My first closer in the car bizz was an old-timer. I was in my mid-twenties and he was in his fifties, maybe even sixties. He’d been selling used cars on auto row back in the 50s. We had three crews at that store and our crew was always the number one crew by a healthy margin. Everyone called my closer Space. Not sure why, but I always assumed it was because he was kind of spacy. But he was the best closer I ever knew.
Space was a very handsome, tall, fit, man, always dressed sharp, with shiny expensive wing tips, high dollar suits and ties, and perfectly coifed hair. He had a radio voice and a gentle way about him that almost completely obscured his steady subtle drive for a deal. He was relentless without seeming so. He also mumbled.
When I got a write up in the booth and even a half-ass commitment, he’d take the write up to close it. My job was to sit in the booth be the customer’s friend and confidante and never say anything and learn from Space how to sell a car.
He’d come in and introduce himself to the customer with his radio voice, a good handshake, and a ten million dollar smile. He’d ask if they wanted coffee or soda, and if they did, he’d reach in his pocket and give me money to go buy something from the vending machine. So I never knew what he was doing while I was gone.
When I’d get back, he would be sitting behind the desk, leaned back in the chair, sometimes relating some anecdote, but many times would be listening to the customer’s story about when their Uncle Jim drove across the country for vacation or some other personal note. And he would laugh in all the right places and he really made people feel like he was listening more than anyone had ever listened before.
After I distributed the goodies I’d find my spot to stand and observe. Space would hold the write-up sheet for the whole time. He kinda folded it with his hand and never revealed the front of the page. Then he would lay the write-up sheet on the desk and smooth it out and tell them something like, “well, let’s see if we can help you out with this car deal.” He would lean forward, lay his hands on the desk, and start mumbling. He was never loud and every once in a while you could hear an intelligible word, and it was always kind of slow and low.
Then he’d look the customer in the eye and ask if he had it right. And he’d turn the write up around and circle the whole thing three or four times, big pen circles around all the scribbling I’d done when I wrote it up, that basically said what they were offering for the car, how much they wanted to put down, what they wanted for their trade, and what they wanted to pay per month. One by one he’d go to the four different squares and circle it again three or four times very deliberately and slowly, but with a flourish. He’d get another commitment and tell them, he really didn’t know if he could do all of that, and he’d tell them, “I just started here.” Then he’d stand up with the write-up sheet, and slowly look it over and say something like, “You never can tell, miracles happen every day.” And a small little laugh and then a big smile, and look the customer right in the eyes and say, “I’ll see what I can do.” And I did the same thing to them before he got there. The customer heard the same story twice.
A small note here: One time, Space was closing one of my deals with a guy who was buying a used car from me. When Space told him the “I’m new here” line the guy started laughing. And he said to Space, “You probably don’t remember, but I’ve bought a few cars from you over the last ten or fifteen years, and you’ve told me that same thing every time.”
The desk would give Space a pencil and I would hang out with my customers and talk about their dogs or kids or my dogs or kids. He’d come back in the booth and sit down, holding the write up sheet, most times a crumpled up wad he held in his fist. He’d lay it out on the desk and pull it apart and say his boss threw it in the garbage can, but he got it out because he knew “you folks” really wanted a deal and he was sure there was some way to put it together. He’d smooth it out and it was always upside down where you couldn’t see the writing, but you could see the big red magic marker writing that was on the other side. He’d run his hand across trying to get the wrinkles out and took extra care and time. Then he’d start mumbling again. Sometimes when Space mumbled he doodled with his pen on the back of the write-up sheet and shield what he was writing from the customer’s view like he was adding numbers or multiplying or something. And he’d mumble. Finally he’d tell them the big boss said he couldn’t do what they wanted and he’d show them the big red numbers, which was not a discount of any kind, his trade in was usually crossed out, the down payment was one third of the full price and the payments were $650 a month.
Then he would get a bump somewhere even if it was only a hundred bucks, and like I found out first from Space, then from experience, it was like a flood gate opened and eventually you’d get to a deal. I know people bitch about how they hate all the back and forth and all the time it takes to buy a car. But I always told folks it’s like having a job that you get paid a lot of money to do. If you sit through three hours of BS and save three thousand dollars that’s a thousand bucks an hour. Bet there aren’t many jobs that make that much, and then I would sometimes say, “And if you make more than a thousand an hour, just pay sticker, and I’ll get you out of here in ten minutes with a full tank of gas and a wash, you’ll still be money ahead.”