Will this catch on over here?

helimachoptor

Belgian car dealer offers second car for free


BRUSSELS (Reuters) – Buy one, get one free: it's a familiar sales pitch for happy-hour cocktails or last season's fashions, but now a Belgian car dealer is luring customers with just that line.
Antwerp-based Cardoen, which sells about 10,000 new and nearly new cars per year, started the promotion at the end of November and said it would run until December 15.
During that period, customers can choose from a range of new, full-price cars -- the cheapest being a 22,800 euro (19,878 pound) Hyundai van -- and then pick a second free vehicle from a selection that goes up to 14,000 euros.
"People have been coming in from all over Belgium and abroad," Cardoen's Commercial Director Ivo Willems said, adding that Cardoen's eight showrooms had seen more than 10 times their usual number of visitors since the promotion began.
"People will still buy cars, you just have to give them as much advantage as possible, to sell in an innovative way."
Willems said Cardoen was able to run the promotion without losing money because distributors in southern Europe had been so desperate to get cars off their lots that they were selling them to Cardoen at large discounts.
The move underscores how difficult the situation has become for an auto industry buckling under a global economic downturn.
Belgian new car registrations fell 16.4 percent year-on-year in November, according to data released on Monday. In Spain, sales nearly halved.
Willems said Cardoen had yet to see an impact on its sales from the downturn.

Would certainly shift a lot of cars anyway

http://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20081205/od_uk_nm/oukoe_uk_belgium_cars;_ylt=AnekUBRinGz68_epmMmDSlLtiBIF

keefg

Ha ha....that's gas....before I even opened your post I thought to myself the only way cars will shift in this climate is if dealers do a buy one get one free offer .

Those crazy Belgians.

niceirishfella

Why not take it up a gear and offer 3 for 2 like Boots? ;-)

Thoie

How many 3-legged people are out there needing 3 boots?

niceirishfella

Thoie wrote: »

How many 3-legged people are out there needing 3 boots?

well, I develop a 3rd leg when I see YORE MA!:D:D

Vegeta

Weren't Autozone doing something like this? Or is the dash polish getting to me again

peasant

niceirishfella wrote: »

well, I develop a 3rd leg when I see YORE MA!:D:D

Keep that crap for AH please

helimachoptor

I would probably shell out for a new car if I could get a decent 2nd hand car for free.

busman

Saw something similar when I was in the US a few years back. http://www.rosevilleautomall.com/
Dealers were giving a free car when you bought a new one! Think it was Chevrolet. If you bought a new model car or truck they would give you 2 year old but still new compact car!

At the time there was no other way they could get rid of the stocks. Nobody was buying compact cars.

John_Mc

peasant wrote: »

Keep that crap for AH please

+1

Possibly the most unfunny and overused sentence on boards :rolleyes:

bazz26

My local Ford dealer was doing this a couple of months ago. It doesn't look like it was a success as his forecourt is still stacked full of used cars.

BTW I'd love to see these "free" cars. There is no such thing as a free lunch as they say.

fletch

Yeh weren't Ford giving a free Ka when you bought a new Fiesta(presume it was the old shape)

djk1000

A little off topic perhaps, but I'm just back from Spain and I saw 2 for the price of 1 apartments!

kluivert

Excellent way to flood the market with even more second hand cars making them even cheaper than they are now.

I feel sorry for Car manufacturers, especially the ones who are stuck paying people in Detriot for not working because of trade union agreements.

If theres an over supply of cars then the prices will drop, just look at the picture in the Irish Times website of a worker loading cars onto a lorry in the middle of a compound in Amercia just littered with new cars going no where.

seamus

I'm not sure just how much it would catch on here at all. Certainly if myself and herself were both looking to get new cars it would work, but in any other circumstance you're effectively stuck with another vehicle that you need to tax and insure and NCT and service.

Does anyone know what the tax and insurance regime is in Belguim for cars?

barryfitz

We'd probably end up with a shed load more muppets on the road.

Example...
Ted buys a new car from his local dealer.
Ted get a smaller second car as part of the 2 for 1 deal.
Ted gives the second car to his 17yo son/daughter/nephew who has just passed his theory test but hadnt got the money to buy his own car.
Teds relative goes out on the road the next day with only the slightest idea of how to drive.

so we get more. non indicating, lane hogging, rear end sniffing fools who think they are the mutts nuts when they are out on the road.

smash

There was a good story a few years ago about this... http://www.snopes.com/business/deals/porsche.asp

it wasn't real though.

Goodluck2me

kluivert wrote: »

Excellent way to flood the market with even more second hand cars making them even cheaper than they are now.

I feel sorry for Car manufacturers, especially the ones who are stuck paying people in Detriot for not working because of trade union agreements.

If theres an over supply of cars then the prices will drop, just look at the picture in the Irish Times website of a worker loading cars onto a lorry in the middle of a compound in Amercia just littered with new cars going no where.

This isn't going to affect the price of cars, it's only a drop in the ocean.

Berty

Lots of dealers have been doing this already.

Autoxchange and Ford - Lyons of Limerick, Pierse motors Tipperary and Sheils Motors in Ennis.

Old News. Instead of the garage paying around €500 to scrap the car they will give it to you for "free", i.e you pay for the scrappage instead. LOL