Many, many years ago I was at Hegarty Motors on Long Island (suburb of New
York City) when the MG TF was introduced. The Salesmen were bad mouthing the
car-"looks ugly", "not classic like the TD", etc. I though these were the
people who were supposed to make want one so bad you would part with your
pre-inflation $2,000 to buy one... Hegarty was one of the bigger, better
British car dealers-along with Nemet and North County (or Country) in the Long
Island area. All three were BMC/Triumph/Jaguar/Rootes dealers. In 1969 none
of them could get me a new Arrow-I had to buy it from a Chrysler
dealer-Chrysler cut off all of the foreign car dealers in 1967-68 and sold
Sunbeams only through Chrysler dealers. This was even worse as the Chrysler
dealers had no idea how to fix the cars.
A lot of dealers here in New Jersey have coffee, cookies etc. to try to make a
friendly atmosphere, but a good dealership is very rare.
Jan
"Russell & Neola" <rmaddock@petrie.hotkey.net.au> wrote:
I've never actually been into an MG showroom, but when the MGF was launched
here in Australia that's more or less the type of showroom they were
proposing. Supposedly MGs were to be sold through a chain of cafes where you
could dine and sip coffee with the cars on display around you. I've no idea
whether the proposal turned into reality.
Russ Maddock
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Sunbeams hit the Gold Coast in June 2001 - www.qld.sunbeam.org.au/national
>
> What would be nice is if the British car companies came back and studied
> Saturn's dealer network and principles. Saturn's cars aren't interesting,
> but their operation and attitude is pretty slick. Imagine an MG dealer in
> downtown USA - there's a nice pot of tea and tray of biscuits on a table
in
> the showroom, some plush chairs at nice oak desks for the prospective
buyers
> to sit comfortably. A regular drawing room kind of feeling. Salespeople
who
> aren't genetically related to sharks, that are ready to speak to you when
> YOU want them to, about a reliable product with the flavor of the United
> Kingdom.
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