NoGaBiker

How is it that you've bought 3 Porsches and don't have a relationship that causes people to fall all over themselves fawning on you when you walk in the door? Seriously, I don't get that. I've been dealing with the same salesman since 2002, when my brother bought a 996 from him and had a great experience. I make appointments with him and everything is smooth as can be. I've followed him from one ATL dealer to the other.

Do you fail to leverage your buying power in all your other business relationships?

Gary JR

Yes we have heard one side of this one off anecdote.

STG

These stories always have two sides to them. There are plenty of buyer/shopper horror stories out there as well.

Plenty of shopper arrogance as well.

PCA1983

What part of the country are you located? I have not seen anything like that in my part of the country (Orlando and Chicago, and one I bought in Atlanta). This is my 9th Porsche, and I had one for 15 years. I've bought 4 since retiring near 3 years ago. I have been a PCA member since 1983, and am totally satisfied with Porsche dealers.

dflowerz

I bought my first Porsche and first 911 and had mixed results with e-mail. Best response was from the dealer in Bellingham, WA. For sure I could have done the best deal there but in the end I went with Porsche Bellevue since it is very close. I felt I was treated very well there and got a lot of followup after taking delivery to make sure I was satisfied and to answer any questions. But I was always aware that the dealership was very concerned about its customer satisfaction rating.

Archimedes

Nope. My dealer's been great. Good experiences with a few other local ones as well.

go.illini

I agree it is about building relationships. Especially if you expect a certain level of attention during your purchasing experience. For example, my wife and I have purchased or leased 6 BMWs in 11 years from our local dealer. Whenever I visit, even if it is to just look around I always get undivided attention - sometimes even from the sales manager. The last time I came in with my 5 year old daughter they gave her a nice BMW branded gift.

So I get it that if I walk in or email out of the blue that I may not have them falling all over me. I won't put up with bad customer service but I don't expect to be treated like royalty.

Archimedes

So true. I love to get my SA talking off-the-record and hear some of his stories. Some of the stuff he tells me customers have done is mind boggling.

bluehorseshoe

Here are some random comments after dealing with approximately 6 Porsche dealerships over the past couple months. Four of them were out of state, two were local. All were professional but the majority lacked follow-up (and this ins't a bad thing for me because I'd rather pursue the sale versus the sales person bugging me everyday).

One example was with a local dealer. Spent a few hours with the salesperson and test drove 3 different models while they looked at my trade. I believe the salesperson knew I was a serious buyer yet he never followed up with me after I left the dealership, never even gave me a number for my trade (told me they had to shop it around and would get back to me in a day or two with the number).

In part I think it may be the internal culture within Porsche to let the customer come back to salesperson, reverse psychology thing.
The other part, of course, is that they are very busy trying to keep up with current sales. Funny thing is that the discounts for new 2017 911s that I've found (6-8% off MSRP) seemed pretty standard across the dealerships that I shopped.

The last three cars that I've purchased were from out of state dealers and haven't had a bad experience yet.

Bradley Scott

I wasn't going to be the one who said this - but I don't understand it either.

Even if purchased at different dealerships, I would assume servicing the cars at your local dealership would build a magnificent relationship that would extend to the sales department as well. (It was in my case for my 3 S Classes - all bought in different dealers but serviced in Manhattan - the last S purchase from Manhattan because of the built relationship)

Gary JR

Reminds me of my BMW European Delivery experience. We were escorted down a ramp towards our car which was spinning on a disc and highlighted by spotlights. As our session with the customer assistant was finishing some assistants showed up with our luggage ready to stow them in the trunk. We drove off to begin our European tour feeling just like, uh, royalty.

fuddman

The notion that you can "build a relation" by purchasing more cars from the same dealer, IMO, leads to expectations which aren't really there.

It's much more accurate to say you're more likely to build a relation with an SA (or dealer) when you buy cars from him repeatedly at MSRP or, even more accurately, MSRP+. If you're a negotiator, you're an adversary for his money. He recognizes that relationship, even if you don't.
Relationship or no relationship, I'm not suggesting accepting or giving disrespect. As others have pointed out, in a business environment, there are ways to handle that. But, it is a business. And, as an SA put it it in a moment of frankness: "I'm here to make money, not friends." I find it helpful to keep that in mind when I'm shopping for cars.

NoGaBiker

^^ OP is complaining that he doesn't get treated like the wealthy, repeat-Porsche buyer he claims to be. Best way to solve that is to find an SA (as you and I both said) and buy from that same person every time if possible, at a reasonable haggle off of MSRP, but not a "I read on the internet that people are getting 911Rs for 12% below MSRP" type of haggle. This lets the SA know you're not going to just bend over, and also lets them know there's plenty of profit in it for them and that as long as they are reasonable you're not just going to take their deal down the street to save a dollar ninety five.

If you just want the best price on every deal, then being a hard-assed negotiator and walking away from a deal if it's not perfect may be the better approach. But it's not often you can manage to get the "Ah, Mr. Smith, welcome back!" treatment while choking the SA for every last penny you can squeeze out of him. It's kind of one or the other.

I bought a Wrangler 12 months before I bought my current GTS. I emailed 8 metro-ATL dealers, refused to talk to a single one on the phone, gave my exact specs that I would be ordering, and told them whoever gave me the Jeep for $4000 below MSRP (which was only about 29k) would get cash the next day. 5 of the 8 played along, two of them actually met the target, I chose the closest one. All because I wanted a good deal and couldn't care less about having a good relationship with a Chrysler dealer.

On the Porsche, my SA and I both knew I was almost certainly going to buy from him because we both knew he was going to treat me exactly as I wanted to be treated, spend 4 hours with me custom ordering exactly what I wanted while swapping old-school car stories, and in the end he'd give me 4-ish percent off on a fairly hot allocation at the time. That's how I wanted it. Saving another couple grand by spending an extra hour on the financials, then leaving and going to the other dealer to "show I meant it" and all the rest, was just something I wasn't interested in doing with the Porsche.

Dewinator

I'd love for Porsche to have their own dealerships like Tesla. That's not happening anytime soon, but your relationship with the SAs is much more important than the salespeople. The negotiating process is going to happen no matter what, but having someone who is willing to indulge you and really look into it when you say you're getting a weird noise or feel something strange or whatever is going to make all the difference.

Gary JR

Not in my experience. I want a fair deal and want my SA to make a fair amount for his efforts. Re: relationships this has served me well.