BMW's Push for Custom Order Cars

[crackberry]

Originally Posted by chemgeek

The dealers certainly like to tell you they can keep the deposit. It's nice to work in the legal field, because not only will they refund the money, but apologize for the inconvenience at the same time.

Do they make you sign a contract that lists that the deposit will not be returnable? i feel like that is something southbay bmw would pull.

in that case, what would happen?

[DrakeKemper]

Originally Posted by BMWI6

BMW does NOT make a 5 liter turbo so unless this guy is willing to pay millions of $$$$ for BMW to develop it for him, I guess he's not gonna get his X5 the way he wants it.

He said V8 turbo, which they do make, in the X5M

[dtc100]

I still like to find the closest car I like on the lot, warm it up, take it to a very long test drive, try all road conditioins including redlining it several times to make sure it is as solid as a piece of rock, before taking it home.

If it is not what I expected, I will find a different package, go through the same process until I feel that I can live with it for the next several years. This cannot be done if I am test driving a demo, I have driven many demos, they are never the same as a brand new car on the lot. Bad idea to use demos to get customers to like the car.

[crackberry]

Originally Posted by dtc100

I still like to find the closest car I like on the lot, warm it up, take it to a very long test drive, try all road conditioins including redlining it several times to make sure it is as solid as a piece of rock, before taking it home.

If it is not what I expected, I will find a different package, go through the same process until I feel that I can live with it for the next several years. This cannot be done if I am test driving a demo, I have driven many demos, they are never the same as a brand new car on the lot. Bad idea to use demos to get customers to like the car.

agreed. if you are going to ask someone to pay for features, you should be able to test drive it before you buy.

its also hard for people to buy stripper cars because they ride so differently than fully loaded cars, making it really hard to buy a car without being able to test drive it.

[XC]

It surely makes the whole experience feel as something special... as long as the waiting time doesn't expands too much. Having the money in your hand you are tempted to get whatever is sitting in the showroom...

[Imola.ZHP]

Originally Posted by jmikeh

great. now let me order an E91 with the twin-scroll turbo so I can have the car I really want. oh wait - my bad. American's don't like wagons. I'll have to take that damn SUV off the lot...

x2!

[cipher5]

Originally Posted by iBeJayKaying

....Except that they're not ACTUALLY letting us "custom build it" the "way we want" right? I mean, where's Individual Program in all of this?

....So really, even when having the car "custom built" we're "sacrificing what we really want" such as color and other options, exactly as BMW claims that we're doing off the dealer lot. So what's the difference in the end? Custom building it or buying it off the lot, we still make sacrifices and don't get what we really want (in America where the individual program isn't available to us).

'Course, this is just my $0.02, feel free to disagree.

AMEN brotha!

[Itanius]

Most Americans don't like waiting 2 hours for a new car purchase, let alone 6 weeks.

[The J-Man]

The video link of the car being born will be a monumental failure, ala BMW Owner's Circle.

[RPM90]

Originally Posted by dmboone25

Surely this initiative is limited to the X vehicles produced in South Carolina, right?

There is no way I could get a 3 series from Germany in 2-6 weeks...it took both of my E92s and my E82 8 or more weeks to get to my driveway...

Unless the Spartanburg plant will start building cars as well....

I ordered my 135i as I wanted it, and it was delivered to me at my dealer within 6 weeks. Some take even shorter. If there is a car already in the "pipeline" that is ready to be built close to what a customer wants, then if your salesperson can get the slot they can reconfigure the options to meet the customers wants. It can shorten the delivery by 2 weeks.
The longest part of the whole deal is the ship transport and then getting it from the port to your dealer.

BMW has an excellent process by which to customer order and build, but the shipping is the slow down, as some cars have to wait at the shipping port for a ship. If BMW were to bring 1 and 3 series manufacturing to the states, we could custom order and have our cars in less than a month!

It sucks that US car companies can't even do this with cars built right here in our own country. I've asked about a Mustang getting ordered an built and it's pretty darn near impossible. The sales guys just steer you away from that idea saying it would take too long.
I'm patient though. I'd still be willing to wait 2 months if I can get the car options exactly as I want.

There was a time in the US where a customer could order a long list of factory options and get what they wanted, from colors, gauges, engines, performance exhausts and transmissions, to cosmetics, radio's, etc...
But, times got tough in the 70's and economy of scale allowed for lower manufacturing costs. So, building a bunch of identical cars kept prices lower, and people wanted the lower prices, but lost the customization.
The US auto market hasn't recovered the customization since then.

Even Japanese/Asian cars can't reliably or quickly be customized.
Last year when the Hyundai sport coupe came out, I asked if I could custom order what I might want, and was told, No. The dealer said he gets what they send, though they do get some say in certain things. But, once the order is put in that's it. And, the dealers want to sell what's on their lot as it costs the money to keep the cars on the lot. I say it would be better to allow customers to order cause that's a SOLD car, opposed to the dealer picking lot cars that just sit there cause they ordered too many options or not enough, with the wrong transmissions.

Audi/Porsche, and BMW really have their act together, and their sales shows that it works.

[RPM90]

Originally Posted by iBeJayKaying

....Except that they're not ACTUALLY letting us "custom build it" the "way we want" right? I mean, where's Individual Program in all of this?

....So really, even when having the car "custom built" we're "sacrificing what we really want" such as color and other options, exactly as BMW claims that we're doing off the dealer lot. So what's the difference in the end? Custom building it or buying it off the lot, we still make sacrifices and don't get what we really want (in America where the individual program isn't available to us).

'Course, this is just my $0.02, feel free to disagree.

What we do get is a LOT better than nearly all other brands.
Packages are good for a reduction in overall component costs.
You can get nearly all the parts from the premium package individually, but in the end, if you get most of the individual parts of the package, you're better off getting the whole package as it will cost about the same, and you'll get a couple of extra items thrown in.

It would be great to get more options given to us, like the whole pallet of exterior colors and interiors. Maybe with the new system BMW will be able to keep costs down and still allow greater customization.

Still, what we can get now is a heck of a lot better than what Ford, GM, or Honda, etc.. can offer.

I don't feel like I compromised at all with my custom order, especially since I was able to get a manual trans, cause of the 5 BMW dealerships I went to NONE of them even had a manual to test drive, let alone packaged with the options I wanted.
To me, there is a big difference between getting what's on the lot and what I ordered.

[ptack]

Originally Posted by bavarian19

I have ordered my past 2 cars from the factory. I will continue to do so.


BMW would get more custom orders if they would start offering custom paint and things like the msport package at the same time Euro markets get it.

Ditto.
Just more BS from the BMW marketing department. Give some more choices and maybe people will be more interested.

[FStop7]

Originally Posted by crackberry

what? all the bmw dealerships require a deposit in the la area (except maybe southbay....and you have to order m3's with at least the tech and prem package)

And your deposit is 100% fully refundable under CA law.

Originally Posted by ptack

Ditto.
Just more BS from the BMW marketing department. Give some more choices and maybe people will be more interested.

Are you prepared for MSRP to go up significantly in order to cover the cost involved in putting more choices into BMW's processes?