Watched a programme on TV last night about "Britains Biggest Spenders".
It featured a lady who was "wealthy" to put it mildly. She drove around in a Bentley and whilst on the way to the airport "popped in" to her local Bentley dealership.
She was told that they had a waiting list of around 100 cars, but after 10 minutes browsing she ordered a convertible AND a Coupe! Both in black and "move me to the top of the list please". "Certainly madam" came the reply.
10 minutes shopping and she'd just spent the think end of £350,000
Must be nice!
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If "think end of £350,000" is a typo for "thick end . . .", I like it. It's almost as good as my all-time favourite, "100m above seal level".
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I don't think the salesman said he'd move her to the front of the queue, just that he was sure he could do something, got to be a bit careful about annoying the other customers while on camera I'd have thought!
It was Jack Barclays Bentley dealer, very convenient for those in Chelsea or Knightsbridge.
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Believe me, nobody gets moved on lists, well not for Bentley anyway. Trust me on this, it's only oily salesperson nonsense. Allocations and the like are scrutinised very carefully and idiot salespeople (ie all of them!) are a strong factor in punishment to dealers via less cars.
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Slightly off topic but what was wrong with that bloke from Manchester? Looked like he had rigor mortis of the face. Bad plastic surgery?
Perhaps he should have spent less on the knife and more on the car.
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I'd heard from someone with first hand experience of Bentley that buying two made you a fleet buyer and queues don't exist then.
My chairman was number 12 or something on the pre-launch queue for the DB9, until the dealer rang him and said sorry we're allocating your car to (I think) Michael Owen, nothing you can do about it. He was happy to wait, which given that he hated his DB7 seems rather odd, but it is a sensational car and I'm sure this snub is now forgotten.
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Nsar, you're probably not wrong, but it is all noted and it doesn't help a dealer's allocations the next year. Also, what a salesperson says and what actually happen are two very different things. I deal with the egos-on-legs every day of my life, and many of them spout absolute and utter nonsense for a very large part of the day! I do genuinely understand why they do it, but it doesn't mean I like it, or them.
I love the Michael Owen story. I'd really like to ask the dealer what makes him more important than somebody paying the same money for a car that happens to have made his hard-earned from hard graft..... if I was your chairman I would have told the dealer to stick the car where the sun don't shine. I refuse to give my money to people who hero-worship "celebrities", and I would have happily paid extra to a dealer who didn't brown-nose someone because they can kick a bag of wind about!
It's the same reason I don't go to music concerts, and also why I pray for the day when all music downloads are free! : )
Chirpy today aren't I?
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Isn't it possible the orders really come from on high? Free advertising when a high-profile national hero type - Owen's pretty inoffensive isn't he? Of course I don't read the comics - is photographed smilingly taking delivery of his new Product.
No doubt efforts are made not to inconvenience those bumped down the queue too much.
Just a thought. Of course I have every sympathy with stevied's stroppy egalitarian line too.
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Hee hee! Lud, will you be my dad please? I need someone to calm me down today, I've run out of Valium...
Again, you're probably right re orders from on high, but I do know that franchised dealers; as independent businesses, have the power to impose their will far more than Joe Punter realises... and far more than the manufacturers would like sometimes!
As footballers go, Owen is a nice chap. Nice to his family and probably kind to animals, and yes I grudgingly concede (!) that free advertising is probably a money-spinner. Doesn't sit easily with my principles though (such as they are). A lot of it stems from the fact that I don't "get" football, it leaves me cold. Ergo, can't understand the concept of someone being a "hero" for doing said job. Heroes save lives and change life for the better. Footballers entertain the masses.Not quite the same thing in my book.
I am thinking of renaming myself Citizen Smith.
Power to the people!!!
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Dear oh dear stevied, hoist with my own petard, slipping into sloppy postmodern journalese... I'll be calling suicide bombers martyrs next.
I'm not an enthusiast either, flaccidly support the home team in major events and smile when they win, but you don't catch me glued to W Brom vs Galataseray 11th division friendly playoffs complete with showers of bricks and bottles. Even so, to many deprived young these top footer players represent a realistic aspiration, so are in any case that more apposite thing, 'role models'.
That's why we sneer when they behave too badly.
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I am thinking of renaming myself Citizen Smith. Power to the people!!!
Very much off line, but I watched a re-run of Citizen Smith on late night TV last night. Bearing in mind how good it was when first shown it's dated horribly.
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>>.................also why I pray for the day when all music downloads are free! : )
Actually they are free ...............(but you knew that didn't you).............just ask any teenager for a quick tutorial !!
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I know NOW! : )
Lud, I loved the phrase "hoisted by my own petard". It has a nautical ring to it!
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Military, not specifically naval, Elizabethan or Jacobean, 'blown up by my own bomb'. Very likely from some 17th-century dramatist.
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'Martyred', I should have said.
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A petard was indeed a sort of medieval bomb but the phrase "Hoist by his own petard" comes from Hamlet: "For 'tis sport to have the engineer hoist with his own petard"
Just thought you'd like to know that. Or not.
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A petard was indeed a sort of medieval bomb but the phrase "Hoist by his own petard" comes from Hamlet: "For 'tis sport to have the engineer hoist with his own petard" Just thought you'd like to know that. Or not.
Loved it. Knew it was something like that.
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I love the Michael Owen story. I'd really like to ask the dealer what makes him more important than somebody paying the same money for a car that happens to have made his hard-earned from hard graft..... if I was your chairman I would have told the dealer to stick the car where the sun don't shine. I refuse to give my money to people who hero-worship "celebrities", and I would have happily paid extra to a dealer who didn't brown-nose someone because they can kick a bag of wind about!
Hear hear!
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I guess he drives a DB9 and I probably never will because he has got what he wanted, albeit with a short delay, whereas I would have blown my top, felt good about it briefly and then a few weeks later realised I was driving round in a car for the next couple of years that isn't actually what I wanted. Plus to go back and ask for the DB9 I could have had would mean me at the back of the queue and getting mighty cheesed off every time I saw one on the road.
Plus it's a good self deprecating tale to tell, whilst also letting people know you've got a DB9!
A good lesson in business/life.
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My mate Darren(seriously loaded-his main house has 16 bedrooms and 7 bathrooms!!),when his daughter was born,he was struggling to get the child seat in his Ferrari 550 maranello.He walked in to the Bentley showroom,with the aforementioned child seat under his arm.He walked up to a new Bentley continental GT and said to the salesman "if the seat fits I will buy it".
It did and he did.£119000 cash.
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