Enliven Daily

“The key to this business is personal relationships.”

Last week at this time, my wife Tracy mentioned that she wanted a new car.  Our 2003 Accord has been awesome but it is now 7 years old and running great, but did have 144K miles on it.  Because she travels about 45 miles each way to work, we wanted something good on gas.  We are both low maintenance so did not need any bells and whistles; just the basic additional options of some power, a/c and keyless entry.  We wanted to spend about $20k and narrowed it down to the Nissan Altima, Honda Civic or Toyota Camry.

The first ad that jumped out at us was for a 2010 Camry listed at $16K so on Monday, I took a swing by the dealership even though it sounded too good to be true.  It was a basic model and also a stick shift which ruled it out but the salesman, Sal, at Rockingham Toyota in Salem, New Hampshire was a nice guy.  In addition, the Sales Manager, Jeff Azer was very genuine as he thanked me for my visit and asked me to call him directly if they could help with our decision.  On Tuesday, I made a few calls about the Altima and nothing wowed us but I kept thinking about Toyota despite all the issues surrounding them these days. 

So on Wednesday, Tracy and I went back to Rockingham Toyota so she could test drive the Camry and were met by Jeff.  But first as we walked in, we were met by the dealership mascot, a friendly golden retriever so of course I had to frolic around with him for 5 minutes despite my wife’s chagrin.  These were all good signs, especially the dog.  We took a Camry out for a test drive and it drove nice and Tracy liked it.  Now we had to negotiate.  The new salesperson, Lisa, was also very nice and between her and Jeff, we only had to negotiate a little as they came in below invoice and gave us what we wanted for our trade and within a few minutes, they had a sale and we had a new car.

Large purchases can be a very stressful time as people want value and do not want to feel taken advantage of.  My wife and I are a great team as I go with my gut and she uses her brain so together, we are a powerful combination when it comes to decision making.  As we told people that we bought a Toyota, we got the “Really, even with all the problems they are having?”  I always come back with a quote I heard about 10 years ago – “the safest airline is one that just had a crash”.  Like our opening quote from Jerry Maguire that has been used in this space many times, the relationships, especially with the Sales Manager, are what made this deal happen. 

So if you are in the market for a new car and live near southern New Hampshire, go see Jeff Azer at Rockingham Toyota and tell him Lou sent you.