New fictional series is aimed to provoke thought — and provoke dealers
We’ve now published a handful of fictional columns about a dealer principal named Bill Tanner, who is making his living operating an “automotive retail business” in 2030. He operates a near virtual dealership, and uses technologies to manage his business that are not yet available — but might be one day.
Our writer, veteran auto industry journalist Annette McLeod has done a really nice job taking current dealership industry trends and extrapolating them forward with a view to what could unfold. It’s an interesting picture, even though it might not always present a rosy picture for the retail auto business.
What we’ll discover in this series are things like consumers selecting vehicles from holographic salespeople, a virtual F&I manager who is the best in the business and projects herself into people’s homes, a tiny footprint dealership that is more of a boutique than a showroom, a succession dilemma as the dealer principal isn’t sure who to hand the keys to the company’s website to, customers who have their vehicles picked up and dropped back off for service appointments, and there are many more twists and turns yet to come. But this series is about more than just the changes to the physical dealership and the business processes.
This series is also intended be a human story. We are looking at how these changes affect individuals, starting with our fictitious dealer, but also extending to his family, friends, workers and colleagues.
To outsiders, Bill Tanner appears wildly successful — but that doesn’t make him happy or mean that he has no regrets. Bill is a reflective soul, and the fact he laments for days past, even in the midst of amazing new technologies, makes him human. Makes him like you, and like me.
As he reflects back on the “good old days” where he actually met with customers and staff in person, we’ll see that change doesn’t always mean progress.
Our aim with this series isn’t to provide a business case analysis of what is most likely to unfold, but to entertain, provoke and get you thinking. If you disagree, and get a little mad about what we are publishing, well that’s good too.
In crafting the outlines for the series, our team wanted to push the limits a bit and explore what life could indeed be like in the not too distant future.
Please let us know what you think. Agree? Disagree? See things unfolding differently in the years ahead? Send me an email at: tphillips@universusmedia.com and share your thoughts. I’ll be sure to pass them along to Bill Tanner.
