TOGETHER WITH:
Howdy, Fam!
Your customers are watching Tomi Mikula's videos, whether you've seen them or not. Today on Auto Collabs, we're releasing our long-form, in-person conversation with the founder and CEO of Delivrd, the flat-fee service that puts a professional negotiator on the buyer's side of the deal.
Tomi spent years working inside dealerships before he switched sides, and The Wall Street Journal once called him "a car dealer's worst nightmare." Love him or can't stand him, hear his case straight from him on Auto Collabs, so you know exactly what your customers are hearing.
In today's email...
Europe's warning on Chinese vehicles
What Goldman's AI cutoff means for your store
The trade-in that never made it to sales
VW pulls its year-end lease deal
Keep Pushing Back,
—Chris with Paul, Kyle & Kristi
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The auto industry's top trade group is calling Europe a warning for the U.S.
Alliance for Automotive Innovation CEO John Bozzella came home from the Paris Motor Show urging Congress to ban Chinese vehicles during the lame-duck session, before Chinese brands can gain a foothold here. More than 20 Chinese brands exhibited in Paris, up from nine a couple of years ago.
Europe | U.S. | |
|---|---|---|
Chinese brands' footing | 7.8% of 2025 new-vehicle sales, up from 1.7% a decade earlier | Blocked by tariffs and national security rules |
BYD | 14 models in France, targeting 200 French dealers by the end of 2026 | Not on sale here |
Policy response | Proposed cap of 350,000 Chinese hybrid and plug-in hybrid imports a year, plus a "Made in Europe" push | Congress weighing a permanent ban |
Why does Europe's scramble matter to U.S. dealers?
China's domestic passenger sales fell 28% in September while its exports climbed 73%, and that excess capacity is showing up as heavy discounting across Europe. On Wednesday's show from SEMA, we walked past booth after booth of Chinese tire and wheel brands, a reminder that the parts side of the business already knows how this story goes.
Whatever Congress decides, know where your store would stand if a Chinese brand ever comes calling.
Running a Smarter Store
Scott Traylor spent more than 20 years running dealerships before moving into automotive AI, including leadership roles with Berkshire Hathaway Automotive and EchoPark.
At ASOTU CON West, he is bringing that operator perspective to one of the biggest questions dealers have right now: what should Voice AI actually be doing for the store?
Scott's session gets into how dealers can turn customer calls into usable intelligence their teams can act on, giving managers more visibility into what customers are asking for and what needs attention next.
If AI is anywhere on your 2027 plan, hear from someone who has sat on both sides of the desk.
Goldman Sachs took AI coding tools away from its traders after months of use.
Under October guidance, Goldman limited Anthropic's Claude Code and Microsoft's GitHub tools to its roughly 12,000 engineers and its quant strategists. Traders who used them to monitor client flows and build models lost access, though staff can turn to the in-house GS AI Assistant, now rolling out to about 46,000 employees.
What should your store decide before a cutoff decides for you?
Dealerships handle customer data all day. Our full take boils it down to three calls:
Approved tools: which AI tools your team is cleared to use.
Who gets them: which roles have access, and what everyone else uses instead.
What stays out: the customer data that never goes into an outside tool.
Put the answers in writing, and walk your managers through them this week.
A trade-in mentioned on a service call never made it to sales.
That's the scenario Paul opened with on Wednesday's Edge Webinar with CallRevu. Gaffney Buick GMC's Earl Wheless shared how his team catches those moments, and how the store grew from about 50 to about 100 sales a month along the way.
"[Y]ou just kind of spin around at the desk and say, 'Hey, Jamie, did you hear what that customer said?'"
Earl Wheless, Internet Sales Manager, Gaffney Buick GMC
Read our takeaways on reviewing every call and the service-to-sales handoff.
VW is skipping its Sign Then Drive lease promotion this year-end.
The popular promotion typically ran from November into early January, one of the year's key selling stretches, and VW dealers aren't happy to lose it, Automotive News reports. If you sell VW, plan your own year-end lease messaging now.
🏁 Off the Line
BMW cut its 2026 profit outlook as restructuring costs mount, while Ferrari raised its outlook again after a strong third quarter.
Hyundai's Q3 operating profit rose 5.5%, driven by strong hybrid sales.
Arvest Bank adopted FICO Auto Score 10 to sharpen loan pricing for thin-file and first-time borrowers.
💼 Beyond the Lot
Canva is restructuring 1,271 roles, 22% of its workforce, as growth slows.
AMD's Q3 revenue rose 45% to a record $13.4 billion as data center sales nearly doubled.
George Selden receives a U.S. patent for his "road engine," the first American automobile patent. (1895)
Susan B. Anthony casts a ballot in the presidential election in defiance of the law and is arrested weeks later. (1872)
Franklin D. Roosevelt wins an unprecedented third term as president. (1940)
Thanks for reading, Friend!
