Conekilr

subscribed....I am very intrigued and look forward to reading the final outcome of this mystery....It would be nice if we can get the breakdown by colours of these mysterious 30 PTS allocations...

Jimmy-D

Screw PTS. Get an RS in GT3 Silver and have the whole thing wrapped Satin Black.

shapiroeric

Well this is my first Porsche and while it's an amazing car I will say this whole thing leaves a bad taste in my mouth about the dealer network and brand.....

mcsmcs1

Not defending Porsche on this in the least, but seeing your avatar reminds me that I was never more jerked around than by Ferrari and its dealership network. In fact, lately it has felt like Porsche has taken a page out of the Ferrari playbook. I have a general principle that when a company makes it too hard to spend my money, I move on.

shapiroeric

Yeah not gonna try and say that's not true.....I will say my dealer was always upfront with me about the game.....they've always treated me great and I'm just an "average" owner.....

Z356

Yes, Dave, I can fully understand how you feel. It's has been extremely frustrating to see how Porsche has mishandled the PTS program, especially for the MY2015 gt3 allocations handed out from September 2014 forward.

Well, they better get their eyes checked because 'money green' is going out of favor with currency bill designers at US Treasury. Believe that department is studying issuing this groovy colored currency next! It was designed by a local San Francisco man that lives at the corner of Haight & Ashbury. What do you guys think?




I have asked all in the group of Rennlisters working with me on this story to give me the last input/update today re: whatever additional info they might have received today from their dealer contacts or PCNA. I will most likely post the entire story tomorrow here on Rennlist. It will be a new thread, but I'll post a notice here & a few others recent PTS gt3 threads. And then we will see if the CEO of PCNA responds to my email and clarifies the situation for us. But I think we need to bring this story out to the gt3 forum so that all of you know at least what we know in our smaller sub-group!

Saludos,
Eduardo
Carmel

.

shapiroeric

Eduardo....what kind of a response are you looking for?....explanation?....apology?....do they really care?....it would be great if they took this seriously but I have my doubts....how they can magically make 30 PTS cars after refusing early orders is beyond me...

Z356

What I have basically asked Detlev von Platen to do is to help us identify all the dealers that have been allocated these PTS gt3's. We have a pretty good idea (as the story I'll report tomorrow will demonstrate) but we have a few 'blanks' or 'holes' in our matrix. I have also made him aware that some of these 'lucky' dealers (although thankfully not all!) are asking huge premiums over MSRP.

These late PTS gt3's are additional allocation to US dealers of a particularly rare commodity in the MY2015 gt3's - namely 'Paint-to-Sample'. PAG artificially created a scarcity for PTS by instituting a moratorium on that desirable option last Fall. So they created the 'monster'. In the parlance of dealers price gouging is called 'market adjustment'. In this particular case, the market was manipulated by PAG's moratorium on PTS, which created this inbalance between supply & demand. Other standard color gt3's are selling at MSRP at US dealers. Some of these few late PCNA PTS allocations are selling at premiums over MSRP. So that is a fact. So my hope is that when Detlev von Platen learns that we know that some of these dealers are taking advantage of PCNA's largess (these are reward cars, after all), he might have no choice (because he now can NOT claim he didn't know) but to intervene & put the word out to these greedy dealers that these markups are counter to the spirit in which PCNA allocated these reward gt3's to them. Go back & read Mooty's recent post to see a good explanation of the kind of 'influence' that PCNA can exert on their dealers even if they are independently-owned businesses. If he believes these markups could hurt their reputation or create bad publicity, there is a chance he might tried to do something about it. Or so I hope.

As I decided when to break this story to the public, one of my principal concerns was that if all of these dealers with the rare PTS allocations (the ones we have not yet identified since they don't all necessarily show up at PCNA dealer database) start hearing of the premiums some California, Florida and WA dealers are asking for their PTS gt3's, or get a flood of calls from Rennlisters, it would stampede them also to raise their prices and ask for a mark-up. By alerting Detlev von Platen ahead of releasing the story to the general public, I am hoping that he will put pressure on these 'lucky' dealers and request that they NOT to gouge their customers. So it was a tactical move on my part in navigating through this complicated game of chess.

In addition, via this comprehensive email that I wrote to Detlev von Platen, I am giving PCNA the opportunity to correct the record in case any of the scenario which I presented to him is factually incorrect. Earlier last week I contacted Melissa Witek to ask her about these PTS gt3's. But she didn't provide any meaningful response, perhaps due to her middle-level position within the organization. By contacting Detlev directly (and he has staff to monitor all the incoming emails), PCNA can decide 'if', 'when' or 'what' to respond. Anything he or PCNA tells me on this subject I will post just as they wrote it or communicated to me, without editing or editorializing. 'We report, you decide!'...as Fox News likes to say!

I am also interested in finding out the truth behind the 'why' of these late PTS allocations. Who decided on these three colors - 'Signal Green', 'Arena Red Metallic' and 'Modegrau/Fashion Grey'? Who was given the right to specced them in a particular (and some might think odd) way? And I would hope they might fill in the void in our information so that we get a complete picture of their decision making re: these unusual late builds. I am a historian at heart and that is the kind of stuff I love to know about these special series of PTS gt3's that came at the end of MY2015 .1 991 series production.

As for the consequences to their decision to allocate these PTS gt3's, there will be undoubtedly some. You have already read in this thread the posts by some of Porsche's gt3 customers that feel totally betrayed by the appearance of these late PTS gt3's when they were denied their PTS request and were told that NOBODY else (except those that ordered MY2014 PTS and were pushed into MY2015 allocations by the Stop-Sale) would be able to get them. Then, without fanfare, a large number of MY2015's PTS gt3's appear at dealers and some of the latter are taking advantage of the scarcity by gouging PCNA's customers. I hope Detlev von Platen sees the injustice of this and addresses the issue that some of us have been raising in this forum as to how PTS and 'Porsche Exclusive' is run in this market. I would like to see a host of improvements. And I believe we here at Rennlist have particularly knowledgeable customers that PCNA should listen to regarding how to improve this particular program so that it meets the needs of their clients - us!

Finally, Detlev's response, or his silence, will tell us something about the quality of his leadership at PCNA. If he doesn't respond, which is his prerogative, Detlev has silently communicated something else to us extremely loud & clear. I am ready to listen to either message and report it all back to you!

Saludos,
Eduardo
Carmel

shapiroeric

^^^^Thank you very much Eduardo for the response and your interest and attention in this matter....I think I speak for everyone when I say we eagerly await his response, or lack thereof.....

PeteyDaddy

Curious to know if DvP responds. I haven't had a response to other PTS inquiries. Thanks Eduardo

KINGSRULE

One other major point on the PTS debacle not yet discussed...

PCNA flooding the market with PTS cars will diminish the $5500 investment those of us who have PTS cars/allocations were looking forward to. All of a sudden the exclusivity of a PTS GT3 is gone. I feel some compensation is in order here...

ranger22

Show me where porsche makes a promise of exclusivity with PTS? Compensation? Give me a break. Wtf is the deal with people these days?

hf1

So if 30 "PTS" cars hit the market and 200 people want them, how is it to be decided who gets them and by who? How is it more "fair" that a person who receives a first phone call from an ("honest", MSRP-selling) dealer gets the car than the person willing to pay $XXk more for it? Why should Porsche or a dealer deny the latter his chance to get the car he wants?

Is "PTS" actually paint-to-SAMPLE, especially in the case of these 30 cars where the color was neither chosen by their prospective buyers nor was it designed from anyone's "sample"?

Perhaps if there were less people falling for the Porsche marketing and lingo, there'd be less dealers able to sell these cars at huge mark-ups over (already "PTS" marked-up) MSRP?

I'd get a life -- it's just a painted car. You'll get bored by it in a year or two and look to replace it with another, just like the dozen ones before it.

stronbl

Subscribed ...

<3mph

You know, I'll admit that I also initially felt a little taken aback that Porsche would make so many copies of what I thought would be a unique car (at least based on the exterior colour). I told myself that while I loved the PTS program and was all for enthusiastic individuals ordering PTS cars however they dreamed up (even if it were the same as mine), there was something quite different about Porsche deciding to "flood the market" (I had thought similar words) with arbitrary selections. (Full disclosure, in case it wasn't obvious, I have a GT3 in fashion grey. I joke that I stole Conekilr's (ex)colour, but in truth had been considering a few similar non-metallic greys including modegrau before being made aware of his order.) I felt bad also for others who had ordered Signal green, or for JCBH who had the creative spark to put "Kills Bugs Fast" on his sill, and now were seeing their ideas "plagiarized" (if I can call it that, considering these are all just repeated from past cars or poster slogans).

However, the more I thought about it, the less I felt that way (at least about my own situation--I won't speak for anyone else). When anonymous918 mentioned he'd be getting a fashion grey GT3, I was ecstatic for him, and for the fact someone else appreciated the same colour too! I then began to see it as a bit of a compliment that Porsche would make cars using this colour. Almost like a wink wink, nudge nudge, we like it too and think others would want one just like it! In fact, if these cars increase the interest in these particular colours, by making them a little more visible to the public and Porsche fans, then perhaps this could end up even increasing their historic and perhaps monetary value (for anyone interested in their cars as investments), versus having a little known, poorly understood platypus of a car (no offence to platypuses) with a funny name (like "fashion grey") for a colour!

I guess if I have any reservations about the whole affair, it's that loyal, willing customers were passed over when the decision was made to produce these cars, and they were not also given the opportunity to order a car. Especially if it was in one of these colours, and especially if it turns out to be true that the PTS colour could have been modified to another colour. There is no real good reason why a few extra cars couldn't have been tacked on to the run to reopen the PTS window for these customers.

So, in the end I don't feel the need for compensation for myself (just like as a Cat C customer I didn't feel that compensation was required), but perhaps an apology and option to make things right for the customers who missed out on PTS is in order.