GM Looking To Ebay?

At General Motor's press conference this morning they stated that they are in talks with Ebay over selling their vehicles on the popular website.

This could work in my opinion as you search the make, model, color and options within a certain distance from your home and purchase the vehicle online and then go to the dealer that has the car or truck and pick it up. Pricing is uniform, eliminates rebates and you secure financing online and sign all of the paperwork at the dealership when you pick up your new car.

Only one very big problem! Trade ins!

Dammit, what do you do with your old car or truck? Sell it on Ebay? Suppose no one is willing to buy it? They could always go to the dealer that has the new vehicle and see if they are interested in it just like you do now. Are you starting to see the big role that the dealer plays in the new car sales process. Who pays off the present loan you have so you are free to get another one? The dealer. Who makes all of these vehicles available for immediate sale at considerable interest costs? The dealer. Who provides knowledgeable staff to make sure you get a vehicle that will meet your expectations? The dealer. Who is responsible for the things that go awry with any new car or truck? The dealer. Who provides trained and knowledgeable service people to solve any problems that do occur? The dealer.

People in most cases do not consider all of the things that dealers provide them so they can sell the old car, payoff the old loan, have vehicles available NOW. Dealers front the money for all of these things to happen and want to also make a profit, yeah, like maybe 1 or 2 percent gross.

Now I will be the first to admit that not all dealers are concerned with just how successful the whole sales and service process goes. Most times it is a huge mega dealer that has a business model of volume, volume and more volume and have no concern regarding selling you another vehicle. It is all about today's profit. I worked at a very large dealership and they needed to take in $2,000.00 per day from vehicle sales just to pay the interest on all of those cars available for sale NOW. That $2,000.00 did not address the 35 people involved in selling vehicles paychecks or the mortgage, insurance, electricity, advertising,health care, equipment, depreciation or any other number of varied expenses. I'm pretty sure total daily overhead was around $9,000.00 per day.

Frankly I just don't think a laptop and a mouse are going to substitute new car dealers. Sorry Meg!