Ford dealership in Massachusetts has best sales day in months after employee pricing announcement
As the United States levies tariffs on all foreign cars and auto parts, customers and dealerships have been bracing for the sticker shock. In response, Ford Motor Company announced a promotion to give all customers their employee discount.
"A lot of manufacturers have announced price increases already. I saw Volkswagen is adding a line on the window sticker for an import fee," said Chris Lamley, President of Sentry Auto Group. "Ford is the number one automaker building cars in America, with the highest number of hourly autoworkers, and that is why they decided to come out with employee pricing for everyone."
Lamley admits he and his sales staff we were on pins and needles as the tariffs dropped on April 2. They were expecting price hikes and a difficult sales market. Instead, this past Saturday they sold 17 cars. It was their best sales day in the last four months.
"I have been thinking about a car honestly for three years now, and I decided between avoiding tariffs and taking advantage of the Ford opportunity, now would be a good time," said Joshua Murdock, a Sentry Ford customer.
Murdock drove an hour and a half from Rhode Island to Medford to buy his new truck.
Customer saved $1,500 on Ford truck
"It has been sitting on the lot for four to five months now, so I was able to avoid the tariffs, and that saved $1,500 with the employee pricing," explained Murdock. "The tariff is 25% on autos, so that would have been a 25% increase because the model I bought was made in Mexico, so It would have been subject to the tariff."
"The employee prices on most cars are lower than what the prevailing price would have been in the market," said Lamley.
The question becomes, can dealerships still profit at these much lower price points especially when competitors begin to raise prices.
"We will see how that shakes out, obviously that's not the customer's problem, that's our problem. My father founded this company, and one of his core philosophies is that our goal was to sell each customer two cars this one and the next," said Lamley. "We would rather sell twice as many cars, and make half as much on each one, and if that's what it comes out to, we are OK with that."
Lamley says Ford makes 80% of its cars in the U.S. but does have component pieces from Canada and Mexico. Those parts would be subject to tariffs.
