How do dealers "go to inventory" at the end of the year?

Careful readers may have noticed that in the past few years, when they take the city's light rail, they will find that there are more and more new car stocks parked in the weedy parking lots along the way. They have gradually become the norm. Near the end of the year, when manufacturers are impacting sales once a year, these inventory of new cars will be sold by what kind of marketing methods, and have become a topic of common concern to consumers.

How to define "stock cars" differs internationally. According to the dealership inventory early warning report issued by the China Automobile Dealership Association, models with stocks within six months are classified as normal stocks, and new cars with stock times exceeding six months are generally defined as “long stock age” models. Consumers should be cautious when buying cars at the end of the year and carefully look at the production date of the models. Don't just be fooled for the cheap and be blinded by the various marketing methods of the merchants.

Destocking is an important task at the end

Under normal circumstances, the reasonable stock factor of the channel distributor is between 0.8-1.2, that is, it satisfies the sales task of about one month, and exceeds the 1.5-month inventory warning. Before the first quarter of this year, it was the toughest period in the auto market. The inventory of distributors from many domestic manufacturers peaked. China Automobile Dealers Association announced at the time of the dealer inventory warning report, including Great Wall Motor, Dongfeng Yueda Kia, Changan, Baojun, SAIC Roewe, Infiniti, Dongfeng Citroen, Jaguar - Land Rover, Changan Ford, Brilliance China, Beijing Hyundai, Skoda The inventory coefficient of 15 brand dealers including SAIC, Volkswagen, Dongfeng Peugeot and Chevrolet exceeded 2 months. Inventory of individual brands was more than 3 months. Dealers’ sales pressure in the first half of the year was the largest in recent years. .

Into the third quarter, these stock cars are digested? After several months of vigorous sales promotion on the sales side of the manufacturer, dealer inventory of several brands began to rise back to a reasonable range. For example, brands such as Beijing Hyundai and FAW-Volkswagen Audi all returned within two months of inventory, but there are still individual The brand's individual "Long Ku Ling" models continued to increase, adding to the uncertainty at the end of the year.

How manufacturers go to stocks with different strategies

For the "inventory", the brand manufacturers have used what strategy? In general, if there is an early warning of a dealer's inventory, the manufacturer will adjust the sales strategy in a timely manner, increase promotional efforts, and allow the dealer inventory to return to a reasonable range. Taking Audi and the Hyundai brand as examples, in the first half of this year, sales dropped sharply. Manufacturers immediately implemented cash subsidies to dealers to help dealers reduce costs and adjust inventory in a timely manner. As the most effective promotion method this year, some manufacturers will also increase the support for auto finance, use the loan interest-free policy and other preferential strategies to promote "destocking."

"It can be said that this year is the first year of financial leasing." According to Luan Xuehong, deputy secretary-general of the China Automobile Dealers Association responsible for dealers inventory warning program, this year, including the big car search, all cars, gift letter and melon seeds used car The business platform began to be involved in the sales of new car e-commerce vendors. What it saw was mainly the rapid growth of auto financing leasing business. These platforms have used the Internet finance adequacy funds to cut into the new car loan business in the form of financial leasing, and achieved rapid development in the market.

Some industry sources broke the news with the Beijing Youth Daily reporter: Taking the loan business of a certain platform as an example, the new car with a current guide price of 200,000 yuan has been negotiated with the manufacturer to obtain these “stock cars” at a price of 160,000 yuan or less. Right to sell, then implant loan products, and sell them with zero down payment and high monthly rent. After three years, the car-buying consumer almost finished paying 60% of the car's price of 16 million yuan, but he could still make a 30% down payment to pay for a high-interest loan. This kind of operation method has no objection to a kind of sales profits in the current auto market, and has also become a target for each platform to imitate each other.

Buy "Long Ku Ling" car should pay more attention

In fact, the dealer inventory coefficient is only an indicator for the dealer to measure the sales end, it does not affect the consumers to buy cars, but the inventory is not the same as the conventional "long-age" car, consumers not only face many traps at the time of purchase, at the same time It will also have a great impact on later use.

From the international practice, regardless of the manufacturers inventory or dealer inventory vehicles, the minimum requirements for storage must be pavement hardened parking. In fact, due to the long inventory time and large quantities of individual brand models, they are almost randomly left unattended and parked. The area around the storage vehicles is not only overgrown with weeds, but also the wheels of some cars are deep in the ground and the tires are deformed. Such vehicles Even after the sale has been prepared, there are various hidden dangers in the later use, such as the aging of the wearing parts, dampness of electronic components, and shortage of battery electrolyte. Such vehicles can easily affect later use, and the problems are not easily noticeable.

Remind consumers that at the end of the year when buying a car, do not try to be cheap and ignore the actual production date of the vehicle, causing trouble for the car. When customers mention the car, they should check the nameplate of the car as much as possible. Generally, the factory nameplate is in two positions, one in the engine compartment and one in the side of the main driving door. The nameplate clearly identifies the "year of manufacture" of the car.

In short, the auto market at the end of the year is a mixed bag, and consumers are wary of "stock cars" that appear in the name of various kinds of offers.