MJones

Was $10,000 which I could live with.
Just found out today that they raised the price!
To a whopping $25,000.
I respectfully declined at that price!

chaosoul

hehehe

Mussl Kar

I stopped air freight when my toiletries kit went to $15,000.00 clams. Just put it in the carry on now.

bronson7

Curious question here. Anyone have any idea how many cars Porsche airfreighted in the past anually?

silverrules

Believe or not I have always enjoyed tracking the ship hoping it does not sink

C.J. Ichiban

They charged me something like 15,000 to airfreight my 911R in late December after it was supposed to be done in October.

Z356

Not many would be my guess. But in the recent past,
many of the 918s sold to North American customers
by PAG were shipped by airfreight!



****
But did you know that in the 1980's Porsche
seriously considered airfreighting all 911s
destined to be sold in the US directly from
Flughafen Stuttgart to Reno–Tahoe International
Airport to accelerate customer delivery times
and improved corporate cash flow!



See post #1891:

https://rennlist.com/forums/991-gt3-...-sale-127.html



Saludos,
Eduardo
Scottsdale

porscheflat6

Interesting information! Thanks for sharing

bronson7

Wow, the thought of air freighting all 911 cars back in the 80's would've been incredible. Just goes to show you how much profit is built into these cars.

Z356

Let's examine what you said, analyse what was
going on...& factor in the age-old time value of
money!

The normal journey of a 1980's Porsche from
Zuffenhausen to port, wait for transport, ship
across the Atlantic (and via Panama through
the Pacific if going to our West Coast), was
(AND STILL IS) very time consuming! Over
30 days at minimum. Often 60 back then!
And you add longer/more expensive land
transport, port fees in Germany, seafreight,
port fees in America, potential delays due
to labor strikes at port, etc.

The alternative was to negotiate an exclusive
arrangement with Lufthansa, get discounted
prices for high volume, a quick/cheap truck
transport from Zuffenhausen to to Flughafen
Stuttgart, same day arrival in Reno (where
Porsche bought a hangar/warehouse on the
airport's tarmac to expedite air freight arrival
of its cars) & then ground transport to dealers
from this strategically center located next to
modern Interstate highways (US80)!





This would allow Porsche to get quickly paid
for each delivered vehicle to their dealers, some
perhaps less than a week after they were finished
being built at Zuffenhausen! Average base price
of a 911 was then approx. $30K & rising. When
you also consider the large % of cars then sold
by PAG in California, just a short jump & skip away
from Reno, Nevada, you then start to realize the
sheer brilliance of the original plan!



Saludos,
Eduardo
Scottsdale

bronson7

Well explained Eduardo.

Nick

I am curious as to how many a cars a 747 would be able to ship to the US. Why was the plan discarded?

n2cars

[QUOTE=Z356;14216826
This would allow Porsche to get quickly paid
for each delivered vehicle to their dealers, some
perhaps less than a week after they were finished
being built at Zuffenhausen! Average base price
of a 911 was then approx. $30K & rising. When
you also consider the large % of cars then sold
by PAG in California, just a short jump & skip away
from Reno, Nevada, you then start to realize the
sheer brilliance of the original plan!



Saludos,
Eduardo
Scottsdale[/QUOTE]

My dealer in 80's was Vasek Polak in Hermosa Beach. They told me that 80% of Porsche's production came to the USA ... 20% went to the ROW. Of that 100% that was sent to the USA ... 80% was sold in California. That's one reason why Reno was chosen . Hop skip and jump to deliver vehicles in California.

Z356

That is the myth. The reality might be something
else. According to this source, % of US market
share of total Porsche production is much less
than what we all thought in the 1980's:




http://carsalesbase.com/us-car-sales-data/porsche/

****************************************
I don't know the actual logistics of how many cars
they could have fit on a Lufthansa cargo jet. It
would have been a Berlin Airlift...in reverse!



The plan was discarded, as I recall, because the
entire new system Porsche had envisioned for
selling their cars in the United States was stopped
cold on its track by the concerted legal action from
the franchise Porsche dealers. Porsche folded &
eventually moved its headquarters (of an organization
now called PCNA) to Atlanta. Karl Ludvigsen, author
of 'Porsche: Excellence Was Expected' (the bible for
many of us), wrote an interesting article on it for
Autoweek back in 2006, many years after the plan
was discarded:

Porsche vs dealers: No Contest

"A generation ago, Porsche tried to replace its U.S. dealerships
with a new distribution network. To the company's surprise, the
dealers' legal muscle prevailed. Porsche's U.S. sales were rising
and its profits were booming in the early 1980s. The company
wanted more direct control of its place in the U.S. luxury market.
In January 1984, the 323 U.S. dealers who sold Porsche cars
learned that the company would not renew its contract with
Volkswagen of America Inc., which had imported Porsches
since 1969. As of September, the dealers were told, they no
longer would get Porsches from VW. The other shoe dropped
Feb. 15, when Porsche executives met in Reno, Nev., with the
automaker's dealers. Porsche said it had set up a new company,
Porsche Cars North America Inc. It would be headed by a former
U.S. head of BMW, Jack Cook.

A subsidiary of the new company, Porsche Centers Inc., would
set up 40 stores across the United States to sell vehicles at
retail and also distribute them to dealers, said Porsche AG
CEO Peter Schutz. "Each will be from a cookie cutter," Schutz
told the startled dealers, "with a standard building of about
22,000 square feet on around two acres of land. Each will be
in an industrial park near a major airport." All of the centers
were to be up and running by the beginning of 1985, he said.
Porsche would spend about $25 million to build the centers,
Schutz said. In addition, Schutz and Cook hoped to attract
investment in the centers by existing dealers and wealthy
Porsche owners.

Going it alone

At Porsche headquarters in Stuttgart, the company's new
sales chief, Mario Jon Nedelcu, explained the reasoning
behind the plan. Now that VW was building cars in the
United States, he said, "the quality of the marketing organization
could no longer develop in sufficient measure to suit our
exclusive automobiles." Schutz also was concerned about
some U.S. dealers charging other dealers a hefty premium
for hot Porsche models, thus inflating prices to customers.
Porsche also would need a strong and efficient U.S. distribution
network, Schutz knew, to fend off growing competition from
Japan. Consultants assured Schutz that Porsche was within
its legal rights in planning its new network. "Since we were
establishing a completely new marketing apparatus," Nedelcu
said, "we had no contracts and no obligations. In this situation
we could establish our business as we felt it should be, and
in a form which suited the product."

Agents, not dealers

Porsche assured its dealers that they weren't out in the cold.
They could continue to service the cars. Acting as sales agents,
they also could take orders for cars that the nearest Porsche
Center would fill. But instead of maintaining their 16.7 percent
dealer discount, they would have to accept 8 percent as agents.
Porsche gave the dealers 60 days to decide whether they wanted
to be part of the new arrangement.

Dealer groups immediately attacked the plan. The National
Automobile Dealers Association said it "strikes to the heart of
the franchise system." NADA vowed to "take whatever actions
necessary to preserve the legitimate interest of our Porsche
dealers." The American International Automobile Dealers
Association said the scheme was "a frontal assault on the
entire automotive franchise system and must be resisted
by all automobile dealers. If Porsche can get away with this,
every carmaker will try it." U.S. Porsche dealers had invested
as much as $300 million in their stores, AIADA said. Porsche's
plan, it argued, would "render much of this investment valueless
and inflict grievous damage on these dealers."

Taking it all away

Dealers ridiculed the notion of investment partnerships in the
Porsche Centers. Said Joe Herman, a Porsche dealer in Rochester,
N.Y.: "It was like being told, 'We are taking your wife away, but
since we know you are still interested, you can buy a piece of the
bedroom set and once in a while you can come and pay a visit.' "
Alan Johnson sold 200 Porsches a year at his San Diego dealership,
and he raced Porsches as well. "I've developed an asset that I value
very highly," he said. "Now somebody's taking that away from me."
Volkswagen of America also objected to the Porsche proposal.
Fortune magazine estimated that VW made more than $40 million
importing Porsches in 1983.

VW found itself the target of lawsuits by its independent distributors,
which said the suspension of Porsche deliveries would violate state
franchise laws. To protect itself, VW filed protests against Porsche
with motor vehicle boards in several states. Most states had laws
that governed dealer termination and retail activity. Some prohibited
automakers from selling cars directly at factory stores, a common
practice in Europe. Despite the promise of lining up independent
investors, the Porsche Centers smelled suspiciously like factory
stores to many skeptics.

The dealers pledged to stick together. Just days after the Reno
meeting, dealers contributed more than $1 million to a fund to
fight the Porsche Centers plan. A new Porsche Dealers Action
Committee hired law firms in Washington, D.C., and California
to prepare federal suits. Dealers filed lawsuits against Porsche
and VW that sought more than $3 billion in damages and penalties.
They also lodged 69 administrative protests with state motor
vehicle authorities. In March, Porsche gave in. Cook told dealers
that the company was abandoning the Porsche Centers plan.
Instead, he said, Porsche Cars North America would work
directly with the traditional dealerships. It would negotiate
a new franchise agreement with the Porsche Dealers Action
Committee.

Following Europe's model

How did Porsche misjudge so badly? From a European vantage
point, factory stores were the norm rather than a threat.
Automakers in Europe could control their dealers much more
rigorously, because their franchise agreements were exempted
from European Community laws governing business competition.
Automotive News editorialized that Porsche had made "one of
the biggest retreats in the history of the auto industry. … We
fear that Porsche has damaged its relationship with its dealers
and that it may take a long time for the wounds to heal."
Fortune said Schutz's "repeated defense of the plan before
the family owners turned him into an advocate rather than
an analyst ... Lacking confidence in his German executives,
Schutz grew increasingly isolated as he concentrated on the
specifics of his scheme." In defeat, Schutz said that "in the
time available, we couldn't wrestle all the alligators. You
can't take on the whole world."

Cook's tour

Cook had told his colleagues he was convinced the Porsche
Centers project would succeed. He said later he was astonished
by the uproar the plan created. "We obviously not only struck
a nerve, but we struck a chord much deeper in the whole retail
automotive dealer organization," he said.

A former BMW dealer, Cook took responsibility for the "agent"
tag that had alienated many dealers. "That one is my fault,"
he said. "I wanted to differentiate between dealerships and
the new entity." Porsche's U.S. sales windfall proved transient.
As the German mark rose against the dollar later in the 1980s,
prices rose and sales fell. In 1988, Cook left Porsche Cars North
America. A spokesperson said, "Porsche has different plans and
measures to promote sales in the United States."

Karl Ludvigsen
Automotive News
September 25, 2006

Saludos,
Eduardo
Scottsdale

Nick

Good stuff! Thanks.