(Published in a Linkedin group) There’s a new car dealership that is daily visited by dozens of people. All of them buy something, leave with a smile on their faces, invite others to go there on the same week and buy again! Fiction? No – it’s reality today! Come and get to know this phenomenon.

The non-Customers potential

It’s nice going to a FNAC store for a stroll, checking out the shelves, seeing what’s new, listening to a CD, having a coffee or thumbing through a book. It’s nice going to a FNAC store, even if we’re not buying anything then. But, yet, sometimes we do! Or not! Granted that a FNAC store will always be on its clients’ minds as a place to visit whenever they want to buy one of the products available there.

Entering a dealership is often an intimidating experience. The place, which is unfortunately not very busy, doesn’t make its first time visitors comfortable. Closed or even locked doors do not boost the visitor’s interactivity with the cars on show. The customers that are interested in a proposal or in giving their personal information can find a place to sit, but there are no places to simply be there for a while. Generally, the Consultants approach is receptive towards the Customers that show a true interest in buying, and clumsy, uninterested or even dissuading towards all the others – the non-Customers…

Let’s now imagine that a Dealership decides to create, in its own stand, a pleasant space to, for instance, have a coffee. If one starts attending that place, even if not interested in buying a car, he/she will eventually have a contact with the Brand, its values, products, services and sales team. The most likely consequence will be that, if that person decides to buy a car, this brand and this dealership will be on the shopping-list.

Even in Portugal, there are already some dealership facilities where we can see an effort to reinvent the non-Customer hosting by putting up pleasant spaces to be or by carrying out events, such as art exhibits. We must only extend this concept to a greater number of sites and, especially, to manage that the sales team performance is also seeing eye-to-eye with this receptivity approach to non-Customers.

Afterall, it is possible

While I was admiring the steaming plate with some succulent cannelloni with stir-fried onion, cocktail sauce and molten mozzarella, I was recalling the text above that I wrote in 2006. This luscious dinner was lying on one of the tables at a new Italian restaurant, located in República Avenue, Lisbon. But this wasn’t just any restaurant: this was Spazio Dual City Caffé, an innovative concept that gathers under the same ceiling all the specialties by Chef Guerrieri (www. chefguerrieri.com) side by side with Alfa Romeo and Lancia cars.

Not immediately noticed by someone coming from the sidewalk in República Avenue, this new space compensates this discretion with an impeccably uniformed attendant handing out the menus at the door. And here’s where the surprise begins: prices are unexpectedly accessible, considering the tempting designation of these delicacies and, especially, considering the strongly appealing impact of the venue itself.

Combining current and historical references to the brands with a permanent contemporary art exhibit, the concept has the merit of raising the cars on show to the décor pieces category. The restaurant is located on a “mezzanine” around the exhibit venue, granting a pleasant view and a very trendy ambiance. The repast quality matches the initially created expectations and the service is nice and helpful.

And the icing would be…

The Spazio Dual City Caffé is a very pleasant space to go to, appropriately composed as far as the number of people there is concerned. It provides a seducing and competitive restaurant service and a laid-back contact with the brands’ values and products. Undoubtedly, it is an example of what the car retail sector can do so as to incentive the showrooms’ attendance, whether by potential Customers or by the above mentioned non-Customers.

Besides the ability of consistently keeping up the present working patterns and the concept of “good restaurant decorated with awesome cars”, there are always other evolution tracks to explore.

Recognising that in such a place there should be exhibited the high-rank versions of the commercialised ranges, it would be desirable that the access cost of each exhibited range would be mentioned in a both elegant and subtle way. Only exhibiting the high-rank versions cost, even with discriminated options, may give out a wrong idea of the brand’s cost general position.

Finally, when I visited Spazio, the most appealing model (Alfa Romeo Mito) was (well, I must say) positioned right at the entry. A middle-age lady walked in, approached the car, walked around it, looked inside, checked out the prices and left without the Consultant ever approaching her. With the adequate approach, he could have simply handed her a business card, just in case she “ever needed some further information on Alfa Romeo…”. At this kind of places, balancing the intended commercial pressure absence with the acting efficiency when opportunity calls is not easy, but it is necessary. It is necessary to act promptly and elegantly, without intimidating the non-Customers, but using all the possibilities for taking the first step towards a business. Considering the presented concept global quality, this is just a detail which, when improved, will definitely become the icing on the cake.

by Ricardo Oliveira

Workshops “.inspiring”

Presentations on this subject to be integrated in Dealerships General Meetings, Sector Conventions or Local Workshops are available.