Sunday, October 4, 2009

G.M. and eBay: A Noble Experiment

G.M.'s innovative attempt to market cars on eBay is generating a lot of press, but it doesn't appear to be selling a lot of cars. Alejandro Martínez-Cabrera of the San Francisco Chronicle reports:
Neither company released the number of complete transactions that resulted from the program, but according to the Los Angeles Times, the last two weeks produced only 13 sales out of 21,000 listings.

"My understanding from the numbers I've been told is that (the program) drove a lot of inquiries and a lot of traffic but didn't sell a lot of cars," said Peter Welch, president of the California New Car Dealers' Association. "I suspect it was because consumers decided it was more convenient to go to the dealership."



2 comments:

  1. Notwithstanding all of the babble from new-age critics of the auto industry who think that autos are interchangeable, personality/design-emotion-free, functionally-undifferentiated transportation appliances, not enough customers actually think along those lines to such an extent that they are willing to buy from a picture and a text description.

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  2. First thought in my head too,JWilly. Like buying a pig a poke. unclebuck.

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