A year and a half ago, I had an outstanding experience purchasing my wife's new Buick at Carl Black.
Short version ...
If you want to test drive a sports car at Carl Black, make sure you only work with the person you contact beforehand. If I had to guess, since they are so close to UCF, I think they probably get a lot of young kids that want to come in and want to drive Camaros and Corvettes, which only gets their salespeople into trouble. In my case, I was wearing my UCF polo as I had just come from the airport as I just flew home, so I'm sure that's exactly why the salesperson initially responded to me the way he did.
I.e., I probably came in looking like just another UCF student who wanted to test drive a sports car I couldn't afford.
Long version ... spoiler tag purposely used to protect your innocent scrollbar
Short version ...
If you want to test drive a sports car at Carl Black, make sure you only work with the person you contact beforehand. If I had to guess, since they are so close to UCF, I think they probably get a lot of young kids that want to come in and want to drive Camaros and Corvettes, which only gets their salespeople into trouble. In my case, I was wearing my UCF polo as I had just come from the airport as I just flew home, so I'm sure that's exactly why the salesperson initially responded to me the way he did.
I.e., I probably came in looking like just another UCF student who wanted to test drive a sports car I couldn't afford.
Long version ... spoiler tag purposely used to protect your innocent scrollbar
Until 2014, we usually purchased my GM products from David Maus in Sanford, since they support our Corvette Club (Florida Corvette Club). But when we purchased my prior Chevrolet Equinox at David Maus in late 2012, they screwed up the Incentives, and we had to repeatedly get them to fix it during financing. Hence why we wanted to try Carl Black, and reward one of UCF's sponsors, for our next purchase.
Before purchasing, I tested out Carl Black's services by taking my 2009 Corvette Z51 to them, especially since they were closer. I verified they had a Corvette tech on-staff, and he was excellent. We ended up taking all three (3) of our GMs to Carl Black for servicing. We never had an issue and they always took care of us. So in 2014, when I my wife wanted a new car, I wanted to reward Carl Black on east Colonial for supporting UCF athletics.
My wife test drove no less than three (3) different cars that day, including a 2015 Chevrolet Camaro V6, but settled on the nimble 2014 Buick Encore (aka Chevrolet Trax) as her daily driver. From Sales to getting all of the Incentives correct in the Bill-of-Sale to the Financing, everyone was perfect, always cordial, very accommodating, and even ended up staying after closing to finish off our trade. Everyone even commented on my UCF polo, saying "Go Knights," and gave us some extra tickets for the next game, which I gave to some friends.
At that time, I promised Carl Black if I went to trade my 2009 Corvette Z51 for a Corvette Stingray Z51 or Z06, I'd come to them first.
In 2015, several of our club members on the east side of town stopped taking their Corvettes to Carl Black. Apparently they fired their Corvette Tech, and were repeatedly getting into arguments with owners over various things, even simple, obvious things. E.g., not wanting to use Mobil 1 andtheir own, preferred synthetic "blend" instead (despite GM recommending, and always using from the factory, Mobil 1 since 1984). Our club members are now taking their Corvettes to Autonation instead.
But I still wanted to reward Carl Black with my next purchase, given how they took care of us last time, even if I had the servicing done elsewhere.
The past few weeks my wife has been getting the itch for a Camaro again. And since I rarely drive my Corvette since I travel so much, less than 4,000 miles total in the past 3 years (Sebring, Road Atlanta, maybe a day drive every 2 months or so), I decided I might as well trade it while it still has some value. Since I'm waiting for Chevrolet to get the 'teething issues' out with the new Stingray and, even more so, Z06, plus the new 2016 Camaro SS models have the same LT1 V8 and 8-speed automatic as the Stingray, we decided to purchase a new 2016 Camaro SS. That way my wife would get the "fun car" she wanted, and I'd go for the V8 upgrade so I wouldn't mind parting with my Corvette.
I shopped around late this week, from Hendrick in Atlanta (where the brother of one of our Corvette Club members works) to Autonation (since they have Corvette tech) to Carl Black, to see what inventory was available. I kept to my promise and responded to Carl Black first, visiting them Saturday morning on the way home from the airport. I hadn't slept much the past 3 days, even missed my Friday night flight due to a customer issue, but was excited to get my wife in a V8 to see if she liked it more than the V6 in the older 2015 model she had tried out earlier. Shar had taken my prior inquiry, and returned with a phone call, as I'm sure she saw in our file that we've purchased from them before, and still bring some of our cars to them for servicing.
We arrived just before 9am, and apparently their morning staff meeting ran over until past 9:15. No problem, and my wife and I conversed while looking at the Z06 in the showroom. At 9:20, I finally decided to leave and come back, after all, I was very hungry and a bit exhausted. But just as I got up, the morning meeting broke, and I was greeted by a young gentleman.
I mentioned Shar had already contacted us about our inquiry, and he asked if he could still help. I sincerely appreciated his offer, as I'm sure he probably suspected we had been waiting for a bit (given their meeting ran over). I told him we were interested in a Camaro 1SS, knew they didn't have one on the lot, but would like to custom order one -- all while I wanted my wife to drive the 2SS they had, to ensure she didn't mind the added power over the V6. Immediately I was shutdown with, basically (and almost directly) a "No" and how they "don't let people test drive their sports cars." Even my wife, who is a teacher and extremely understanding, was shocked at his first response.
It took me a couple of seconds, but I know I explicitly said my wife was going to drive it (let alone we're both into our 40s). I was still a bit shocked at his response, especially since Shar was aware of our inquiry on a Camaro SS, plus our history with Carl Black, including servicing our cars, including the Corvette. I don't know if he had just been reprimanded or otherwise had an issue with a past customer who test drove one of the sports cars, and I'm sure my UCF polo didn't help. Maybe he thought I was a student, but he really was adamant about no one driving any sports car before I even said anything.
Finally, I made my first response, which was probably a bit confrontational, "Well, I could take my business elsewhere then." I'm sure my response was a bit of a bark of my own. My wife said it wasn't out of line, and it wasn't loud, considering his response, but more of, 'Yo' dog, I'm the customer, you're the person I'd like to give a commission ... even if 9 out of 10 customers don't, I could be that 1.' If I could go back in time ... I'd probably say something like that instead.
He responded with, "Well, I can ask my manager." At this point, I was just going to ask for Shar, but I was still a bit shocked. Instead, I sat down on the chair behind me, and as he sat down in the one next to it, as I said, "You know, I own a Corvette. And I promised and I'd like to buy my next one here, because we had a great experience buying here before." I didn't want to dislike him. After all, the last guy with a UCF shirt that came in here could have been a kid who totaled one, and got him into trouble, possibly fired. I didn't know his circumstances, and people do abuse car salespeople.
My wife, being the better reader of people, read his eyes and would tell me later he had his "oh sh--!" moment right there. And that's when she intervened, trying to confirm, "So ... you can approve it with your manager?" And I just let my wife talk from then on.
After he walked away to talk to his manager, I told my wife we were leaving, and we'd come back later, when I was fed, less tired and in a better mood. She agreed that might be best. I was also worried I barked at him in front of his peers, although my wife later said no, no one looked and I wasn't loud, only confirmed what I barked. But then she also said he didn't start the conversation well. Again, I can only imagine how many issues Carl Black gets with UCF students just wanting to test drive sports cars. I even later joked with my wife that he probably paid me a complement by thinking I was that young to be a UCF student.
Once home, while taking a nap, my wife found a Chevrolet Camaro 1SS with the color she loves, that dark Blue Velvet Metallic (I'm more partial to the sky-like Hyper Blue Metallic). Even better, it had the Dual-Mode NPP Exhaust like my Corvette with its LS3+NPP. It just sounds too sweet to not have. It was at Jon Hall Chevrolet in Daytona, who sponsors one of our Club's sisters, the Ponce Inlet Corvette Club. Our Club members regularly help them with events, and we even attended their Corvette Car Show a few years back at Jon Hall, and Hall was most excellent hosts.
I even loved the upgraded rims in their 1SS package, though I wish the Camaro had Michelins instead of the crappy Goodyears (which is a GM issue, not the dealer). Even Corvette Racing (and finally the GM on the production Corvette itself) dropped Goodyear years ago to the tune of 1-2s and 3-4s faster lap times at Sebring and Le Mans, respectively.
After getting Jon Hall to come up $4,000 on my Corvette in trade (I wasn't going to trade it if I couldn't get at least the bottom Kelly Blue Book trade value for "Excellent"), we drove away with our new, $40K Chevorlet Camaro 1SS, it's 455 hp/ft-lb LT1 V8 engine, that new, fast shifting 8-speed automatic. My wife only drives automatics, I prefer manuals, but the new auto-8 shifts almost as fast as a dual-clutch (even upshifts faster than some), plus the sweet sounding NPP exhaust with the valves that open up.
Here's the "Car Porn" for those of you that love GM sports cars ... (my apologies if not)
P1030573 by Bryan Smith, on Flickr
Now I'm still going to consider Carl Black when I do go to buy a new Corvette in a few years, since they support UCF. And who knows, I could have responded better to the salesperson that greeted me, especially since they are so close to UCF with lots of kids who try to come over and drive their sports cars (I was wearing a UCF polo, after all).
But I recommend if you are going to try to test drive any sports car at Carl Black, contact them beforehand like I always do, and then just ask for the person you were already corresponding with. Will remove a lot of confusion, and any issues that Carl Black likely has with common UCF students. I didn't think of that until after he initially responded, and I probably should have just said 'I'll wait for Shar.'
Before purchasing, I tested out Carl Black's services by taking my 2009 Corvette Z51 to them, especially since they were closer. I verified they had a Corvette tech on-staff, and he was excellent. We ended up taking all three (3) of our GMs to Carl Black for servicing. We never had an issue and they always took care of us. So in 2014, when I my wife wanted a new car, I wanted to reward Carl Black on east Colonial for supporting UCF athletics.
My wife test drove no less than three (3) different cars that day, including a 2015 Chevrolet Camaro V6, but settled on the nimble 2014 Buick Encore (aka Chevrolet Trax) as her daily driver. From Sales to getting all of the Incentives correct in the Bill-of-Sale to the Financing, everyone was perfect, always cordial, very accommodating, and even ended up staying after closing to finish off our trade. Everyone even commented on my UCF polo, saying "Go Knights," and gave us some extra tickets for the next game, which I gave to some friends.
At that time, I promised Carl Black if I went to trade my 2009 Corvette Z51 for a Corvette Stingray Z51 or Z06, I'd come to them first.
In 2015, several of our club members on the east side of town stopped taking their Corvettes to Carl Black. Apparently they fired their Corvette Tech, and were repeatedly getting into arguments with owners over various things, even simple, obvious things. E.g., not wanting to use Mobil 1 andtheir own, preferred synthetic "blend" instead (despite GM recommending, and always using from the factory, Mobil 1 since 1984). Our club members are now taking their Corvettes to Autonation instead.
But I still wanted to reward Carl Black with my next purchase, given how they took care of us last time, even if I had the servicing done elsewhere.
The past few weeks my wife has been getting the itch for a Camaro again. And since I rarely drive my Corvette since I travel so much, less than 4,000 miles total in the past 3 years (Sebring, Road Atlanta, maybe a day drive every 2 months or so), I decided I might as well trade it while it still has some value. Since I'm waiting for Chevrolet to get the 'teething issues' out with the new Stingray and, even more so, Z06, plus the new 2016 Camaro SS models have the same LT1 V8 and 8-speed automatic as the Stingray, we decided to purchase a new 2016 Camaro SS. That way my wife would get the "fun car" she wanted, and I'd go for the V8 upgrade so I wouldn't mind parting with my Corvette.
I shopped around late this week, from Hendrick in Atlanta (where the brother of one of our Corvette Club members works) to Autonation (since they have Corvette tech) to Carl Black, to see what inventory was available. I kept to my promise and responded to Carl Black first, visiting them Saturday morning on the way home from the airport. I hadn't slept much the past 3 days, even missed my Friday night flight due to a customer issue, but was excited to get my wife in a V8 to see if she liked it more than the V6 in the older 2015 model she had tried out earlier. Shar had taken my prior inquiry, and returned with a phone call, as I'm sure she saw in our file that we've purchased from them before, and still bring some of our cars to them for servicing.
We arrived just before 9am, and apparently their morning staff meeting ran over until past 9:15. No problem, and my wife and I conversed while looking at the Z06 in the showroom. At 9:20, I finally decided to leave and come back, after all, I was very hungry and a bit exhausted. But just as I got up, the morning meeting broke, and I was greeted by a young gentleman.
I mentioned Shar had already contacted us about our inquiry, and he asked if he could still help. I sincerely appreciated his offer, as I'm sure he probably suspected we had been waiting for a bit (given their meeting ran over). I told him we were interested in a Camaro 1SS, knew they didn't have one on the lot, but would like to custom order one -- all while I wanted my wife to drive the 2SS they had, to ensure she didn't mind the added power over the V6. Immediately I was shutdown with, basically (and almost directly) a "No" and how they "don't let people test drive their sports cars." Even my wife, who is a teacher and extremely understanding, was shocked at his first response.
It took me a couple of seconds, but I know I explicitly said my wife was going to drive it (let alone we're both into our 40s). I was still a bit shocked at his response, especially since Shar was aware of our inquiry on a Camaro SS, plus our history with Carl Black, including servicing our cars, including the Corvette. I don't know if he had just been reprimanded or otherwise had an issue with a past customer who test drove one of the sports cars, and I'm sure my UCF polo didn't help. Maybe he thought I was a student, but he really was adamant about no one driving any sports car before I even said anything.
Finally, I made my first response, which was probably a bit confrontational, "Well, I could take my business elsewhere then." I'm sure my response was a bit of a bark of my own. My wife said it wasn't out of line, and it wasn't loud, considering his response, but more of, 'Yo' dog, I'm the customer, you're the person I'd like to give a commission ... even if 9 out of 10 customers don't, I could be that 1.' If I could go back in time ... I'd probably say something like that instead.
He responded with, "Well, I can ask my manager." At this point, I was just going to ask for Shar, but I was still a bit shocked. Instead, I sat down on the chair behind me, and as he sat down in the one next to it, as I said, "You know, I own a Corvette. And I promised and I'd like to buy my next one here, because we had a great experience buying here before." I didn't want to dislike him. After all, the last guy with a UCF shirt that came in here could have been a kid who totaled one, and got him into trouble, possibly fired. I didn't know his circumstances, and people do abuse car salespeople.
My wife, being the better reader of people, read his eyes and would tell me later he had his "oh sh--!" moment right there. And that's when she intervened, trying to confirm, "So ... you can approve it with your manager?" And I just let my wife talk from then on.
After he walked away to talk to his manager, I told my wife we were leaving, and we'd come back later, when I was fed, less tired and in a better mood. She agreed that might be best. I was also worried I barked at him in front of his peers, although my wife later said no, no one looked and I wasn't loud, only confirmed what I barked. But then she also said he didn't start the conversation well. Again, I can only imagine how many issues Carl Black gets with UCF students just wanting to test drive sports cars. I even later joked with my wife that he probably paid me a complement by thinking I was that young to be a UCF student.
Once home, while taking a nap, my wife found a Chevrolet Camaro 1SS with the color she loves, that dark Blue Velvet Metallic (I'm more partial to the sky-like Hyper Blue Metallic). Even better, it had the Dual-Mode NPP Exhaust like my Corvette with its LS3+NPP. It just sounds too sweet to not have. It was at Jon Hall Chevrolet in Daytona, who sponsors one of our Club's sisters, the Ponce Inlet Corvette Club. Our Club members regularly help them with events, and we even attended their Corvette Car Show a few years back at Jon Hall, and Hall was most excellent hosts.
I even loved the upgraded rims in their 1SS package, though I wish the Camaro had Michelins instead of the crappy Goodyears (which is a GM issue, not the dealer). Even Corvette Racing (and finally the GM on the production Corvette itself) dropped Goodyear years ago to the tune of 1-2s and 3-4s faster lap times at Sebring and Le Mans, respectively.
After getting Jon Hall to come up $4,000 on my Corvette in trade (I wasn't going to trade it if I couldn't get at least the bottom Kelly Blue Book trade value for "Excellent"), we drove away with our new, $40K Chevorlet Camaro 1SS, it's 455 hp/ft-lb LT1 V8 engine, that new, fast shifting 8-speed automatic. My wife only drives automatics, I prefer manuals, but the new auto-8 shifts almost as fast as a dual-clutch (even upshifts faster than some), plus the sweet sounding NPP exhaust with the valves that open up.
Here's the "Car Porn" for those of you that love GM sports cars ... (my apologies if not)
P1030573 by Bryan Smith, on FlickrNow I'm still going to consider Carl Black when I do go to buy a new Corvette in a few years, since they support UCF. And who knows, I could have responded better to the salesperson that greeted me, especially since they are so close to UCF with lots of kids who try to come over and drive their sports cars (I was wearing a UCF polo, after all).
But I recommend if you are going to try to test drive any sports car at Carl Black, contact them beforehand like I always do, and then just ask for the person you were already corresponding with. Will remove a lot of confusion, and any issues that Carl Black likely has with common UCF students. I didn't think of that until after he initially responded, and I probably should have just said 'I'll wait for Shar.'
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