Somewhat OT: Is selling for a car dealer a good job?

[Rick Lee]

For years I have had a repressed fantasy of selling cars for a living. I have been in sales (in other fields) for about seven yrs. now and came minutes away from leaving my current job a few yrs. ago to be a service adviser for Audi. My boss gave me a 20% raise on the spot to keep me. The other night I was surfing Craigslist and came across a sales opening for a local BMW/Audi/Porsche dealer (ad didn't say which one). So I fired off an outdated resume, a one paragraph cover email and voila - they just called and I have an interview there tomorrow.

I like my current job a lot and am the top producer here. My boss is good to me and I work in a very cool environment, never past 5:30pm and never on weekends. BUT....I will probably never make much more money here than I currently do and I know plenty of car salesmen make a LOT more than I make here. So I figure I'll either put this car-selling fantasy to rest for good or jump on it by going to this interview. Anyone have some experience or advice here? I'm all ears.
__________________

[Joe Bob]

It's a whore's business. The perks and discounts aren't worth it. Even if you are management you aren't safe from the boss coming in and firing everyone for a crappy month.

[biosurfer1]

i think it depends greatly on the dealership...i worked as a detailer for 5 different dealerships over 3 years (4 owned by the same guy), including Mercedes, and i would reccomend working at only one of them to any friend. most of the sales guys were under constant pressure to sell more, no matter how many they sold, it was never good enough....tremendous negative reinforcement around those places. being a detailer was fine because most of the guys would treat me well and i got paid no matter what, cant say the same for sales guys, no sale, no paycheck.

but hey, if its your dream job, i say try it out for a while and if its not for you, quit, you certianly wouldnt be the first.

and BTW, i'm sure you have a great resume, but they will hire you pretty much no matter what, you have to give them a reason not to...good luck!

[john walker's workshop]

picture a pack of hungry crocs when lunch is served.

[Rick Lee]

"and BTW, i'm sure you have a great resume, but they will hire you pretty much no matter what, you have to give them a reason not to...good luck!"

Now that's funny. Before I came to my current job, I tried and tried to get an interview with the local BMW dealer and never could. Ditto for Porsche....even though they were running ads for sales jobs. Do these kinds of jobs start out with a base salary or a draw? How long does it take to get a sale? How much commission can you make on one sale?

[biosurfer1]

the first month is usually quite different than other, the managers give you almost all of the "up's" or potential sales so you should sell alot in the first month, they do this for two reasons, first, they want to see how good of sales person you are, and they want you to make a alot of money the first month so you'll stay. i know that most of the guys at the typical dealerships (ie toyota, honda, acura) started off at 13% and worked their way up to 20% comission, but that information is basically worthless since there are so many loopholes and backdoor items that increase how much you'll make with warranties, add-on's etc.

give you an idea....i used to have to do the the so called "Premier Paint Protection", which was basically was good wash and a glorfied wax job, maybe took an hour of my day ($7.25), and the kit they use ($99, of which only about 1/4 was plenty to do the job)...so the total cost them about $106.25...i know for a fact they sold this item for $995, with the sales person taking about $475 if they sold it, pretty amazing.

i started working at the dealerships because i wanted to know how the business was run, and after 3 years, i know about as much i can, and still dont know how the fu@! most those places run, the money flow is unbelieveable.

[biosurfer1]

since 3/4 of the paint protection kit was left over, we always had bottles and bottles of it laying around because they gave us a new kit everytime someone bought the service, we used to use it on our own cars all the time, i'd say i did my car probably 25 times over the years, so that means my car is worth $25,000 more right?i'll start bidding for my tacoma off at $45,000

[Rick Lee]

Now that's interesting. Is that 13%-20% of the total price or amount above dealer invoice or what exactly is that figure? Last time I went with a friend to buy a BMW, they tried to sell her the clear-bra for $995. I just bought the whole Invinc-Shield kit for my 993 for around $135 and will DIY intall it. Sort of like girls working in clothing stores or guitar players in music stores, I'm worried I'd spend even more on car parts than I already do!

[Shawn 357]

Very tough business, service advisors tend to get yelled at by their boss, the customer, claims adjusters, and also have tough work schedules. You can make good money, but good dealerships are few and far between.
The amount of markup on extended warranties, aftermarket corrosion products, window etching, gap..........is ridiculous.

[EdT82SC]

I work close to an auto mall, and sometimes for fun I'll go test drive some car or another at lunch. I've noticed that the turnover among salespeople at these dealerships is amazingly high. It's seems like the norm is that they don't last 6 months. I have no idea if it's because of the job, the dealership, or the type of person they hire to sell cars. Makes you wonder though....

[Rick Lee]

I know this dealer is one of the good ones. I've gone to them for years for parts on my BMW and Porsches and know lots of folks who've bought cars there. I think it's a little different than the auto malls with endless, common cars. If I were ever going to buy a from a dealer, I would definitely go to these guys and I would not consider working for any other dealership in this area.

[biosurfer1]

Ed, you couldnt be more correct, i recently went back to the toyota dealership i worked at to have some work done, and i walked around and there were 36 sales guys there when i was, only 2 remained who i knew, and that was less than 2 years ago when i quit.

as to the % they make, i believe that it was 13-20% of what the car sold for, as long as it wasnt an ad car(which are the ones you see in the paper), then the sales person only got $100. interesting thing about those cars are there were guys who would push those the most and guys who would do everthing they could to get you to buy another car. i used to wonder why some guys would push those so hard, but i realized that people looking to buy those cars usually didnt require much time, in-out-onto the next, so it was a quick $100, but other guys just didnt see them as worth the money.

in addition to comission, sales people also got "spiffs" during the month, $1000 for the top seller, $750 for second...etc.

one lesson i learned that i didnt know going in is that the sales guy is really not the bad guy, sure some are, but for the most part, they would sell you a car for whatever to get their money, its the sales manager who makes all the haggling necessary, trying to squeeze every last dime out of you. so dont be so hard on the sales guy next time, unless its clear he is also a scam artist...

[Cookie Porsche]

Rick,

Things might be different in your part of the world, but...

My best time (work) ever was in car sales - I loved the job. Yep - it is not for sissy's or clock watchers, but if you're mad enough it is great.

I believe it is a killer job for the killer - it may be cold on the top but the view is the best.

Oh - I left to start on my own and today have two great businesses (one is a Porsche shop). I still dream about my days with BMW (sob sob).

Tom

[Chuck Moreland]

My first job was prepping cars at a Datsun dealership (Datsun is now Nissan for anyone with no gray). This coming from my perspective as a 16 yr old punk working in the shop, I may be the least qualified to answer, but

They had 5 or 6 sales guys that were producing and stayed. Then every month 3-4 newbies would show up. At the end of the month they were always gone.

Getting the job looked easy, keeping it - not so. Looked pretty stressful.

edit: Wow. I just realized that is a turnover of about 40% PER MONTH!

[Todd Simpson]

I like my current job a lot...My boss is good to me and I work in a very cool environment, never past 5:30pm and never on weekends.

Not many people can say all that about their job.

A friend of mine was selling BMW's and making 150K a year. He worked nearly every Saturday and evenings until 9PM.

He left and now sells mortgages over the phone from his home office. He's got a steady group of agents he works with that send him business (no here today, gone tomorrow refinances)

An occasional weekend but no nights. Come summer he moves his office to his home on Cape Cod. Not bad quality of life.

[biosurfer1]

and since i always get asked the question, "when is the best time to buy a car"...the answer is the last tuesday night in january, 5 minutes before the dealership closes and hope that its raining...

[Todd Simpson]

My friend's advice-


Anticipate high stress and long hours, but with good sales ability better than average income, typically 25% of gross profit for commission. BMW Nat'l average is about $2600 per car. The more sales the merrier!

[}{arlequin]

RL, I think you should check out this flick... just for fun, you know
http://imdb.com/title/tt0199054/

[Hawktel]

I think you would be crazy to quit what you have to sell cars.

I have a friend who is in the selling cars business. He got fired 4 times one month. Each time he had to go in an beg for the job back. He has worked at 8 places in 4 years.

He didn't have a saturday off in those 4 years.

If you want this, I'd say keep your real job, and see if you can get a gig working at it part time.

Honestly I'm not sure why we keep the current system of buying cars. Seems like a silly way to do business.

[Rockafella]

Probably like quite a few guys here, I had a (couple of) car dealer jobs scarring my working life. A lot of my friends did too during our high school and college years. My $0.02 is that it is the most pure sales environment ever! Cut throat and high pressure.

Your job is not to sell cars, but to make money at all costs. So, in this regard, it is exactly like the sales job you probably have. I am also in sales and the only differences I see are that the product is something I like (good) and the level of dirtiness is higher and more acceptable (bad, of course).

I have so many stories from my 3 years that it's unbelievable. Lots of fun for my age at the time, but I'm not so sure I'd find it entertaining now. The real money is made on used cars and accessories, as the margins are higher and the comp structure is roughly the same (15-20% of gross profit after the house takes its cut...so GP on invoice + "pack" or more likely a "mini" of $50-$100 per unit).

Personally, I would love to get into the business, but I figured that if I wanted to do it right, you get into a peripheral business like finance, insurance, and warranties. That's where the real money is made. The "buy here, pay here" guys make more money than any legit high end salesperson ever will.

Rick, you sound like a professional sales guy. If I were you, I would figure on a limited timeframe just to learn the business and make the contacts. If you want to make a carrer out of it, I suggest the F&I desk.

Oh, if nothing else, you'll get the lingo....."Mooch" = customer that wants everything for free, "roach" = crappy car/crappy customer with bad credit, "stroke" = joyrider........and the list goes on.......

Your first order of business is to get a white suit with white shoes


PS, the best sales guy at the last dealership I worked at had salt rings on the OUTSIDE of his suit jacket and messed up teeth, but he sold units like a mad man. That's your competition