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Mystery shoppers love Infiniti, hate Tesla

Infiniti, followed by Lexus tied with Mercedes-Benz took the top two spots for best sales experience according to mystery shoppers from the latest Pied Piper Prospect Satisfaction Index, while EV manufacturer Tesla recorded the lowest overall score. Not surprisingly, premium brands dominated the top ranks. Including the three already mentioned, luxury brands occupied seven of the top ten spots and included Audi, BMW, Porsche, and the only American brand to crack the upper echelon, Cadillac. Toyota, Volkswagen, and Nissan rounded out the first ten positions. The news for domestic automakers isn't good. Aside from Caddy, the only other star-spangled automaker to score above the industry average is Chrysler. The rest of FCA, most of GM, and all of Ford fell below the line. But Pied Piper's mystery shoppers handed Tesla the biggest walloping – the company is ten full points below the next lowest brand, Volvo, and its score of 86 is 17 below the average of 103. It's baffling, considering the company's touted direct-sales model. "Tesla leaves me scratching my head," Fred O'Hagan, Pied Piper's president and CEO, told Wards Auto. "They own all of their stores, so you would think each one would be doing the same thing. But they're not. Tesla is consistent in its inconsistencies." O'Hagan added that there's a "huge variation" in Tesla's store-to-store effectiveness, and that in some cases, shoppers found showroom workers that acted more like "museum curators," Wards Auto reports. It might be popular to call Tesla the Apple of the car world, but based on Pied Piper's work, the brand has a long way to go to emulate the uniform shopping experience of an Apple Store. The news might be bad for Tesla, but even for the brands that scored below average, there's cause for celebration. Only Tesla and Mini lost points in this year's rankings, and only Mercedes and Lincoln held steady. Every other brand, including Infiniti, which topped the index for the first time, gained at least one point. The biggest improvements belong to Porsche, Land Rover, and Mitsubishi, which all jumped five points. Pied Piper's annual Prospect Satisfaction Index uses mystery shoppers – over 6,100 this year – from across the country to assess dealers and generate rankings from over 50 individual factors. News Source: Pied Piper via WardsAuto Green Audi BMW Cadillac Chrysler Infiniti Lexus Mercedes-Benz Nissan Tesla Toyota Car Buying Car Dealers study

GM slashes prices in China as sales falter

Buying a vehicle from General Motors' stable of brands might be a lot cheaper in the near future – at least for customers in China. The effort comes as GM hopes to keep sales there growing, and the decision alludes to yet another sign that the Asian country no longer has the booming auto market of past years. GM and its Chinese joint venture partner SAIC are slashing prices by as much as the equivalent to $8,700 on 40 models from Buick, Chevrolet, and Cadillac, according to The Detroit News. Across all of automaker's nameplates, the overall sales dipped in China in April by 0.4 percent to 258,484 vehicles. Among the drops, Buick was down 8.5 percent, and Chevy shrunk 5.6 percent. Caddy's numbers increased 4.6 percent for the month, though. Buick remains a popular brand in the minds of Chinese consumers, but according to The Detroit News domestic automakers there are starting to eat into the dominance of foreign companies in the market. The country remains important for GM, though. Late last year, it outlined a future strategy that included China as a major pillar, including a $14 billion investment to build five new factories and boost sales. News Source: The Detroit NewsImage Credit: Alexander F. Yuan / AP Photo Buick Cadillac Chevrolet GM Car Buying Car Dealers saic

Cadillac cancels its car subscription program after just two years

Cadillac is cancelling its Book by Cadillac subscription service, according to a report from the Wall Street Journal and confirmed to Autoblog by a Cadillac spokesperson. The $1,800 a month service has been in operation since early last year. The Cadillac spokesperson told us this: "Following nearly two years of service, Cadillac will temporarily pause the Book by Cadillac program effective December 1, 2018." This moves comes not too long after the decision to leave its New York City headquarters and return to Michigan. While Cadillac claims the disruption of service will be temporary, there's no defined plan to start the program back up again. The reason for the cancellation? The service ended up being more costly than Cadillac expected it to be. Owners will have 30 days from the time they're notified to turn their vehicles in. If this subscription service was your only transportation, then you better start looking for something else. The service was available in New York City, Dallas and Los Angeles. Subscribers could choose between five different Cadillacs: ATS-V, CTS-V, CT6, XT5 and Escalade. You'd be allowed up to 2,000 miles per month and 18 vehicle swaps per year through the concierge service. Cadillac would bring the car of your choice to you and take the old car away at your whimsy. The price included registration, taxes, insurance and maintenance costs. No long term commitment was necessary to sign up. This makes Cadillac one of the first manufacturers to end a nascent subscription service. If it starts back up again, expect it to look a bit different from the current program. Cadillac says it's using this experience to make strategy adjustments in the future. Whether that means a much more costly program for users, or no subscription program at all, we don't know. Plenty of other manufacturers still offer limited subscription programs in select cities. We highlighted some of the biggest ones in our vehicle subscription service guide here. It'll just be a waiting game to figure out if these modes of ownership take off going forward. For more information on Vehicle Subscription Services, check out the Complete Guide. Related video: Cadillac Car Buying subscription service book by cadillac