> With a manufacturer direct sale you don't know what a reasonable price because they would never have to tiers of pricing which could be found out and exposed

> With a manufacturer direct sale you don't know what a reasonable price because they would never have to tiers of pricing which could be found out and exposed as so called "invoice" and similar pricing is done with regular car dealers. Right, but it would eliminate overhead and economics says that reduces cost because Ford isn't going for maximum profits, it is going for acceptable profits in the marketplace. My particular issue of needing a particular model aside, the manufacturers are still competing with manufacturers. If Tesla has done nothing else, he has shown that if there is a niche that isn't being filled by the manufacturers, that startup can compete. If the manufacturers overprice their cars, they create a niche for someone to move in on. Their current pricing model reflects this, but the dealership era is the past. They came about when car companies were going out of business all of the time and people wanted to deal with someone who had been in their town for a long time. They wanted to buy the exact something they could see and warranties were nearly useless. Now we have the internet. If Ford screws someone over in Florida, California hears about it the same day. Because of the competition that the internet has created, dealerships have had to move closer and closer to a 3% profit on sales or lose business. This has put many dealers out of business already. It is only a matter of time. I hope.