Fighting Chance New Car Buying Guide - Why The Fighting Chance Information Package Is More Empowering Than Its Competitors.

Who I Am,

Why I Created Fighting Chance

And What's Unique About It

An Open Letter From James Bragg, Founder

(Also CEO, COO, CFO, Hands-On Day-To-Day Manager,
Product Developer, Research Analyst, Web Site Honcho,
Head Customer Coach, IT Officer, Marketing Director,
Purchasing Agent, Treasurer, Controller, Straw Boss,
Slavedriver, Bottle Washer, Lunch Gofer & Janitor.)

To My Web Site Visitors and Prospective Customers:

Since the people who run those “corporate” automotive information web sites are invisible “phantoms,” I thought it might be helpful to tell you something about the worker bee who started this little business.

WHO I AM
I’m a graduate of Andover, Yale (Phi Beta Kappa) and the Harvard Business School and, at the core, a marketing guy. I’ve been a Brand Manager at Procter & Gamble, a New Products Director at Hunt-Wesson Foods, a Marketing Director of a Fortune 500 company and an Executive VP & Partner in a Los Angeles advertising agency, where among other responsibilities I supervised a national automotive account.

WHY I CREATED FIGHTING CHANCE
After all those years of helping others develop and market their brands, I yearned to have a brand of my own. I wanted to be self sufficient, running a business where the only jerk I had to deal with daily would be the guy whose face I shaved. (I work in the loft of my home with the help of one savvy long-term assistant. My wife is my only real boss, and our college-age daughter spends all the money.)

But what kind of a brand would it be, and in what category?

The guiding principles of my quest were:

To identify a business that might make the world a little better — ideally by finding a consumer need that wasn’t being met well by others.

To be able to use the skills I'd developed at digging deeper into information to provide the most complete picture on a subject, recognizing that knowledge is power and that more knowledgeable consumers become smarter shoppers.

To keep the business small enough to have telephone contact with my customers, both to help them by answering their questions and to learn from them as the described their experiences. Fighting Chance is “an information boutique.” I deal with 5,000 to 6,000 customers yearly — 95 to 115 per week, on average. (There have been times when I’ve shut down the web site because I couldn’t handle more customers effectively.)

To be a true consumer advocate, avoiding even the hint of a conflict of interest. My revenue would be based solely on my ability to serve customers effectively. I would not be “for sale” to anyone associated with the industry I chose as my focus.

The decision was a “slam dunk.” When I analyzed the new-car business from the consumer’s perspective, it was like someone had tailor-made an opportunity just for me by creating these elements:

An industry selling a high-ticket product to over 10 million retail customers every year.

A purchase process that consumers dreaded more than a root canal procedure, with no knowledgeable people on their side to learn from and talk to as they went through it.

A bevy of so-called “expert” automotive information web sites hawking ancient advice. Advice based on decades-old assumptions about the retail car business that is at odds with todays’ reality, where the impact of the Internet has dramatically changed the financial relationship between dealers and automakers. Even highly-respected Consumer Reports was still basing its advice on “the way it was,” which is a far cry from “the way it is.”

A quiet conspiracy to hide the truth about this relationship on those so-called “consumer-oriented” automotive web sites because they get their income from the automobile business and won’t tell consumers anything that might jeopardize that revenue stream.

Some of those auto sites even use "smoke and mirrors" to exaggerate the results consumers realize by using their advice or their service. The worst examples are those who calculate their "dollars saved" claims by subtracting the selling price from the full sticker/MSRP! (Who pays the MSRP for any car these days? Only the guy who just fell of the turnip truck.) In addition, they often include any customer cash/rebates in their "money saved" claims. Shame on them. That's money even the turnip truck guy receives! Claims based on those numbers are totally bogus. But some folks are gullible enough to believe them.

I will never stoop to that level. Customers reporting back to me tell us how much they've paid in relation to the total dealer invoice price, before subtracting any cash incentive.

MY FEELINGS ABOUT CAR DEALERS

I have no axe to grind against them. I do not think the average dealer is a bad person who’s out to rip off and “scam” consumers. The owners probably have $4 or $5 million or more invested in buildings, equipment, inventory, parts and people. Like any business, their objective is to make a profit that provides a decent return on that investment. I have no problem with their making a profit.

I have always found it comical that so many otherwise-smart consumers are willing to buy the idea that someone can tell them "what the dealer really paid" for a new car. In a typical year, we all buy hundreds of different products and services for our families, and no one can tell us what the seller paid for any of them. But somehow, we're willing to believe someone can tell us a what a dealer pays for a $15,000 to $100,000 automobile? Does that make sense to anyone reading this? If I believed that fantasy, I'd still be wondering why the Easter Bunny didn't show up and putting a tooth under my pillow every night.

My objective, and that of my customers, is never to get a new car at any target price, based on an assumption of the "real" dealer cost that's impossible to learn. Instead, it's “to get the best deal possible on their chosen vehicle in the part of the country they live in at the time they’re shopping.” That “best price” is reached in the competitive bidding process we lay out in detail for customers.

Given the nature today of “below-the-line” dealer incentives that are impossible to learn about in detail, some dealers may be willing to lose money, sometimes a lot of money, on a deal because it gets them a much bigger reward. And the dealership with the low offer this month may be the high bidder next month, depending on where it stands vs. one of those below-the-radar targets, which are often not based simply on sales numbers. That's the reality in the retail automobile business today.

WHAT'S UNIQUE ABOUT FIGHTING CHANCE?

First, there are two extremely knowledgeable veteran people here to talk to as you go through the negotiation process.

I’ve been doing this full-time since 1993. That’s over 18 years of 60-to 70-hour weeks. (When it’s yours, it’s different.) 60,000+ working hours, continually learning something new to pass along to you from studying and analyzing the industry and from the new insights I get from customers. (My wife calls me a "grinder.") 116,000 customers and counting, at least half of whom I’ve spoken to over the years (about a dozen a day, my favorite part of my job). It typically takes at least 10,000 hours to become really proficient at any profession. Do you think there's anyone at any other automotive site you've visited (or will visit in the future) who has anything close to 60,000 hours invested in the subject of how to get the best price on the new vehicle you want?

It’s inevitable that you’ll have some questions along the way. Issues will come up. Clarifying something you’ve read in the package. Checking the veracity of what some dealer said. Going through the numbers of a lease with us before you sign it. Whatever. There’s no such thing as a silly question. We look at this process every day; you do it only every few years. Call our 800 number and ask. I and Greg Santucci, my 10-year assistant, will help you navigate through to a happy conclusion. There are very few questions we haven't been asked and answered multiple times over the years. No other information service has customer service people with anywhere near our level of experience and expertise. (How many auto information companies can you call and talk to the person who started and owns the business?)

Random House sold more than 65,000 copies over 4 editions of my book, “Car Buyer’s And Leaser’s Negotiating Bible.” It’s out of print, but I now own the rights to it and hope to find time to update it this year and put it on the web site. (Check with Amazon to read 30+ sparkling readers' reviews.)

I may not know more about this subject than anyone else, but I’m in a better position to share it than anyone whose revenue comes from auto companies and car dealers.

Second, you will get penetrating insights about how the retail auto business works today that you will find nowhere else, complete instructions on when and how to conduct the negotiating process to get the best deal available, as well as helpful coverage of several important related subjects that no other automotive info site is covering well.

Here’s a very current example:

I have known for several years that dealers have been getting “below-the-line” money (invisible to consumers and automotive web sites) from automakers from hidden programs that are separate from the offers listed in any incentive reports. My customers know about this. There’s a five-page piece in the Fighting Chance package that covers the many different variations that I’ve run into (“What I’ve Learned About ‘Below-The-Line’ Dealer Cash Programs. Facts No One Else Is Telling You.”) But that probably just scratches the surface of all the ways these programs can be structured.

I have always wondered where the money comes from to pay for these “below-the-line” programs. There is no traceable source in the pricing information. But in January of this year, I turned up two bolts of lightning that made the answer crystal clear.

The first was a leading automaker’s January '11 price increase that had a very different twist, a twist which lent the first substantive credence to what I suspected had been going on for years.

Then, on Amazon, Greg Santucci, my assistant, found (for $.99+ shipping) a 17 year-old book that confirmed that all automakers had been doing the same thing for years to counteract the negative effect on dealer profits that resulted from invoice prices becoming available to everyone on the Internet.

That “aha moment” of discovery and the steps along the road to it are outlined in the package piece titled, “The Missing Link: The ‘Top Secret’ Fact The New-Car Business Has Been Hiding From Consumers For 17 Years, Finally Uncovered.” No one else will ever tell you this. If they’re in the car business, they don’t want you to know. If they’re not, they’d never spend the time to ferret out the truth. (This issue should become as obvious as the nose on your face to anyone who claims to be close to the new-car business, yet no other consumer advocate or automotive web site has even thought about digging into it.) After reading this piece, your response will be, “Oh, so that’s how they’ve been doing it.” (One customer wrote, “This is the ‘Rosetta Stone’ for the car business that should open everyone’s eyes to the real financial relationship between car companies and their dealers!”)

The 9-page centerpiece of the package is titled “How The ‘Email/Fax Attack’ Can Get You The Best Deal, Saving Money, Time and Aggravation.” This takes you through the negotiation process, teaching you exactly what to do and say, step-by-step, to get the best price available on the vehicle you want. (Got questions? Give us a call.)

There’s also a two-to-seven page “Big Picture” analysis I update for each brand about every two months. In it I tell you, model by model, whether sales have been up, down or sideways, whether the average dealer sells two per month or twenty five, what the brand’s holdback is (money built into the invoice price that dealers get back after the vehicle is sold), and how much over or under the total invoice price our customers have reported paying for a vehicle (before subtracting the impact of any cash incentives).

And there’s the current copy of the biweekly 5 to 6 page CarDeals incentive report, the best source I’ve found listing the automakers’ national offers.

These additional package pieces are loaded with helpful insights and advice you won't find on those "corporate" web sites:

Will Your Vehicle’s Value Drop Like A Rock?

What They Don’t Want You To Know About Product Quality

Dealing With A Trade-In

Smart Ways To Buy An Extended Warranty

Should You Buy A “Demo?” At What Price?

Can You Get The Vehicle Configuration You Want?

Important Note On Pricing Of Dealer-Installed Accessories

Things To Consider About Placing A Factory Order

Have You Chosen A Crashworthy Vehicle?

The Crucial Financial Importance Of A Dealership’s Customer Satisfaction Rating

How To Avoid The Big Leasing Rip-Off

Got a question when you read any of these pieces? Just give us a call.

Where else on or off the Internet will you find an information package that's this complete and comes with someone to talk to as you go through the negotiation process? Nowhere.

I may have the Guinness record for the longest attention span on one subject. Who else would spend 18 years and 55,000 working hours doing this? Some would say that sounds boring, but it seems I learn something new almost every week to pass along to customers.

I don’t take myself too seriously. (I tell my friends, “I’m in the twilight of a mediocre career.”) But I take my chosen work very seriously, and I love every minute I spend doing it.

Sometimes I feel so lucky that I have to pinch myself.

Finally, a brand manager with his own unique brand! One that empowers consumers in the purchase process they dislike the most.

How cool is that?

It makes me smile every day.

(If you do what you love, you'll never work a day in your life.)

Warmly and respectfully,

James Bragg