You Can Buy Cars On Amazon, Rivian Tops Satisfaction, Small Biz Sentiment Up

Paul J Daly  0:01  
All right, Wednesday, December 11. Today, we're talking about the big drop yesterday. You can now buy cars on Amazon. We're going to review that process. Also talking about rivian topping the satisfaction charts and small business sentiment. Actually first saw that story yesterday, and it made me so happy. I made a post about it. Got feelings and thoughts and feelings and feelings, thoughts and feelings

Kyle Mountsier  0:27  
about today, just so everybody knows, and we, we, I'm gonna, I'm gonna sneak preview the fact that there's a chance one day, we may change the name of the show because, you know, but today the automotive troublemaker shall be the automotive troublemaker. So you if you were wondering, liver, why it's called the troublemaker, today is the day why it's called the troublemakers. So stay tuned every problem as we get ourselves and everybody else in trouble,

Paul J Daly  0:56  
it's kind of speaking of getting in trouble. We're gonna put that right there. Tell you about a website that we made called nada parties.com and this is going to be the authority and all of the parties that are going on after the NADA show each day in January, go to nada parties.com so you can see the parties. Pick where you want to go, or if you have a party, you can actually submit it, and we'll put it on the site, because they're a two sided marketplace, you know what I mean here? And by the way, we'll mention this. We're having a party this year, and it's going to be awesome, and we hope you can go. However, there are very limited tickets, and some of the tickets are sold out. We're gonna have a lottery at the end with some remaining tickets, but make sure you go to the site and get on the list. If you're you need to be on the wait list. Get on the wait list. If you're a dealer and you still need a ticket, there's still some available, but make the decision now to go tree and you're good. Just don't get it. Gotta commit to going, because we're gonna verify that you're going the day of or the day before. I don't know how it's gonna work, because we have limited so we don't need the old like, this isn't the kind of party you sign up for and then you don't go like this is the only one you sign up. If you are going you do that,

Kyle Mountsier  2:04  
we will publicly shame you. We're gonna, I'm kidding. That's not Well, I don't know. We're, we're nearing the wall of shame for multiple reasons. Why not? Well, we

Paul J Daly  2:13  
might do it for a soda con people trying to get their own dealer tickets. They might be a public posting this year.

Kyle Mountsier  2:17  
I'm ready for it. Let's go. Troublemakers, unite.

Paul J Daly  2:21  
Okay, all right, here we go. Big, big, big news. Yesterday, Amazon opened its online car shopping marketplace. Amazon Auto is 48 cities, including major hubs like Los Angeles, Dallas, Miami, not Syracuse. The platform opens a streamlined buying experience. Started with Hyundai as its launch partner, and they do have this fortunately, in Nashville, where Kyle is, so he's going to shop the site for a second, and while you're pulling that up, basically, shoppers can browse finance, schedule, vehicle pickups through the Amazon ecosystem. Hyundai, the first one on board, with more brands expected to join in, 2025 they are emphasizing local dealerships remain integral to the transactions. Gin offension, Amazon, auto global headset, quote, dealers are the sellers of record. Interesting way to put that, that sounds like a sounds like a very non automotive. Way to put that, well,

Kyle Mountsier  3:10  
that's the that's their platform. They got sellers of record. Okay? They

Paul J Daly  3:14  
also said the online experience will drive happy customers to their dealership, promising upfront pricing, trade and valuations. Handle it online. They want to integrate more features like test drives and expanded financing options and Kyle's on the site right now. There we go as we first

Kyle Mountsier  3:31  
thing is, is they're, they're dropping a $2,300 uh, where do you see this incentive? Look at this. You see this right at the top. It's for a limited time. Buy a car, get $2,300 in amazon gift cards. Are you dead serious? I mean, that's bananas. You can buy so many wysiwygs. It's unbelievable. That's

Paul J Daly  3:56  
you can buy through this timing. I mean, the timing is perfect, because, if you're the

Kyle Mountsier  4:00  
timing is really, it's like, Christmas gifts, buy a new car for Amazon. It's like, let us give you this money you're gonna spend here. You know what? You know what dealers should do? They should drop like, $2,500 in amazon gift cards as, like an incentive somewhere. You know, I don't know. I'm sure there's some. And if you're

Paul J Daly  4:15  
just listening, it's a very clean homepage, and their slogan is, find period by period. Go, go, go. Period.

Kyle Mountsier  4:22  
Yeah, super, you know, super Amazon Okay, go ahead. Super amazoning, yeah, but you got this little, like, nice, clean app experience looking thing. Now, we haven't been on the app. I don't have the app shared, but, like, it's kind of a basic, you know, run of the mill, couple value home page, couple landing value props, you get to the SRP, and you get basically the the normal Amazon shopping experience, which, in my opinion, on the desktop isn't that great. It's just not that great. No cards, definitely like hot I don't know someone in auto figured out that, you know, decided. The like.

Paul J Daly  5:00  
So basically tell the people for they can't. On the left side, you see make the only option is Hyundai. You have a price slider that starts as low as 22 five and goes up over 53,000 then it has a bunch of check boxes that you can pick for. You know what type of range you're looking for. You can pick a vehicle. Then you can select the TRIM models, select body color. They're all like little options on the left hand left side of the page, and then the vehicles appear on the right side of the page, like Amazon products would, yeah, and it's all new cars. What's that display ad form? And you got a little display ad for what is that? Scroll down. There's a display trying to sell you.

Kyle Mountsier  5:35  
Oh, look at this. Oh no. Shine high. Hold palm made. They don't know you. They don't have me picked at all here for that. That's hilarious. I'm not even logged in. They just already know, right? They're like, ah, these two bearded guys. I'm talking about millennial. He was a millennial. Unbelievable. So then you go to the actual thing. You still get the deal with the $2,300

you've got, you know, oh, the the first to write a review. Look at that little first to write a review on a product. I wonder if you this could be a lot of fun. Our price care clarity at Amazon autos, we're up front with every cost, fee and rate, so you know exactly where your dollars go. Begin a purchase to your custom price with eligible savings and rebates, plus add a trade and you can use instantly if things change. We offer the flexibility to cancel at any time before driving your new car off the lot right up in the Oh, you got a gallery, little iframe gallery here, uh, kind of hard to navigate the galleries and fake pictures. I mean, this is honestly like, this is about as good as a 2012

Paul J Daly  6:41  
dealer website. Come on now, 2015 at least. Yeah,

Kyle Mountsier  6:45  
maybe 2015 lots of things up here in the price card. But that's pretty typical for Amazon.

Paul J Daly  6:49  
That's the thing. Like, this is familiar Amazon vernacular, right, right. So I think that that's what they have working for. And the people are looking it's, I mean, but

Kyle Mountsier  6:58  
I will say this, they have a full, I mean cars rule ready, like price breakdown, detailed price breakdown rebates. Rebates are clearly listed. Rebates are listed any install, factory installed, options, MSRP, price, win, financing, dock fees, the whole nine yards. It says who the seller is. I'm obviously in Nashville. It says Hyundai of Columbia. You got a little deal. Click on

Paul J Daly  7:27  
Hyundai of Columbia. Click on that. Let's see. What the like does it tell a little something about the

Kyle Mountsier  7:32  
dealership? Let's see. So we've got a goes to this page, and it's got like, a little like landing page that tells you about landing page. Worst landing page ever. It's pretty I mean, this is, like, definitely basic, right? Like, the most clean, cool looking thing is this, right in the middle there's a little, like, display thing that says, begin your purchase that links right back to the home page, ladies and gentlemen, so you're already down. Still a lot to be desired here, but

Paul J Daly  8:01  
okay, well, hey, they took a swing and it's like, did it? If you're one of the markets, you can go shop it. I totally the the be the first to write a review. I feel like we need to go in and troll every vehicle we can. No, don't troll and push them back to more than cars like this. Is why local dealers are awesome.

Kyle Mountsier  8:17  
Ah, because they sell cars on Amazon. There you go.

Paul J Daly  8:23  
If I'm a dealer right now one of those markets, I'm absolutely filling out a review for every one of these vehicles. Every you

Kyle Mountsier  8:30  
like, send your people, fill out the reviews on the cars. Nada.

Paul J Daly  8:33  
Let's shut it down. All right. Well, there you go. We got Amazon in the game. Not not in beta. Are they in beta? Is it technically?

Kyle Mountsier  8:40  
It says beta right at the top. Oh, well, there you go.

Paul J Daly  8:42  
Well, I hope, I hope that people know that they're going to use their activity for research and development purposes, because they are okay. Well, there you go. Lot of research. Oh, get

Unknown Speaker  8:55  
out of that. One didn't say too

Paul J Daly  8:57  
much. Get in trouble. Thought, more rivian BMW and Tesla are the three automakers topping the Consumer Reports brand satisfaction survey, which shows that EV brands are excelling in owner loyalty, while traditional automakers fight for consistency. An impressive 86% of rivian owners would buy a rivian again, cementing the brand status as a leader in owner satisfaction. Tesla rose two spots in rankings, but did see a slight dip in owner buy again sentiment compared to last year, the top five brands overall, rivian, BMW, Tesla, Porsche and Lexus. The bottom five, RAM, oh, RAM, Chrysler, Nissan, Volkswagen and Jeep. Well, Volkswagen surprised me. Surprising Yeah, the Consumer Reports survey highlights how automakers with broad, consistent lineups build long term customer loyalty, uh, while those uneven lineups struggle. But the EV thing like, especially with rivians, you and I saw like rivian, you understand why it is what it is

Kyle Mountsier  9:55  
look I've not talked to a revision owner. That isn't the same thing. As someone who eats keto or vegan or does CrossFit or cross like they all run in the same circles. They like you walk up, you're like, Hey, how you doing? Did

you know I drive a rivian? Have you seen my rivian? You know, it's, it's, it's one of those brands that has attracted a an extremely loyal following. I think BMW and Tesla have the same thing. You think about this. It's like people that are buying these brands are shouting from the rooftop that they're buying and owning these brands. And

Paul J Daly  10:32  
I don't think it's funny. I don't think of BMW that way, but I feel like Porsche that way. But maybe I'm just not, I

Kyle Mountsier  10:38  
don't know. I would say like BMW owners are proud of their BMW ownership,

Paul J Daly  10:41  
okay, for sure, yeah, I feel you,

Kyle Mountsier  10:45  
yeah. But like, it's, you know, I don't know it's, it's a, it's a symbol, it's a status symbol. But it's also clear that, like, they put together a vehicle that people love driving and would buy again, yeah?

Paul J Daly  10:57  
Think I, when you look deeper in the report, the only issue where rivian Did chalk up some complaints is in the servicing, right? Which is, which is valid, right? They don't have a net, big network built out. We've covered some stories of things taking a while and but, uh, I mean, I don't think anyone would not trade for something,

Kyle Mountsier  11:16  
something, local dealers, something, something is that? What you heard something

Paul J Daly  11:21  
about that I don't know. Got it speaking of small local small businesses,

Kyle Mountsier  11:29  
apparently, small business confidence in the US has surged to its highest level since mid 2021 driven by post election optimism the National Federation of Independent Business than en fib, if you want to, if you want to get that done. And fib reports significant improvements in economic expectations, hiring plan and sales outlook. The index rose to 101.7 in November, marking an eight point jump. Small business owners are expecting the economy to improve. 36% of them plans to higher increase to the highest level in a year with 32% of businesses reporting compensation increases. Wow, and fewer owners in the in the survey listed inflation as their top issue. Though 28% still plan price hikes in the coming months, so people still driving those prices up. Transportation, construction, professional services, still struggling to find people.

Paul J Daly  12:28  
Ah, so I have a few thoughts about this. Number one, the optimism isn't X rose to one. Oh, 1.7 that sounds like a radio station. What's the scale here? I don't understand. I know, but it seems like it's good the best results in four years. I made a post about this on LinkedIn because, and the premise is, what's the ROI of a fired up small business owner? And right? You start like, people are optimistic about things, which means better working environment, better customer experience, less stress on families. And I think it's one of those things, like people say, Well, you start talking about a recession too much. You're going to find yourself in the middle of one. The middle of one when you have optimism like that also is contagious. And there is something about this holiday season that feels a little different. When you just start out and about in the retail stores in the malls, right? It feels different. And the fact that small business confidence is up is a major player in that. I'd be, you know

Kyle Mountsier  13:19  
what? I'm you know what's interesting to me, actually, this is like now that I'm kind of like, in retrospect, over the last couple weeks, even restaurants that I've been in, I've gotten more interactions with management than I have in a very long time. Like most, I don't know if there's a training or there's just this refreshing going on in the small local business. They've been passing Will's book.

Paul J Daly  13:43  
There is changing Nashville now. Everyone's like, oh, you never know. You never know. There is some there's something in the air. And I think it feels really good after a lot of years of just COVID and all the and inflation and all the things. So I think everyone's kind of starving for some optimism, and I think it's going to catch on. Going to catch on, or it is catching on. Obviously, I'd be curious to see how the next dealer Sentiment Survey matches up to this small business one, because a lot of dealers are technically small businesses, right? And we'll see if those two rise together. I wouldn't be surprised if they were. Obviously, we have our own things that we're dealing with. But, you know, it's just Wednesday. We're optimistic. We got in here we are. We default to optimism. I wonder if we got in trouble today. We'll find out later in the social media. If you don't follow us on LinkedIn, let us know what you think by following on LinkedIn and telling us talk to you next day, next day tomorrow,

Kyle Mountsier  14:35  
the next day, the next day, give him the next day.

Transcribed by https://otter.ai

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