July 20, 2005
Cars, cars, cars!
Goodbye old friend...
... traded in for Ad's b-day present last Friday (see previous blog).
As I mentioned, this is an ironic twist since it's basically the car my wife was looking for last spring when we had a bad experience at our local Ford dealer.
How did we end up buying three cars from Mark Hendee at Bryden Motors?
It all started when I wanted to gift that old Geo Prizm up there to my son in late 2003. I ran into Mark at our store one afternoon while he was looking for someone to explain Palm PDAs to him. I learned he wanted to use it for selling cars at Bryden's. In passing, I happened to mention that I'd always wanted a PT Cruiser, but doubted I'd ever get one since Bryden Motors was on my wife's boycott list (a very short, but very long-lived list you don't ever want to be on) due to a lemon of a car we bought there in 1984 and they seemed out of my price range.
Long story short... Mark said he could win over my wife to give Bryden's another try and get me a deal I could afford. More story short... after a couple of weeks of back-and-forth... he did just that. Then Ad got the Geo you see above. (Its clear coat was fading then, too.)
Late in the spring of 2004, Suzi got the bug to replace her aging '93 Ford Escort Wagon which, at that time, was her favorite car of all time. She was sold on buying a Ford Focus, all she needed was a test drive to seal the deal so we arranged for one at the local Ford dealer. (In defense of what you're about to read, I think we got a new, inexperienced salesperson.)
I scheduled a test drive appointment for "around 6:30 pm" on Thursday, but we were ran late due to work and dinner and stuff. The salesperson called at about 6:15(!), asking if we were coming or not. Suzi had just gotten home. We finally got there a little after 7:00pm.
Now... remember... this was a test drive by scheduled appointment for an essentially done-deal car sale!
Car #1: Dead battery, this was the car waiting for us to drive. Salesperson took us to it.
Car #2: Found the keys, found the car. Salesperson helped us find it, but it was a 3-door (ZX3) STICK. No good.
Car #3: Found the keys, salesperson said "...it's a gray one out there..." handed us the plates and said she'd check the Escort's trade-in value. We searched the lot, it wasn't gray, it was blue. It had so much promotional writing on the front window ("Dude, you're getting a Dell!") that it couldn't be driven safely off the lot.
As we sat in the car, Suzi looked at me and said, "That's it. We're done here. Let's go." She got out of the car and we had to wait for the salesperson to finish their drive around the block in our Escort. When they breathlessly walked into the showroom, I handed over the dealer plate as Suzi said, "We're through here" and out she walked without looking back, leaving me with the salesperson and my mouth gaping open. It was 7:35 pm.
(My wife is a lesson in "customer service is everything." Businesses - You don't ever want to piss off my wife. Another story... Best Buy has been on her boycott list since 2000.)
While we drove back into town, I jokingly suggested we swing by Bryden's and look at the Neons. (I already knew that there's not really a car like the Focus wagon in Chrysler's car lineup.) She said, let's look, maybe we'll see "the guy we bought the Cruiser from..." We came back into town on Gardner Street and had to double-back to Bryden's and...
"It was dark and stormy night..." and it was late - 10 or 15 minutes to closing when we pulled into the lot across from Bryden's offices. We looked around and then who should we see standing down a ways on the sidewalk? Mark Hendee.
In TEN minutes... With the wind blowing and rain spitting... Mark had us test driving TWO vehicles. One - a Neon and another he recommended because my wife mentioned she drives to her mom's almost every other weekend. He said something to the effect, "...you don't want a small car, you want a highway car...something with power and comfort - like this Dodge Stratus." He was absolutely right, and he did this in something under 15 mminutes! And he assured us he could get us a deal to make it as affordable as the Focus or Neon.
This is the short version, and it took a week to close the deal, but in that 15 minutes Mark did everything right and far more than the Ford salesperson had managed with a day's warning. (We signed the papers and picked up the Stratus on a Tuesday - exactly 10 years after we bought the Escort we were getting rid of!)
Want a Chrysler? See Mark Hendee. He's 3-for-3 at our house - a car a year - 2003, 2004, and 2005.
Ad's new Focus ZX5:
My PT Cruiser and Suzi's Stratus: 
