Tried to buy a trailer yesterday but.....
Hi all, as the title states, we found a 5th wheel we liked and sat down to make a deal with the sales manager who of course took over from our original salesman. After taking all of the information about our trade in, out came "the book" to look up it's value. After looking up our trade, he stated a value that he would give us as a trade in on our new purchase.
Fine, then came the offer which was full MSRP minus trade in plus some BS charges. When I countered by taking out my calculator and lowering the MSRP by 30% and deducting the trade value he had just given me, suddenly my trade became zero! He said that the trade included a discount and that the bottom line was all that mattered.
So I came back and asked what the price would be without a trade. He went back into his office and returned with a number written in black felt pen with a big circle around it. He stood over me and slapped the paper down in front of me saying that was what I had to pay.
My wife and I immediately stood up and said we might check back later in the year when they were more hungry to sell us a trailer at a more reasonable price and walked out. We sat in the car for a minute but nobody came out to beg us back in so we left feeling good about our decision.
What really got me though was the email I got this morning from our salesperson thanking us for allowing him to show us the trailer yesterday and that he would be in contact and continue to help us make a deal.
Ha Ha. What really got under my skin was the fact that we were potential repeat customers at this dealership, having bought our last trailer there six years ago. The sales manager never acknowledged this fact and when he stood over me in a domineering posture, I had to leave before I would have had to get into a confrontation with him.
I know that this is not the typical sales tactic but felt I had to share it.
Fine, then came the offer which was full MSRP minus trade in plus some BS charges. When I countered by taking out my calculator and lowering the MSRP by 30% and deducting the trade value he had just given me, suddenly my trade became zero! He said that the trade included a discount and that the bottom line was all that mattered.
So I came back and asked what the price would be without a trade. He went back into his office and returned with a number written in black felt pen with a big circle around it. He stood over me and slapped the paper down in front of me saying that was what I had to pay.
My wife and I immediately stood up and said we might check back later in the year when they were more hungry to sell us a trailer at a more reasonable price and walked out. We sat in the car for a minute but nobody came out to beg us back in so we left feeling good about our decision.
What really got me though was the email I got this morning from our salesperson thanking us for allowing him to show us the trailer yesterday and that he would be in contact and continue to help us make a deal.
Ha Ha. What really got under my skin was the fact that we were potential repeat customers at this dealership, having bought our last trailer there six years ago. The sales manager never acknowledged this fact and when he stood over me in a domineering posture, I had to leave before I would have had to get into a confrontation with him.
I know that this is not the typical sales tactic but felt I had to share it.
