model 3 despite having gotten it in 2018. Not sure where all the service nightmare stories come from, every time I have dealt with them they've fixed the issue.

yea i've had 2012 leaf for decade now, zero issues. i've had a tesla for over a year now, zero issues. From what i understand, if i do have an issue, i'll just have to push some buttons in the tesla app, and everything will be figured out for me.

I think a lot of the contrary voices are people scarred by ICE experiences and searching for comparable "gotcha boogeyman" to EV's to satisfy themselves with their current car situation, whatever it is.

Re: Ford CEO says EVs will be sold 100% online with nonnegotiable price

#580

Post by 0xffff2 » Fri, Jun 03, 2022, 7:30 PM UTC

tmh88j wrote: post #574

itsoktocry wrote: post #492

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I had a dealership quote me $2600 for a required service package. I don't get it. "Required" by whom? Just say no, negotiate a better price, or take the car elsewhere. > Getting the repair done by the dealer gets you a warranty by the manufacturer, which is the only additional value that I see. No, the warranty exists regardless of where the car is serviced.

> No, the warranty exists regardless of where the car is serviced. I'm not sure if that's true for Ford, but this is in the owner's manual for the Nissan GT-R. > OBTAINING WARRANTY SERVICE > You must take the vehicle to an authorized Nissan GT-R Certified dealer in the United States or Canada during regular business hours at your expense in order to obtain warranty service. > WHAT IS NOT COVERED > Repairs performed b…

> WHAT IS NOT COVERED

> Repairs performed by anyone other than a Nissan GT-R certified dealer.

IANAL, but I don't think that clause is legal in the US. Any equipment originally covered by a warranty and still within the time/mileage limits of the warranty must still be covered unless Nissan can prove that the work done by an outside tech was the cause of failure.