The car-buying process changed profoundly more than a decade ago when consumers began to research invoice pricing online. These educated consumers then walked into a dealer essentially knowing how low a sales manager could go in price to earn his or her business. While some salespeople and dealers lamented the availability of the information, others didn't mind: Front-end profit went down considerably on vehicle sales, but settling for a lower front-end profit often helped close a deal, and the true profit was then made in the finance department and later in the service lane.
There's a new boat-buying site ready to launch that wants to arm boat-buyers with the same type of information. It's called SeeDealerCost.com, but so far, the impending launch has been laced with controversy.
A press release announcing the site states: "Similar to sites in the automotive market, See Dealer Cost is not a selling site, but provides product information, including prices, features and specifications. Site users will be able to configure products and save configurations in their account, or print them out. In addition, a wide range of supportive information will be available, including financing, insurance, relevant articles, and pre-owned value information. For participating companies, See Dealer Cost is a lead generation and/or advertising site. Today's buyer requires high-value, technologically advanced products, great service, ease of doing business and the best deal possible. The problem is customers don't know what the best deal possible is. The auto industry, however, reports a higher closing rate when the customer is better informed."
Who's behind the new site? The Marine Retailers Association of America (MRAA) issued a letter to manufacturers to warn of the new site and identified the founders as former marine executives Jack Malone (Mercury) and Dave Taylor (U.S. Marine).
The letter urges manufacturers not to cooperate with SeeDealerCost.com and states the MRAA's belief that "the harmful effects that will result from the publication of actual dealer costs to the retail public are self evident. It is axiomatic that dealer profit margins will shrink to marginal levels as consumers, armed with actual dealer costs, will 'low ball' dealers with purchase offers slightly above dealer actual costs. In an already historically poor economic environment for the retail sales of boats, the negative resulting effects can be catastrophic as dealers, who sell less and less boats, will be forced to even lower and lower profit margins while still maintaining high overhead costs for labor, rent, insurance and floorplan interest charges. We can certainly foresee the scenario in which dealers will also be routinely compelled to try and explain to their potential customers that numerous other expenses, other than the actual purchase price of the boat from the manufacturer, must be factored into the retail price of a boat as set forth herein."
