These Facebook groups flip the script on dealerships by giving customers the leverage.
Dealer markups are getting so out of control that it seems we can’t go a week without a new story of markup lunacy. It’s reached the point where finding any sort of mildly interesting car for MSRP is almost impossible. However, some dealers see this as an opportunity to not only snag sales from customers they otherwise wouldn’t get but also look like the good guys in the process. In some new Facebook groups, dealers and salespeople are fulfilling customer requests for cars at MSRP.
These brand-specific Facebook groups have been popping up in the last year or so and are simply designed for customers to find dealers who aren’t marking cars up. It’s a delightfully simple concept: potential customers go to the brand-specific group they want, they post a request for a car at MSRP, and then dealers/salespeople make them offers. Sometimes, dealers will even post certain in-demand car listings at MSRP, or even lower, on their own.
via Toyota
It’s actually a fascinating idea because it flips the script on the typical dealer marketplace. Typically, dealerships holds all the leverage. They’re the ones with the cars and customers have to seek them out, so dealerships set the prices and the terms. But with these Facebook groups, it’s the other way around. The groups have the customers and dealerships have to match customers’ terms in order to get sales.
There are different “No Markup” groups for specific brands, like Toyota, Ford, Subaru, and Lexus, as well as specific cars, like the Ford Raptor and Maverick. In all of them, you’ll find new car listings at MSRP or lower from dealers who are vying for sales while boosting their reputation as the good dealerships.
These groups won’t stop dealer markups from continuing to get more and more out of hand but at least they offer an outlet for customers to get fair deals. You might not be able to find the exact car your looking for in any of these groups but there will be people who save money from them, rather than just paying whatever markup their local dealer was feeling that day.
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