Latest / Auto Collabs / The Industry Needed Answers On Pricing Transparency. So He Built The Room

Transcript

The Industry Needed Answers On Pricing Transparency. So He Built The Room · Auto Collabs

• 0:00
  [upbeat music] This is Auto Collabs. You know that, that time when... Wait, everybody's got siblings here. Yeah. How long can you spend... [laughs] Maybe this is too personal a question to just ask- [laughs]...
• 0:17
  on an intro. How, what's the basic timeframe of amount of time you can spend with s- some siblings before you're like, "You know what? It's awesome that- We've had enough...
• 0:26
  it's awesome that we have our own homes far away." [laughs] Hmm. I mean- What's the, what's the timeframe? Man, this is gonna... How are... Are you trying- Sorry... to get us in trouble-
• 0:35
  You don't have to answer that, man... like right off the bat? You don't have to answer that. Michael, what's your answer? [laughs] Okay, but you gotta understand, okay, so Italian family, right?
• 0:41
  So you're sitting at the dinner table for at least eight hours. [laughs] Before you start the meal. Yeah. A- yeah. And then you start eating. And then you start eating. I need some bread immediately.
• 0:50
  You gotta get into at least three or four heated discussions and go through the whole, like, repentance and forgiveness cycle. Several times. Several times.
• 0:58
  And then somewhere around day three, you're like, "We can go home now." Well, one of the coolest things is, like, we don't have that dynamic, right? No.
• 1:06
  Like, I'm sad that you- we've been here in person for a few days, and you guys are about to go home, and I'm really sad about it. Wait, where is he going? Why are you making us sad now? I'm sad. Well, we- [whining]...
• 1:13
  we get to do one more podcast. Yeah. And a little bit more time together. Um, today we get to talk with Jim Fitzpatrick, uh, founder, CEO- Mm... of CBT News, a legend in the industry. Legend.
• 1:23
  I cut my teeth at a CBT News event. That's right. And now CBT News events are coming back. They're coming back. Right? Let's go. Let's go. They're doing a one-day. We get to talk to him about it.
• 1:33
  Uh, hey, I, uh, the segue is good because one day is plenty of enough time to be with a whole bunch of- [laughs]... industry people talking about FTC stuff when it's all a little bit tensions, you know? A little bit.
• 1:42
  It's like a little Italian dinner. Yeah. We gotta go through the whole cycle. Well, hey, listen, we hope you enjoy this episode with Jim Fitzpatrick.
• 1:53
  [upbeat music] Jim, thank you so much for, uh, put- putting aside some time to talk with Kyle and I when it's, uh, like we're all in a studio today. This is a really- Look at that... rare one.
• 2:01
  We're trying to match your energy- It's rare... with the studio energy. We are.
• 2:04
  [laughs] So, uh, all right, let's, let's talk about, um, what happened, like, I don't know if you ate something that didn't set right- [laughs]...
• 2:12
  but you got crazy enough and said, "I wanna do a live event in Washington, D.C. this year." [laughs] What- Yeah... what got into you, and why are you doing this event?
• 2:19
  Because I said, with the incredible traction that Paul and Kyle got [laughs] from their event, dammit, I gotta come up with something. No.
• 2:26
  [laughs] All kidding aside, kudos, by the way, to you for a, and congratulations to another incredible event- Thank you... with AutoCon. I mean, every...
• 2:33
  The, the, the industry's still talking about it, and I'm jeal- I'm a little jealous, quite honestly. Uh- You're gonna be there next year. I already gave you the dates, so [laughs] Congrats on that.
• 2:39
  You guys have stuck with that. The event keeps getting better and better. For dealers that are listening to us having this conversation, if you have not gone, you have to go next year, as I will be there as well.
• 2:49
  But, uh, but for sure, congrats on that.
• 2:51
  And to get back to your original question, w- you know, the, we do so many shows, I know you guys do, too, with these 97 letters that were sent out by the FTC that freaked out the industry. What does all of this mean?
• 3:03
  Where am I breaking the law? Wait a minute, I'm okay with the state law, but I'm not okay with the feds. I'm okay with the feds, but now I'm breaking three state laws as it relates to compliance and fair pricing.
• 3:12
  So we said, look, right now the industry is in this flux situation. They need answers. They need direction. We need to hear from elected officials.
• 3:20
  We need to hear from NADA representatives, state representatives as well from the ATAEs out there.
• 3:26
  So we're all trying to figure this thing out because at the end of the day, you know, we, we see the headlines on ASOTU, on Automotive News, on CBT News, where there's dealers that are getting some major fines out there.
• 3:38
  Yep. So it leaves the rest of the industry a little, running a little scared right now.
• 3:42
  And when you drill down on this issue, as I have ever since we announced this, if you've got a social media person out there, and we all love Russ Flips Whips, he was at your event. I love him. We've had him on the show.
• 3:54
  But here's the thing.
• 3:55
  If, if the, if the individuals out there that are representing your dealership are even on social media and they give a number to say, "Hey, you can buy this car right now or this pickup truck that I'm standing next to for 61,959," man, you better be on the number on that in a bi- Ooh...
• 4:10
  it better include the necessary fees bef... you know, when that customer comes in. That's how granular they're getting on this.
• 4:16
  So everything is at play right now, whether it be your third-party lead providers, your website, uh, whatever it might be, you're out there, you know, as a, as a dealer that's just waiting to be fined if it's not correct.
• 4:31
  So as I said, we're bringing together all of the necessary stakeholders i- in this particular, on this particular topic of fair pricing and compliance and to try to figure it out together.
• 4:41
  Hopefully, everybody leaves with some better an- or s- some clear, uh, path forward and some answers on this topic, which is really the goal. So we're gonna have- How's it-...
• 4:49
  Senator Bernie Moreno and, and a m- a number of other elected officials. I'm told now that we're gonna get somebody from the FTC, which we're very excited about. There you go. Wow. Yeah. Yeah. So, yeah.
• 4:57
  That's what I was gonna ask because there's been,
• 5:00
  there's been a differing level of h- how different parties are kind of approaching the visibility on this thing, whether that be the FTC or NADA or even, or even some of the industry partners that are responsible for how these prices get displayed digitally.
• 5:15
  H- how's it been kinda aggregating that attention, getting in, having the conversation with each of those stakeholders to try and bring everyone to the same table? 'Cause that's, that's a work in itself.
• 5:24
  So that, that's a great point, Kyle, because I will- [laughs] He's like, "Uh, TBD?"
• 5:30
  [laughs] There's a number of these stakeholders, and you kind of just alluded to them, where they're not really ready to go to the dealer community yet, especially not in an event like this or in a setting like this- Mm-hmm...
• 5:41
  because they don't necessarily have the answers, you know? Yeah.
• 5:43
  And, and right now I'm referring to the third-party lead providers, of which I've reached out to every one of these individuals and said, "Please, y- you know, don't make a final decision on this not to come.
• 5:52
  You've got to be there. You guys at the third-party lead provider, you stand at the crossroads of, of this very issue, and we've gotta get some clarity on this.
• 6:01
  We all gotta be on the same page reading off the same sheet of music, um, because it's so vitally important." Third-party lead providers don't wanna get their clients in trouble. Mm-hmm.
• 6:11
  And at the same time, uh, dealers wanna remain competitive, which means we gotta really level the playing field here.
• 6:17
  If Kyle's got a, a Ford F-150 for 1,000 or 2,000 less than I have got a Ford F-150 on my website or on my ads, you know, at one of the third-party lead providers, guess who's gonna get that customer?
• 6:30
  Even thoughYou, you know, I've spoken to a number of dealers that say, "Well, when we talk to the customers, we tell them that this is the way it's gonna go. We're being upfront about the pricing." That's a nice story.
• 6:40
  You're not getting that lead, okay? They're gonna go, as you all know, they're going to the cheapest guy that's on the web, right? Mm-hmm.
• 6:46
  And, uh, and this is something that we're dealing with every single day and on the, on the conversations that we're having. Probably you guys are finding the same thing, that you...
• 6:55
  All it takes is one bad player in a market to try to scoop up all of that, all of those customers, you know, because their price, their prices are two grand less on the same vehicle. It hurts the whole industry.
• 7:05
  It hurts the dealer community. And certainly they may get fined or they may not get fined, it depends.
• 7:10
  [laughs] And of course, as you know, the FTC came out and said, "Well listen, if you wanna turn in your fellow dealers out there-" Right. [laughs] "... like we're gonna, like we're gonna..."
• 7:18
  [laughs] It wasn't even that- Right? Come on... it wasn't even that polite. They were like- You should... snitch. Yeah. Yes. [laughs] Do yourself a favor. You snitch, right?
• 7:28
  [laughs] Um, and so we're, we're coming to this. There's obviously a lot of conversations that have been had about this, NADA did the, their two webinars. The first one was kind of a bust, but the second one- Yeah...
• 7:37
  seemed like we got a little more clarity. That's right. At least a little more commitment from the FTC- Yeah... uh, for ongoing clarification. What do you expect to come out of the summit?
• 7:46
  Because you are going to have Senator Moreno, maybe someone from the FTC. You're gonna have marketing leaders and tech leaders like John Fitzpatrick, Devon Daley, uh, there.
• 7:54
  What do you expect the output or in your mind, like, what's the best case scenario after this summit? What are we gonna learn and what are we gonna know?
• 8:00
  The best case scenario is, yeah, great question, is to hear directly from these players, the marketing companies, third party lead providers if they show up, and so many others that are stakeholders in this to say, "Look, here's where we, here's where we're planting our flag on this.
• 8:12
  Here's what we can do for you, uh, Mr. or Mrs. Dealer in, on this particular topic. This is where we're going. This is what we're working towards."
• 8:21
  You know, even the third party lead providers, if they don't have a rock solid answer right now, maybe the answer is, "Look, we're working on it diligently." But we need to hear that from them.
• 8:31
  We need to know that this is a top priority and that we're gonna get to the, to the, you know, to the happy place that, uh, that's gonna make all the dealers happy, I should say.
• 8:41
  Uh, whether it be, you know, this week, this month, this quarter, whatever it might be. They're all working on it. They all told me, "Hey, we're almost there. We're, we're working on this right now."
• 8:51
  But to get to back to your original question, what do we want 'em to leave with? We want 'em to leave with a, with a way forward that's a little more comfortable than what they're dealing in right now.
• 8:59
  Also, we wanna, we wanna find out what's on their minds. You know, with the Q&As in this situation are gonna be very, very important.
• 9:05
  After every session, we wanna, you know, pass the microphone around and say, "What do you think, uh, you know, based on what you just heard?"
• 9:11
  We wanna get the feedback to the necessary parties, especially if the FTC is there. Certainly, uh, Bernie Moreno is a huge advocate, as you know, for the retail automotive community, who's a dealer himself. Mm-hmm.
• 9:22
  Had dealerships. So he understands this. He gets it in a very, very big way. His son, Kevin, is about to open up a, uh, a beautiful Mercedes-Benz dealership in Oklahoma. Oh, really? Wow. Yeah. They're excited about it.
• 9:33
  Yeah. It's supposed to be an incredible store.
• 9:36
  But, um, but there's gonna be, you know, so many other, um, uh, individuals there that will be at least able to hear from the dealer community what their pain points are on this particular topic and, and maybe get remedies to these, uh, to, to these situations quicker because of it, you know?
• 9:54
  Yeah. It sounds like it's not just exhortation that's gonna happen at the, at the event, but it's, it's consultation. It's, it's a, it's, it's people coming together having a conversation.
• 10:03
  And I think, you know, uh, a lot of times, uh, uh, you know, when we've talked to dealers, "Hey, why do I need to get in- involved in these political agenda type things?"
• 10:11
  And this is one of those scenarios where if you've got those people in the room, especially dealers with mid to large size, uh, footprints- Yeah...
• 10:17
  they can, they can potentially have a major impact on the way that the entire industry gets d- gets dealt with over the next couple quarters because this is coming down fast and it, and it didn't get well communicated ahead of time.
• 10:27
  It's just, hey, it's happening- Mm-hmm... and so we've gotta start communicating it, to it now. Um, where, where is the event? How can people get there?
• 10:35
  Well- What's the timeline of the event so people understand, like, what their, what their commitment is gonna be? Yep. Great question. Glad you asked.
• 10:41
  So it's gonna be Tuesday, June 16th in Washington, DC at the Salamander Hotel, which is a beautiful property. A little rundown place you found? [laughs] Yeah. It's a gorgeous hotel.
• 10:52
  [laughs] The Motel 6 was, uh, damn packed, so we said, "You know what? What the heck. The dealers deserve better."
• 10:57
  But no, it's, it is, it's a beautiful resort and, uh, and but, but more importantly, you know, the event itself's gonna be great.
• 11:03
  We'll have a little, little, uh, reception cocktail party on the night of the 15th for those people that come in and will be spending the night- Great... um, you know, in the hotel.
• 11:10
  But, uh, but nevertheless, it's, it's, uh, it's gonna be a great event. And as I said, th- it's picking up more momentum as we get closer.
• 11:17
  We're getting even more elected officials that have said, "Hey, I wanna go to this thing", whether it be a congressman or senator. Mm-hmm.
• 11:23
  But people that are stakeholders and those in DC that have got constituents that are auto dealers, that have already heard from some of them, "Uh, you need to be at this." Yes. "I'm going to it. You need to be at this."
• 11:34
  You know? Well, that'll be great. And in, in like case for every event in the auto industry, um, no one buys their tickets till the last minute. Just so you know. We can, we can vouch for that. You know it. You know it.
• 11:43
  Well, and, uh, and I w- I did wanna ask you, because it's been a few years, I think pre-COVID since you all held a- Oh, yeah... held events, right? I cut my teeth at a CVT live event. Live event that, that- Absolutely...
• 11:52
  I think was Paul's first live event. It was. Pull back the curtain. What's it like kinda, you know, in the in- in the insides, getting back into that, the team working on event prep and, you know?
• 12:01
  I'm sure there's some trauma reflex, right? [laughs] A little, little sucking your thumb in the corner for some of it. Oh, you, you got that right. No, I, I, uh...
• 12:07
  Every day I have a greater respect for the job you guys do. [laughs] Every time I'm like, "How the hell do they live this life?" No, we... [laughs] We just have a support group. Yeah.
• 12:17
  You're part of it now, so just so you know. [laughs] We'll, we'll, we'll, we'll patch you into the text thread.You guys, uh, ha- are working in hundreds of people. We are not. This is...
• 12:26
  I'm glad you asked, 'cause this is going to be a much more smaller, intimate crowd- Mm-hmm... of probably 100, maybe 200- That's a great size for this... 100 to 200 tops. It's the perfect size, yes.
• 12:35
  It's, yeah, it's not anything like you put on. I mean, my, my hat goes off to you for the incredible job you do for, you know, hundreds if not a thousand or greater, uh, number of people that, that attend your event.
• 12:45
  But, uh, it's only for one day, not three days- Yeah... uh, which is much, much easier. But, but still, you know, you know, it's hard to get dealers out of their, their- Sure... comfort zone, out of their dealerships.
• 12:55
  They're running their dealerships, so it's like, "This better be for a damn good reason." Right, and then you have to deliver, right? And I think just- Right... like, y- you know this very well.
• 13:02
  If you get the right people in the room, it, it, it could be in a Motel 6, and it'll be a great event because what happens when people are together- Yeah...
• 13:10
  sharing the insights like this, especially people who can make decisions and who are actively trying to find a solution.
• 13:15
  I really feel like that is the job of media in the auto industry, is get the people in the right room- That's right... and then be an accountability mechanism to it. And I think everyone appreciates that.
• 13:26
  Just like, you know, if you decide you're gonna get in shape, right? The best thing you can do is surround yourself with other people. Like, "Oh, we're gonna get in shape together. Cool."
• 13:32
  Why didn't you wake up yesterday morning? Where are you? Like, I'm knocking on your window.
• 13:36
  And I s- I think that that is the role of the media, especially with the tech providers, and the industry partners, and the legislators. We say- That's right... "Oh, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait.
• 13:43
  We owe each other answers. We owe each other a plan forward." And I feel like your summit is the perfect place for that to happen.
• 13:50
  Jim, thank you so much for giving us some of your time today, and, like, sticking your neck out there to assemble the right people in the right place- Oh, thank, thank you...
• 13:56
  for one of the most important conversations that are happening right now. Yeah. Well, thank you so much for giving me some time on your incredible airwaves there to, uh, share, share this information.
• 14:05
  Really, really appreciate it. Can't wait to see you. [upbeat music] I think a, a trait of, of a great entrepreneur is their willingness to adapt to the times. And- Yeah...
• 14:17
  what I'm watching CBT and Jim do on TikTok of all platforms- TikTok, Instagram- I know... and just crush. Yeah. He, he's, he's the guy. And now we're gonna be in person.
• 14:25
  I love his, his thought process around, like, this is the thing that dealers keep texting and reaching out about, and questions, and really just surfacing all those insights that they get from producing news- Yep...
• 14:37
  and being so involved and saying like, "Let's do something about this. Let's put, uh, everyone in a room so we can get some answers." And, and that's the best way to get answers.
• 14:44
  And, and we asked him this, but it's a challenging thing to get some of these people to even come to the table. Yeah, I know. There's a lot that are super excited about it. Mm-hmm. They'll always jump in.
• 14:50
  Um, but it's tough to get, uh, people to the table and have these hard conversations, and I think you said it so well. That's, it's the role of media to, to go like, "Nope, we gotta talk about this."
• 14:59
  Whether, uh, whether it's gonna be us talking about it, and, and we'll, we'll have the lion's share of the information, 'cause everyone's gonna see us on video and in photos, or you can come be a part of this.
• 15:08
  So- That's right... I hope people are a part of it, and if you- Yes, you should go. It, you should go. Be a part of the conversation. Check it out, um, and be a part of it. I hope...
• 15:14
  I- I'm pretty sure that I'm gonna get to be there in person, so, uh, I'm excited. I'll let you know how it goes. Well, I, th- this is what I was thinking about, right? We've gone through a cycle where that...
• 15:23
  What, what you're talking about, that was the original intent of the media, was to ask important questions and to start conversations.
• 15:28
  Somewhere along the way, news media in particular just kind of became about reporting the news and getting the ratings. What- More about commentary, actually. Yeah, more about commentary.
• 15:35
  What Jim's doing is, is bringing it back to its original intent, which is we're not just gonna bring you up to speed. We're not just gonna give you our commentary.
• 15:44
  Let's now pull up the chairs to the- Have a conversation. Be part of the conversation. Let, yeah, let's get to that dinner table together, and we're gonna sit here, and we're gonna hash it out.
• 15:50
  I like how you just brought that back around to the intro. Oh. Oh. Like a good old Italian dinner. Oh, man. Well, I don't think we should say anything else.
• 15:57
  [laughs] On behalf of Comm Now, that's Zire, Michael Cirillo, and myself, thanks for joining this Italian dinner on Auto Collabs. [upbeat music] "Welcome to Auto Collabs." [laughs] "Welcome to Auto Collabs."
• 16:12
  [laughs] Why are we recording? [laughs] Are we rolling yet? Not yet.