\"Would you buy a car from this man?
Richard Macer spends a month at a car supermarket in Dudley with the real Swiss Toni and his colleagues, observing the rivalries and petty jealousy among sales staff.\"
Hour long program tonight - should be interesting! Comments post-prog...
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Watched this a while back on BBC3 and it was quite interesting but I thought they were playing up for the cameras a bit. In fact, it could easily have all been staged as the characters were larger than life.
It'd be interesting to know if it is a fair reflection on car salesmanery with all the rivalry within the sales team
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Lee
MINI adventure in progress
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Well that was interesting, I can't imagine going into Jennings and seeing the salesmen nutting each other!
Blue
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It was this programme that made me so cautious when buying any car second hand. It gives naive people an idea what car buying is really about and how much deception there is in the showrooms.
I could not believe in the programme that Tony sold that Renault to a customer when it was clear that there was a starting problem with the car. It didn't start very well at all and he needed to press the accelerator for it to start.
What did catch my eye is that Tony drives a Lexus. I wonder why he chose a lexus?
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I dropped onto this five minutes in and assumed it was one of the excellent spoof docs'. Only on reading the paper did I realise it was real (??).
It does demonstrate that the whole car sales ethos has nothing to do with getting the customer a good car but everything about moving metal and maintaining profit at all costs.
M.M
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A lot of the program seemed to be centred around office politics which was most amusing and will certainly be noted for future reference.
The massive eye-opener for me was the fact that when Mark left the couple alone to chat "privately" about the car etc he left a bug in the room to listen in to what they were saying. I cannot believe he admitted to doing this - certainly somewhat of a dubious practice which he seemed to think was of help to the customer!
At the end of the day I suppose we all know that a car salesman is put on this earth to sell cars and little else but it's quite amazing watching them do the "pressure" thing to other people.
And as for Gary or whatever his name was headbutting Juri... :)
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Newish name for this particular company but proprietor started up on bombsite in early seventies and has progressed to this current level of prosperity with the techniques employed as shown on the programme
Happy Motoring Phil I
n.b. also subject to successful TS prosecution early 2003.
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I thought that the funniest bit was when they were all talking to the camera saying that they had had threats of violence in the past but they weren't scared of anyone because 'we know where they live, they only know where we work, chuckle, chuckle'.
Big hard looking chap came in with a complaint and the reality didn't bear out their claims I would say.
They were funny but pathetic. I hope he loses all his millions and goes bust.
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I suspect the programme was a clever spoof documentary similar in style to The Office. My reasons being the confession to threatening customers, using listening devices, the bullying of the colleague Yuri, an apparent fight between salesmen.
Any business would not agree to such a film being broadcast, even if it gave free publicity. The incidents involving customers did not appear genuine either. I think the programme was originally transmitted on BBC3 the 'youth' channel that has a reputation for such spoof documentaries. Clever though as it is very convincing.
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Didn't see all of it but what i did see was entertaining and well produced - some great music as well. Undecided as to whether it was a spoof or not!
Ed.
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Undecided as to whether it was a spoof or not!
Try doing a Google search for the name of the company and the name of the town. This leads to a web site that looks remarkably like that of the company in question...
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I dont think it was a spoof. It would have cost a lot to set a car supermarket up to borrow all the cars etc...
I used to work at a vauxhall main dealer - all very professional in customer view, but out of sight a lot of the things said and done in the program were the same as when i was a the dealers:
Same names for customers were the same
Same views on customers (by most of the other 'career' car salesmen i hasten to add!)
Same competitive nature - and yes i saw 2 fights between salesman but bit shocked it was on the shop floor - I'm surprised Mr Dale didnt sack them both, but then one was the new, doing very well salesman, and car sales managers have a lot
of patience for a salesman who is selling
Same techniques for sales - If you ever find a car salesman who cares more for a customer than a deal i'll eat my mouse...
I think Mr Dale was under the impression pre-program that any publicity is good publicity and thats why he allowed it. Bet he's regretting it now....
On a final note, did anyone catch the quick glimpse of the cars coming of the transporter - all differenet makes and models on it- first one off was a peugeot 306. all unclean. -- so that'll be auction purchases then. might as well go straight to the auctiona and save a few thousand and nightmare salesmen....
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Bearing in mind the dealership concerned has the same name, is in the same town, and by the looks of it on the same site as an actual supersite dealer I don't think you'll find it was an "Office" style spoof....
Mind you, perhaps there really is a Wernham Hogg paper merchant in Slough.
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NOW do you see my point about people in Wolverhampton!? ;-)
I'm pretty sure that the place they made the documentary about isn't there anymore - it's been an empty site for about the last 6 weeks. I always used to drive past and wonder how they got the cars upstairs!
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WOW just come across this forum and shocked that the tv program was talked about on here! I can assure all of you that it wasn't a spoof also not many of the scenes were staged either. I took part in the program.. it was great fun to do.
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And it was nearly 15 years ago.
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Don't suppose you know where to get a copy? I'd love to see this again it was amazing, I've been searching for years.
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(Duplicate post)
Edited by Avant on 27/08/2019 at 00:18
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