Reservation/confirmation compounding

[Jimbo]

Hi all,
It just hit me after I spoke with SmartUsa customer service: I live in a town of 35,000 people, in a county of about 65,000 people, 50 miles away from the largest population center in my state, of about 400,000. Location, not reservation date is the key to confirmation and eventually ownership of one of these little bugs. They will tell you that your reservation date is important, but they will also say that a large number of orders in a specific area will gain greater attention from the SmartUsa system. People who live in cities of a million or so have the built in advantage of (a) having a dealer nearby, or (b) get some exposure to the car and positive buzz about it, and (c) the people who get to see and be exposed to the car are most likely to want to reserve one. As more and more orders are placed in larger cities nearest dealerships, few if any new orders are made out in the "Hinterlands" where exposure is less and buzz is nonexistent. Finally, because of the attention paid to these other places, it seems like as more time goes by the line ahead of folks like me gets longer and longer. Now more than 10 months and still no invitation to configure. As I watch people configuring who reserved 6-7 months later than some of us who did so in June, July and August of 2007 It makes me wonder when and if that email from Smart will EVER come.
Does anyone else out there see it this way? Thanks for listening.

[curtis]

I think you got it...Luckily this Hinterlander ordered mine back in march 07 and just picked it up 2 weeks ago.. Kind of bogus the way they operate it if you ask me. It's like standing in line for the Nintendo Wii and the store manager going down the line picking who should get one and who shouldn't based upon your home address. That would go over pretty good i bet! NOT! and yes I did stand in about 5 lines for the original Wii release and didn't get one. I was number 20 in line and the only had 19, then I was number 5 and they only had 2! I did finally get my Wii and now I have the Wii Car too!

[partsrme928]

What I don't wnderstand is how customers within the same dealership can be so far apart.
res # 1181 picking up car tomorrow
res # 1227 orphaned car last friday
res # 1237 no word yet

[dd1]

Same thing here in TX. Reserved mine a little over nine months ago. That's the last bit of info from Smart. No word on conformation and a 9/2009 DDE.

[Big Panda]

here's an interesting observation which kind of contradicts the above post.

there are two smart owners in BFE Illinois ("meaux61" and "SmartNTiny")who live in the same small town just within a few blocks of each other and were assigned to smart center of Indianapolis. don't know 'when' they reserved, but they have BOTH taken delivery of their cars.

it really makes NO sense....NONE i tell ya!

[Agent 99]

Jimbo, I agree with you 100%. Can't get info out of the DDE for anything. I have called and emailed and have been given many 'reasons' why my area is not assigned to a dealership yet. Oh, wait they can tell me who my dealership is, it's _______. Oh that's not the closest one to where you live, well..... leaves me to create my own stories about what is going on, like... maybe untill they work out the kinks in this model they won't assign my area to a dealer so's they don't get stuck with huge towing bills? I've got to get a hobby to keep me busy so that these stories in my head will stop.

[carol f]

I sure don"t understand it either. I am #1237 and reserved May 22 2007 and configured Dec 14 2007. Can NOT find out anything from my dealer which is 5 hrs away. The general manager does't know a vin or what an R11 is. Smart told me it was at port on the 21st of May but my dealer knows nothing. This has been such a mess and who knows what's next. All we can do is wait**but it is so hard everyday not knowing anything. I wish i could just drop in the dealer to see and talk to someone. Good luck to all of you for i know how you feel.

[Jimbo]

Well, here's another thing...Smart got it way wrong when they only allotted 20,000-2008 smart cars for distribution in the U.S. Huh? I'd bet they could cover the California or New York State markets with that many cars, but not the whole 50 states. I think they're stretching out delivery times to cover for the fact that they totally miscalculated the demand. One cardinal rule of business is "Don't Turn Away Business"; and as such they've been taking reservations for orders they have no intention of filling for this (or possibly even the next!) model year. My DDE Says February to April of 2009, and for weeks it was stuck on March-May 2009 so I guess that's a positive step. I know this much, If I wait to 2009 to take delivery of a car I reserved in 2007 it had better be the current 2009 model year, and by rights it ought to be the price quoted in 2007. Yeah, when pigs fly out of my butt.

[maxtraxduffy]

i live in a town of 289 in a county of 8,674 largest town in county is 1400 largest near bye town 25 miles 35000 nearest dealer 127 miles i was a 1239 delivered 5/7/08 that said i think they are tring to get cars in every zip code!or a %of cars percapta in said zip!thats my story and im sticking to it.

[rawlus®]

it is my understanding that those in the cities are not getting their reserved smarts faster - if each of the dealers is allocated a similar number per time period (which would make sense since a given number per month are necessary to cover overhead expenses alone) then it is those in the fringes who perhaps stand a better change, because the cities will have far more reservationists competing for the controlled dealer allotment than in the less population-dense areas where the percentage of reservations to vehicles per time period favors the reservationist.

i can appreciate the frustration because i am nearing the end of my own 12 month wait. in reality, the only person to be upset with is yourself for not jumping on the wagon sooner. i wish i reserved winter of 07 instead of spring 07 and i'd already have mine by now. there would be no practical business reason for a company to discontinue accepting reservations despite a very very long waiting list.

i mean, you know that going in. every news report mentioned the year+ waiting list. if you're not up to that, that's no fault of penske - i am sure if they could magically produce 50,000 smarts to 2,000 dealerships across the country they would do so. their profitability is certainly also hamstrung by the same set of circumstances. the pent-up demand for the product is not a money-maker when the MSRP is prohibited from rising based upon that demand. it would be an entirely different matter if penske was letting the 50K reservation sit and charging a 50% premium on the vehicles that are arriving, but that's not happening.
i can guarantee, PENSKE is just as frustrated as the most frustrated consumer that he can't get more of these things into the country, quicker.