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CAR & DRIVER
Audi Dealers Do It Best, Tesla's Are Worst, According to Car-Shopping Study
The study measured how well dealerships are selling cars to potential buyers.
July 2018
Audi topped an annual study called the Pied Piper Prospect Satisfaction Index (PSI), which measures how well dealerships are doing at selling cars to potential buyers. Tesla finished last. Pied Piper Management (a real company, not the fictitious one on the Silicon Valley television show) said the results of its study, which carries the full name of 2018 Prospect Satisfaction Index U.S. Auto Industry Benchmarking Study, came after mystery shoppers visited 3466 dealerships representing 34 auto brands between July 2017 and June 2018.
Audi, Jeep, and GMC saw the biggest year-over-year improvements, while Infiniti, Tesla, and Porsche had the biggest declines (see full rankings below). As for Tesla’s last-place finish, Pied Piper founder and CEO Fran O’Hagan said the electric-vehicle brand, which has been included in the report since 2014, has shown some inconsistencies at its retail locations. “We found that in about one in four visits nationwide, the experience with a Tesla salesperson is brilliant, to the point that there’s nothing to improve,” he said. But other times, he said, although salespeople may be knowledgeable about the product, they seem to stop short of actually trying to move it out the door. He also said they tend to be weak on providing information about services such as vehicle trade-ins.
