Dealer News

The head of Volkswagen’s  Scout Motors unit insists legal actions by several dealers won’t thwart the automaker’s direct-to-consumer sales model.

Automakers are apparently worried about losing billions of dollars thanks to the steep deprecation curve on all-electric vehicles. The industry expected them to be worth significantly more and are reportedly growing extremely concerned as demand remains low while leased EVs come back to dealerships.

Automotive News has a as guest column out regarding what service managers need to do to get more loyalty from customers.

Hey there it's podcast time!

A car dealership has had its license suspended by the Michigan Department of State over a legal disagreement on what technically constitutes a new vehicle.

While the role of tariffs enacted by President Donald Trump might be small when it comes to rising average transaction prices, the tariffs are costing car dealers money. At least according to one report.

Today's podcast was all about a company that is helping dealers bring mobile service and repair to the customer.

Hey there! It's podcast time!

General Motors is looking to spiff up its stores.

General Motors is revamping dealerships for its Buick, Chevrolet and GMC brands for the first time in nearly two decades. The new program is designed to move the locations away from the traditional dealership experience to yield an open design concept and less high-pressure sales tactics.

It's podcast time again! A day early, because of the holiday. This week we discuss glass cleaner, NASCAR at Atlanta, and whether car dealerships are doomed.

Drivers might be more willing to take EVs on road trips, but high charging costs could put a damper on the fun, at least north of the border.

It's considered common knowledge that consumers would rather take their cars to an independent shop for repairs than the more-expensive dealership. But is it true?

I've been wanting to ask this since we showed last week that consumer trust in dealership service departments is high. Other QOTDs took precedent. But now I have my chance.

Do you trust your dealerships service department?

Depending on your experience, you may have mixed feelings about your dealer’s service department, but a recent study from J.D. Power showed that owner satisfaction with dealer service departments remains strong in 2025.

Automakers sometimes argue with their franchise dealers over markups, EVs, and other issues, but one Volkswagen store is facing a lawsuit from the mothership over slow sales. The OEM said that the New York-based Prestige Imports dealership’s failings have cost it around 1,500 sales over the last 14 years and noted that the store’s leadership hasn’t done much to improve the situation.

It seems a tripartite of price issues, demand problems, and a hamstrung product catalog have spurred a number of Mitsubishi dealers to bend the ear of its North American CEO.

Following news that Florida-based Volkswagen dealerships would be suing Scout Motors over its direct-to-consumer sales, it was brought to our attention that Washington State was likewise coming to grips with non-traditional retail methods. The Pacific Northwest apparently wants to see more all-electric vehicles and is entertaining the prospect of giving them more leeway in order to improve sales volumes — something it has already done for Tesla.

Last week didn’t just bring snow to New Orleans, it also brought a raft of Stellantis dealers to town for a key meeting – and most of them left feeling revved up about the year ahead.

CDK Global has been accused of systematically bogarting the market for dealership management services by California-based rival Tekion, with the latter having launched a lawsuit alleging that CDK is intentionally attempting to curtail any legitimate competition by withholding data.

A trio of insurance companies are suing a New York dealership and the American Honda Motor Company after over a million dollars in property damages were paid to a local homeowners association and the owners of a vehicle that caught fire while parked in their garage. Insurers are claiming that the fire was the result of botched maintenance and negligent vehicle design and are looking to recoup payments.

Nissan dealers in the United States are living through a traumatic experience.

One of my favorite moments in The Sopranos involves mobsters trying to shake down a large, faceless corporation. When the mobsters are told by the manager of a local store that if he acquiesces, he'll be fired and replaced by someone else and the corporation will make sure the mob doesn't get any money.

Perplexed, one says to the other "it's over for the little guy."

That scene came to mind when reading/editing Matt's piece on Penske Automotive Group scooping up another prolific Ford dealership.

Penske Automotive Group has just purchased Michigan’s Bill Brown Ford in Michigan, which sells more Ford-badged automobiles than any other retailer in the world. This is the second Ford dealership purchased by the company this year. Penske had previously bought Don Allen Auto Service Inc. in Massachusetts.

Remember that CDK hack from last month?

Yeah, well, it appears the software company paid a $25M ransom to the hackers.

While it might seem like some car dealers’ technology situations are complete messes, there are some pretty robust processes happening on the backside of their websites and “contact us” forms. CDK Global is a major provider of Dealer Management System (DMS) software, and the company recently experienced significant cyberattacks that will leave its software out of service for several days.

While new-vehicle inventories have been on the rise this year, we’re still below the average supply levels witnessed prior to 2020. But we're getting closer.

While there are absolutely exceptions, the days of the super-sleazy used car dealer seem to be behind us here in the States. Anyone ripped off by one of them probably wishes we had laws like those in England, where a shady dealer recently got jail time for his actions.

Last week, Ford CEO Jim Farley asked a group of dealers for some open and honest feedback while promising to spend the next few weeks visiting showrooms. The point was to create a conversation between the automaker and dealerships that have grown annoyed with some of the changes Ford has been asking them to make. However, the latest from the North American Dealers Association (NADA) meeting makes it sound like the relationship may still be dicey.

In yet another chapter of dealers (and their financial arms) behaving badly, Toyota Motor Credit has been levied $12 million civil fine and also order to fork over $48 million in restitution after a court found the organization played fast and loose with some rules.

The United States doesn't have a monopoly on shady car dealerships.

Nobody likes bureaucratic red tape or waiting on payment and this seems to have become a sticking point for retailers nervously waiting to see how the United States’ updated EV tax credit scheme plays out.

According to a report from Automotive News, dealers are getting worked up about the prospect of not receiving money swiftly enough — mimicking some of the hardships endured during the Cash-for-Clunkers period.

Odometer rollbacks were a thing back in the day when cars had mechanical components tracking mileage instead of advanced computers. Despite the complexity involved in tampering with modern vehicles, one Ohio dealership group is accused of rolling back the mileage on used vehicles and deceiving buyers about the condition of its inventory.

On this Friday afternoon, we find ourselves adding yet another post to our ‘Dealers Behaving Badly’ tag. This time, some former employees at a Nissan dealer in North Carolina are on the hook for more than 400 charges.

Over the weekend, your author happened upon a rural Ford dealership seemingly frozen in time, still using signage from past decades and proudly eschewing whatever cold corporate design is currently being foisted upon dealer principals by The Suits in Dearborn. It was neat to see a store embrace its heritage.

Not all are so lucky, such as a San Antonio Hyundai dealer who is currently removing what many are describing as a local landmark. Why? According to the dealer group’s head of marketing, it’s not part of the “Hyundai experience.”

With dealer lots starting to fill back up with product after years of lean inventories that encouraged salespeople to ask for absolutely ludicrous prices, the Federal Reserve has found that lenders are declining would-be borrowers at a record-setting pace. 

The reasons for this are many. Annual percentage rates have come up, requiring consumers to pay more money over time that lenders just aren’t certain they’ll see a return on. More people are also defaulting on loans across the board and inflationary pressures are poised to make the issue worse since the dollar just doesn’t go as far as it used to.  

After weathering pandemic-related shutdowns, chip shortages, and barren lots, some dealers are complaining our nation’s rail system is suddenly no longer up to the task of delivering new cars. A few are saying they have a point, whilst others muse it is a bit of karma for three years of price gouging and “additional dealer markups”.

The last few years have been crazy for car shoppers, with inventory shortages and harsh price gouging running rampant. That said, the market seems to be healing, and some dealers now find themselves with too much inventory on hand. CarEdge recently released a report on the vehicles that sit on dealers’ lots the longest, and one Jeep model shows more than two years of supply. 

Hands up if you’ve ever had a car repair stretch on longer than your liking. Chances are, most of us have been without our wheels for an unexpected spell – whether that was at the hands of a so-called professional garage or one’s own wrenching ineptitude is often up to our own personalities. This author has sadly fallen into the latter category more than once.

When I worked as a service writer, an upset customer threatened to kick my ass right then and there in the service drive. If I recall correctly, he was upset because there was a language barrier and the price for the service came in higher than he'd expected.

Today's shady dealership story comes to us from the Chicago suburb of St. Charles.

This is where Nissan of St. Charles owner Fred Vargason was forced to pay more than $13,000 out of his personal accounts toward his employees' retirement funds.

Here's a story involving shady behavior and dealerships that is a flip of what we've covered lately. In this case, it's a would-be customer screwing the dealership.

Anyone who has ever bought a new or used car from a dealership knows the minefield of add-ons customers must generally navigate before signing on the line which is dotted. Just this week, my own parents were presented with a deal sheet that showed an admin fee ($799), tire warranty ($499), and undercoating ($999) on a second-hand Lincoln from a non-Lincoln store. They walked.

Consumer Reports has recently published a list of dealership extras they recommend binning when buying your next car.

The way things are going, we could probably just have every story we cover be one about dealerships and bad behavior.

This time it's not financial scams or unsanitary behavior -- it's racism. And the dealership itself isn't actually at fault -- though arguably it missed the opportunity to squash the incident before customers found out.

This is a weird one. It's another "shady dealer" story, but unlike the alleged scam we covered yesterday, this one is just plain gross.

ByrdDawg Motors in Idaho is at the center of accusations that it has scammed customers.

One car buyer claims he was out $20,000.

Maybe it's a coincidence, or maybe we're just paying closer attention as we trawl for news -- or maybe it's that phenomenon where when you see a story on a given topic, you start seeing more.

Regardless, we've seen a ton of "dealership behaving badly" stories lately. As well as "companies behaving badly" stories. Even wrote a few.

So, here's a quick roundup of five dealers who might be seeing lumps of coal in their stockings this weekend.

“There is no choice but for them to improve. They have to find a way to meet customer expectations.” Those are the words uttered by Steve Center, Chief Operating Officer of Kia America, at this year’s L.A. Auto Show in response to questions about the brand scoring dead last in a sales satisfaction survey about its dealerships. 

Well, it seems Dan O’Brien Kia of New Hampshire either didn’t get the memo or is hell-bent on becoming the poster child for Center’s ire. After all, being told to pay $1.25 million in a deceptive practices settlement are unlikely to ingratiate the place to their brand’s COO.

Buick has big EV plans, and its dealers will be paying a big cost if they want to stay with the brand.

Electric-vehicle startup Lucid has sued the state of Texas, saying that the rules around selling cars in the Lone Star state are so restrictive they amount to "economic protectionism."

Ford's plan to divide its dealers by type of combustion system -- Ford Blue for internal-combustion vehicles, Ford Pro for commercial, and Ford Model E for battery-electric vehicles -- has hit a snag.

Every day I see more dealer markup stories. For example, yet another Nissan Z markup story crossed our internal news wire desk this morning.

Federal Trade Commission (FTC) has proposed comprehensive rules changes regarding dealership advertising and how finance and insurance offices are handled. However, dealers, specifically the National Automobile Dealers Association (NADA), aren’t happy with these new ideas and have issued formal challenges to the regulatory scheme.

Younger drivers have reportedly had it with the dealership experience, with Gen Z even more disenfranchised than Millennials. Though it’s difficult to imagine anybody visiting a showroom within the last 12 months having any other reaction. Incentives are down, prices are up, and there’s a good chance whatever you wanted to buy isn’t going to be on the lot anyway. Someone saying they had an exemplary dealer experience is becoming about as common as people claiming they enjoy going to the DMV.

However, CDK Global Inc. still opted to conduct a survey in the hopes of determining just how much less tolerant younger shoppers might be compared to older generations. The takeaway probably isn’t going to shock you, even if the sheer volume of first-time buyers that don’t care for dealerships might.

Following word that Mercedes-Benz wanted to refocus on producing high-end luxury vehicles with loftier profit margins, the German automaker has decided to eliminate dealerships in Europe so it can move on a direct-sales model similar to what’s offered by Tesla.

The company is reportedly eliminating up to 20 percent of its dealerships in its home country and roughly 10 percent globally (with a focus on Europe). This follows previous assertions by Mercedes that half of the brand’s domestic sales will be done via an “agency model” by 2023. Following an agreement with its own dealer network, the company said late in 2021 that it would begin eliminating the traditional scheme of dealers buying their vehicle stock based on market conditions with consumers coming in to haggle. The new plan puts more financial pressure on Mercedes and eliminates any chance of price negotiation. Meanwhile, dealers will get some cash for every vehicle sold and whatever after-sales services they can render.

If you frequent this website, there’s a good chance you’ve seen an article discussing how smaller car dealerships are being incorporated into larger entities over the last few years. As with most other industries, the trend has been accelerating and Automotive News just shared the metrics showing how far we’ve come over the last decade. According to the report, consolidation among mega dealers has made heaps of progress of late and should continue on with their mission of never-ending growth because none of them want to become the little guy after every pint-sized showroom has been bought up in North America.

Genesis is an interesting brand. Decades after Japanese automakers launched premium nameplates of their own, South Korea’s Hyundai decided to spin off one of its sedans into an entire luxury sub-brand in 2015. The resulting vehicles have been solid performers, representing excellent value for individuals in the market for something fancier. Genesis is building real luxury cars and working to differentiate those models from Hyundai Motor Groups’ mainstream products.

But it’s had to overcome plenty of obstacles. While Genesis’ product might be dunking on some of the other Asian luxury brands, achieving the same notoriety has been difficult for the fresh nameplate. The company also isn’t targeting Acura, Infiniti, and Lexus. Its sights are set on the Germans, with many vehicles already comparing favorably. But if Genesis is to become a serious rival, it needs to distance itself from the Hyundai and Kia models it traditionally shares a lot with — resulting in its very first standalone retail store in the United States.

As the industry continues struggling with its planned swap to electric vehicles, we’ve seen plenty of framing suggesting dealer networks are only too happy to participate. But it’s usually juxtaposed with articles indicating that pushback exists, typically whenever the metaphorical rubber meets the road. This month provided several premium examples stemming from the National Automobile Dealers Association Expo (NADA Show 2022) held at the Las Vegas Convention Center.

Though the best had to be when several dealer groups piped up about how much it’s actually going to cost them to install some of the newer chargers some manufacturers believe should be mandatory if they’re intent on selling EVs. Some showrooms are finding out that not all buildings are wired for the high loads incurred by modern charging systems, requiring additional financial investments they hadn’t counted on. With automotive dealerships using product delays as leverage for unprecedented vehicle pricing, it’s nice to see them getting a taste of their own medicine. Or it would be if the costs for updating facilities weren’t guaranteed to be reflected on future window stickers.

The Insurance Institute for Highway Safety (IIHS) is claiming that individuals shopping for a secondhand automobile end up learning less about the modern features lurking within their automobiles. Considering salespeople have meetings about how best to hype the advanced driving aids in new models, this one really shouldn’t have required a survey for the IIHS to piece it together. But the outlet appears to be attempting to link this alleged lack of knowledge to make claims that it’ll somehow contribute to the probably of used vehicles being involved in a crash.

“Used car buyers were substantially less likely than new car buyers to know about the advanced driver assistance features present on their vehicles,” stated IIHS Senior Research Scientist Ian Reagan, the author of the study. “They were also less likely to be able to describe how those features work, and they had less trust in them. That could translate into less frequent use, causing crash reductions from these systems to wane.”

You’re probably well acquainted with dealer markups by now. Supply shortages created during the pandemic have left the world with fewer automobiles and car dealerships are taking full advantage of the elevated demand. As you might have expected, this trend resulted in plenty of people overpaying or becoming cautious of a market they now see as wildly predatory.

Car manufacturers have begun asking dealerships to take it easy on the price gouging. General Motors made its plea last week and Ford has followed up by reiterating its own concerns during the company’s Q4 2021 earnings report. The Oval is worried that dealer markups are tainting its relationship with customers, with top executives making casual references to the trend back in November. Ford CEO Jim Farley is now telling dealers that they need to cut it out lest they be punished by the manufacturer.