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No, but I can imagine a BMW owner complaining that the 2016 model came out 3 weeks after he bought his 2015, with no notice from BMW, the sales guy, or the pres
by tw04 10y ago
No, but I can imagine a BMW owner complaining that the 2016 model came out 3 weeks after he bought his 2015, with no notice from BMW, the sales guy, or the press. And that the 2016 model came with a bunch of new features he really wanted and would've been willing to pay for.
- eanzenberg 10y agoYou sure? Cause in this analogy, the 2015 model was at a serious discount while the 2016 has no discount at all.
- tw04 10y agoI'm sure. It's one thing to be told "Hey, there's a new model right around the corner. But we have this guy on a steep discount to clear out inventory." vs. "Hey, we have this great sale going on. What, new model? Naww, we are just having a sale!!" The incumbent MFG's literally have "new inventory" sales on their last-years model to clear out inventory. They let you know well in advance that a new car is coming with new features so you can make an informed decision.
- Anasufovic 10y agoI think we know which path leads to better sales.
- kmonsen 10y agoAnd which path leads to buyers remorse.
- Anasufovic 10y agoIt's similar to iPhones, countless complaints yet those same people keep buying them.
- usrusr 10y agoBoth, depending on where in the company lifecycle the sales happen. The upstart, by virtue of simply not yet having that many potential repeat customers around, is targeting first time buyers. The goodwill created by having as little obsolescence as possible far outweighs the extra sales they might get through it. This tradeoff changes significantly once a company is established and the number of potential repeat customers is high. Now it's always a balance between repeat sale likelihood and repeat sale cycle duration. Different forms of obsolescence have different effects in different markets. E.g. unlike smartphone makers, car manufacturers tread very carefully when it comes to longevity. Red book value and all that. So what do they do? They have perfected the generational model update cycle. New generation cars are literally designed to make the predecessor look old, because that is the most acceptable repeat sale driver. Tesla just isn't there yet.
- taneq 10y ago> It's one thing to be told "Hey, there's a new model right around the corner. But we have this guy on a steep discount to clear out inventory." Is this not what "hey this 1-2 year old model is on super duper sale right now, it's really cheap, you should buy it!" means? Is a steep discount on older stock not always code for "better shift these before new model comes out"? You see Apple fanboys fall for this one every time, too. "Yay I got a new iPhone 5 last week and it was SO CHEAP, I'm a genius... wait wtf they just announced the iPhone 6."
- vsl 10y ago“Fanboys” don’t, they’re well aware a new iPhone is coming in September. And no, Apple doesn’t lower old iPhone prices until after the new is on sale.
- balls187 10y agoDoesn't BMW update models roughly on the same schedule every year?
- usaphp 10y agoNo, there is no "schedule every year": https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/BMW_5_Series https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/BMW_5_Series
- balls187 10y agoThere is a difference between the platform update, and model year updates.
- jeffwilcox 10y agoYes, the manufacturing gets reset with very minor updates, but nothing too major. It's tough because if you are custom ordering a car mid-year there's a question as to whether to wait for a production allocation in the new model year or not.
- usaphp 10y agoI doubt any auto dealer's sales person will gamble to let a customer know that he should not buy the car right now and he should wait for later...they have bonuses to collect, and the faster they move old inventory the better bonuses are.
- komali2 10y agoI thought Tesla doesn't sell through dealers? edit: I'm absolutely positive I'm missing the joke here
- forgetsusername 10y agoThis might be true if you think that all salespeople are scumbags and that the Internet doesn't exist as a source of information on future models.
- duaneb 10y agoEven in the case the 2015 model was heavily discounted? Seems like a classic deprecation strategy.
- NotSammyHagar 10y agoThey don't reduce prices on "last year's car" unless its been driven as a demonstrator. There were scattered rumors of a few cars being discounted - Tesla said we shouldn't ever do that but it seems a few places did it. There's never been heavy discounting.
- Retra 10y agoNew models of cars come out every year. It seems something easy to be unsympathetic about; Nostradamus could have predicted that new cars with new features are right around the corner. That's the perpetual status quo.
- will_hughes 10y ago> no notice from BMW, the sales guy, or the press Tesla has done this for a long while. Newer larger battery pack options, newer interior and tech package options, and completely new performance and configuration options (insane, dual motor, and autopilot 1.0 all hit at once) While there wern't announcements ahead of time what was coming, there were often advance notice that there was an announcement coming, and even when there wasn't - there was a big period of quiet from Tesla leading up to it. For Autopilot 2.0 everyone knew it was coming for at least the Model 3 launch (Elon said as much at the Model 3 announcement), they just brought it forward. It is really no different to what happens to customers for a bunch of other tech companies. Canon sure doesn't tell anyone when their new models are coming out - you know it'll probably happen at a major trade show, but only if you're someone that follows that kind of thing. The average customer at their camera shop isn't going to have the sales guy say "Hey, wait a week and we'll have the next version available."
- forgetsusername 10y agoCanon sure doesn't tell anyone when their new models are coming out Big difference between buying a camera and buying a car.
- will_hughes 10y agoDepends entirely on perspective - for a student just getting into photography, buying a DSLR from Canon is pretty evenful and a significant portion of their income/savings. For a young professional, buying a $35k car is probably just as eventful and significant to their savings/expenditure.
- vsl 10y agoYes, they keep doing it, and if you pay close attention to Tesla, you’re aware of it. You’re also aware of rumors of AP2 coming. If you don’t follow Tesla news, you’re in for a surprise. Regardless, I think it’s a fair critique: buyer’s remorse is a real thing with Tesla. It’s one thing to buy a $3000 computer from Apple and have it replaced with a much better one the next week, it’s another to buy a $100K car and have a major improvement two weeks later.
- NotSammyHagar 10y agoI can see why that would be irritating. But they did it the last two years - announce updates in Oct/Nov. And they will do it again next year. The difference from regular cars is there's not such a long lead time between announcement and delivery, it just kind of hits the market right after. They are going for a cell phone kind of experience, where it's continually improving.
- jandrese 10y agoCan you image going to a BMW dealership and having the salesguy tell you "You shouldn't buy this car, we have new ones coming out in two weeks"?