We recently wrote about what car salesmen are ready to do in order to get even more of your money than what they actually deserve.
To attract people to their dealerships, even famous automakers are willing to twist the truth. They hire big teams of personnel to create ads that will create excitement of the public and higher general interest for particular new model.
If those campaigns were based simply on highlighting the best characteristics of the vehicles, that would be fine. It’s competitive market, companies are investing a lot of money in research and development of new technologies, just to get their products in the top. If they manage to accomplish something radical and new, and want to brag about it to the public — that’s great. We don’t mind ads of that type.
However, if they are claiming their product is having abilities it really doesn’t have, or if they state the price of vehicle is lower than it really is, that is just wrong and inconsiderate of them.
Don’t trust the photo
Have you ever opened your favorite magazine and came by ad for some new model of a vehicle that looks great but is offered at the ridiculously low price? You would certainly be impressed by what you see, but if you are in market for buying new ride you might be tempted to run to your nearest dealership and ask to see that particular model. At that point, you are going to be unpleasantly surprised, and there are couple of reasons why.
We all know how big companies beautify their ads for TV, printed or online media. Nothing you see there is real and obviously, you know that, but they are too attractive to resist! Even though you know that truck is actually shot in studio and the background on its photo is digitally added later on, it looks great! There are couple of other tricks like added light effects that make vehicle really shine and the photo looks like something you would gladly hang on your wall and admire it every day.
Similar thing is with commercials on TV, only there is post production that is in charge of those videos getting more attractive during Super Bowl halftime show.
Like we said, that’s nothing new and you probably already know how to process that sort of information and separate what’s possible and what’s not. The perfectly looking truck might have some hidden shortcoming and with this we really didn’t say anything new.
What’s more important here is to pay attention to what the ad says. Automakers in most cases show their vehicle in top trim package with all features you could imagine and even some that you never thought of. Price however, would be shown surprisingly small for a vehicle with all those great options. This is simply because the price is actually for a standard model, while luxurious trim level costs a lot more. What’s even worse, base models price still won’t be ‘as little as’ the price that was shown in the ad, because car manufacturers avoid adding fees and additional costs to the ads.
In short, be realistic, calculate how much you can really spend on new vehicle, try to figure out what options you really need and which ones you can live without. Use internet and see how much that kind of vehicle is really worth.
MPG is often exaggerated
Every time we read story or a press release from car manufacturers claiming that they achieved great miles per gallon rating — our stomachs start turning upside down.
First of all, if that number is possible at all (we tend to believe that nowadays rarely anyone would bluntly lie like that), it might be exaggerated in sense that it was measured in the perfect conditions, at the test facilities far away from the real road. At best, they could have reached that 50 miles per gallon on highway applying all of the techniques we mention earlier in our article about improving fuel economy. There are also some other, more drastic measures like overinflating tires, drafting behind big rig truck, turning engine off driving down a hill and simillar insanely dangerous tricks to improve what their new vehicle can really accomplish. And sometimes they would really go that far.
Of course, what is really bothering us in this case is the fact that vehicle is usually shown pushed to the limits by the driver. Full-throttle over sharp turns or over rocky mountains (if the vehicle is 4×4) — are a must. In such cases we shouldn’t even consider fuel economy as possible, but still automakers insists on such claims.
The best suggestion here is to use federal government site for fuel economy and search for a vehicle you are interested in and use combined MPG rating, since it is the nearest to what regular driver, in normal driving conditions, can really hope for. Still, mileage will vary, depending on a lot of things.
The special that is nowhere to be found
Okay, we could have added this one to the list of car salesmen lies. Why?
Well, some dealerships have a tendency to put up an “special offer” for a vehicle, so good that it couldn’t true. And it isn’t. It’s just a bait to drive potential customers to their dealership. When they do come, they will say that it’s currently not available for any reason that first pops up in their mind. It’s on the test run, getting detailed or, really anything else they could think of. If it is on the lot it will definitely be hidden behind every other vehicle they currently have. It would be a real problem to come to that car, since they would have to move all of the other ones they have, and why should they do it when they have “something that is even better” for you? Well, now you get the point.
“Special” isn’t really meant to be sold, it is just a simple marketing trick that should point out to you, dear reader, that you should just avoid that kind of a dealership.
In some cases vehicle can be “real”, but then it should be obvious to anyone here that something must be wrong with it. Even if the seller admits that vehicle has only a minor problems, you can rest assured that there is even more to that story.
These kind of car salesmen are in the worse position than the ones we mentioned earlier since they are offering you a bad deal that might fool you once and there won’t be another chance for that. Sellers that prefer “phantom vehicles” can rely on the fact that many people won’t see through their scheme. Those people should, because one lie always leads to another one and you can never be absolutely certain that, even though deal looks good to you it doesn’t have something at fault.
Rebates that do not apply to you
Another thing that you can see often in car ads is something like “as low as $5,000”, but when you contact the dealership to get a quote about that particular vehicle they will give you price that is two, three times higher than advertised price.
That’s simply because of rebates. It’s a great way to reward everyone that are in armed forces, loyal customer, college graduates, etc. And that’s fine, too. Trouble is that common people usually don’t fall in either of those categories, or if they do, they are not interested in buying new car, suv, van or a truck, at the moment.
Simply, we really can’t blame car manufacturers or local dealerships for putting such pretentious prices in their ads, they have every right to do so, but it would be better if it was explained to the reader more clearly. In this case, we just want to warn everybody to read small print letters.
The large print giveth and the small print taketh away
To follow previous point in the article, here is another thing advertisers do in their ads.
They put in their ads whatever they want really. They can put titles like “you won’t ever need to change your tires”, “for this price you will get every option you want”, “this truck doesn’t break down – ever”, “pigs fly”.
What they do after that is define in those small, almost invisible fonts, that claims noted on the page or filmed ad, might not be entirely true for any account.
Not only is that sneaky on their behalf, we haven’t exaggerated that much — possibilities are, as a matter of fact, limitless by those tiny words.
The main tip, common for all of the mentioned tips is: don’t fall for that hype car manufacturers and local dealerships are creating. Be smart and see that behind every exciting ad there are rides that are humble and in fewer cases not even deserving of your consideration. The best idea would be to read as much as possible about every ride you are interested in purchasing. Writers and editors of magazines, blogs, websites are really trying their best to present vehicles unbiased and realistically, but also the characteristics of vehicles are collected through serious analyses. Those words and numbers are certainly closer to truth.