Scott Painter agreed to the recording of the call, but I wasn't allowed to edit so sorry for the first 3min of phone/personnel delay. Interesting at 12min or so and also at the wrap 48min0sec. Scott Painter said he does not now, and has never, dipped into the DMS to support his pricing curve. I said the dealer sold the car, so the dealer is the source of his "sales data" to drive his portal, regardless--and that he was repurposing that data against the dealer. He said he was giving dealers a great closing tool; I said his $1.5BILLION consumer "savings" included LOST dealer profit. He said his bell curve pricing was fair; I said, since he forces dealers to price a certain way and NOT set their own price (they have to choose a spot called "Good" or "Great") and that he is inevitably on a race to the bottom just like Jackson of AutoNation said. He said he doesn't hate dealers; I reminded him of what he said differently at TechCrunch50 in 2008 (and he said he regrets saying that). He said he also regrets saying that cars a commodities. He said it was business and good for dealers; I used the hypothetical example ofwww.TrueCEOSalary.com to tell him it was bad for dealers and personal (48min0sec). And that was the overall mistake he has made, in my opinion.
And the future is, despite his dancing a bit (in my opinion), www.TrueFinance.com, www.TrueGAP.com,www.TrueServiceContract.com. It's ALREADY www.TrueUsedCarPrice.com, oops I mean www.ClearBook.com.
So, if you don't want to see your industry go the way of travel booking sales and travel agents, KILL THE BEAST!
My opinion. You listen, and you judge.
Thanks!
Keith