The 10-Second Version (AI Summary)
Generated by AI and reviewed by our team.
What happened: On Auto Collabs, Delivrd's Tomi Mikula laid out a dealership model with salaried reps, team bonuses and no F&I office.
Why it matters: Pay plans shape how every customer gets treated, long before the owner sees the results.
What to do: Look at what your pay plan rewards tonight, and what it costs your reputation over the next year.
On January 3, 2023, eight customers in a row told Tomi Mikula the same thing.
Tomi was a successful F&I manager at the time, averaging about $3,000 a deal. That day, eight finance customers sat down in his office, and every one of them said no to everything he offered. Each said some version of "I hate buying cars." He realized that no matter how well he played the system, he would never fix it from the inside.
Tomi went on to found Delivrd, and he walked through that moment in our new Auto Collabs conversation with Tomi Mikula. His case for changing the industry starts with pay, because pay plans shape behavior, and customers feel the effects long before owners do.
What does Tomi Mikula think is wrong with car sales pay?
Today, Delivrd charges consumers $1,000 to negotiate their deals, and Tomi's diagnosis of dealership pay is blunt: "[T]he commission model rewards gross profit, which means the more money a consumer spends, the more money I make."
Here's the store he says he'd build instead:
Salaried reps at $100,000 to $120,000. Knowing every make and model well enough to compare them honestly is a skill worth paying for.
Team bonuses over individual competition. When Delivrd hit 150 deals in one week, every employee got $2,000, including the accountant.
One price for everyone on a given day, set below an inflated MSRP.
One person from greeting to paperwork, with no separate finance office.
A pay plan tells your people which customer to care about: the one in front of them, or the next ten.
Where does Tomi's plan run into dealership reality?
We pushed back on a few points. Paul noted that a single fair price is hard to set when every store's acquisition and holding costs differ. Many of those costs come from the manufacturer, so a dealer can't fix them alone. Kyle, who ran training at a one-price, no-commission store, said single point of contact already works at dealerships Tomi hasn't seen yet.
Our own street interviews also complicate his story. Across dozens of conversations, people's favorite part of their last car purchase is almost always their salesperson. Tomi's response is that many of those buyers don't know what they overpaid.
"I gotta take you to some dealerships, man."
The fix starts with how stores train their people.
Tomi's first store put new hires through 90 days of role plays and vehicle tests, and he says most stores give it three. Kyle pointed to IBM, which once required six months of training before a rep's first solo sales call. Both agree that someone on the job for a week shouldn't be advising a customer on an $80,000 purchase.
Paul summed up why we keep having these conversations: "[W]e're going to fight to make this industry one that people fight to join." Tomi is right that pay and training decide whether customers trust you. The dealers who already get this right are the strongest counterargument to Tomi's view of the industry.
Hear the full conversation on Auto Collabs.
