Nissan EV Bundle, St Louis Service Dept Develops Tech, In-Vehicle PS5

November 23, 2022
Tomorrow is the big day where we get extra thankfulness, but today we’re still battening down the hatches as we talk about Nissans new EV maintenance bundle. We also cover a St Louis Dealer doing their part to curb vehicle theft, as well as a potential PS5 embedded in a vehicle.
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Nissan launches it’s Carefree+ bundled maintenance plan for new EVs which is targeted to address both consumer hesitancy toward new EV technology and loss of revenue opportunities for Dealership service departments.

  • The plan offers Ariya buyers a 3yr/36k scheduled maintenance including tire rotations and air filter and fluid replacements, 100k battery warranty and a year of free access to the EVgo public fast-charging network
  • Data shows new EV owners are more likely to bring vehicles to the Dealership and adhere more closely to the recommended maintenance
  • The move is also positioned to drive more dealership visits and increase opportunities for retention, upsells, and introduction to new models and technology
  • The bundled product removes the opportunity to sell additional maintenance packages that would be a profit center

Service Manager Elliot Silk and his team at Suntrup Kia and Hyundai St. Louis’ grew tired of their customers' cars being targets of theft and decided to fight back themselves.

  • 27 vehicles per day are stolen in St. Louis, a 75% increase over last year
  • “Probably about 8 months ago it started coming in faster and faster and then of course customers are calling me all the time saying, ‘what are you going to do about it?’” said Silk. “Well, nobody has done anything so me and my guys thought about it and we took it upon ourselves to come up with a solution.”
  • The team developed a bluetooth interrupter that requires pressing a button on a keychain in order to allow the vehicle to start which renders the vehicle useless without it
  • Costs $200 to install, and the store is going to be installing on all new models sold

In a move that isn’t all that surprising to the hosts of this show, Sony and Honda are reportedly considering incorporating a PS5 directly into the vehicle the companies are co-developing

  • Sony Honda Mobility says this idea is ‘in consideration’ as it looks to compete with the in-vehicle gaming experience available inside Tesla vehicles
  • In car gaming would only be available when the vehicle is stationary or in some form of autonomous driving mode
  • Honda, individual

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SPEAKERS

Kyle Mountsier, Paul Daly


Paul Daly  00:00

Hey y'all, it's Wednesday, November 23, the day before the big day. Today we're going to talk about Nissan's new Evie bundle. St. Louis service department doing their own part to curb thefts and a PlayStation five and a Honda.


Kyle Mountsier  00:30

Who we'll get to, we'll get to it. I feel you know what I feel? I feel so like, all the poor Canadians, right today. Like guys stop talking about tomorrow off. They're just not here. Like y'all. We are a part of kind of the North American auto industry. You know, you got Canadian companies back and forth. And they're just like, Guys, guys, we get it. It's Thanksgiving.


Paul Daly  01:00

Get it? That's what happens. I think we just need to maybe just celebrate Canadian Thanksgiving a little bit louder next year. There you go. I feel good, right. So all the all whole US crew can be like, oh, let's celebrate that with this. And we'll make it all eat. What else? Hey, look at this automotive news is I'm holding up a copy of a picture of the new name Ed, President Eugene in automotive news page, print edition, page 38. And there are two very familiar looking cats flanking his left and


Kyle Mountsier  01:34

also, you don't follow huge gene. If you haven't checked him out on the LinkedIn or the Instagram, huge gene fields. He is someone that you need to pay attention to Hu g e n e fields, and he is the new president of named mad and just an all around genuine good guy. Like our conversations with him so far have just been awesome. I was actually messaging with him yesterday. And I think that dude is is poised to kind of take everything that Daymond kind of packaged up and bottled up and just let it ride. So yep, can be fun.


Paul Daly  02:09

I like that. I like that. A lot of people on the road today maybe even listening while you're on the road traveling the family flying and family cars about to hit the road here in a few hours. Take a little trip to the away Cheerio.


Kyle Mountsier  02:22

Yes, we're going to have my buddy actually called me last night and he was eating graters which is what's a greater it's the best ice cream on the planet. And everybody in Texas can get lost about Bluebell. It's not even close. Okay.


Paul Daly  02:37

I feel like you've told me several different ice creams are the best ice cream


Kyle Mountsier  02:41

No Never Have I said anything is better than graters. Not a chance. Jenny's is good. Not better than not better. And there are people fight about that in Ohio because it sounds a lot like Cincinnati. You know, it's a thing.


Paul Daly  02:54

Yeah. Never heard of that. Well, there you go. I'll be staying home for inviting favorite ice cream. Oh, I listen to everything Oprah has to say so. Perfect. That's a perfect fit. I'm gonna be staying home with the family. We're cooking like the big dinner foot? Well, I mean, a lot of people were bringing food brooms. 30 people at my house. So you may find you may find me outside trying to mow the lawn or something in November. No, I'm kidding. We have we have an awesome family. We always have a really good time. So we're looking forward to that. Whatever you're doing, we hope that you have some good plans make the best of it. We have a special Thanksgiving episode. Don't miss that. It's a troublemaker pod tomorrow and we are going to help you through your day with some of our best conversation starters. For a Thanksgiving holiday. You can't miss it. It's just a short shot. If you want to like zip out for a few minutes, give a little info and then head back into the family gathering we promise to help you as much as we it'll help you


Kyle Mountsier  03:53

fight that two o'clock family feeling.


Paul Daly  03:55

That's what I like. I like it. Well, we got a few things to talk about today. While everyone is on their way out. First and foremost, this is an interesting one. Nissan has launched its carefree plus bundled maintenance plan for new EVs, which is targeted to address both consumer hesitancy toward new technology but also trying to do something for the dealerships and the loss of revenue that comes from the lack of maintenance requirements for an Eevee to create more opportunities and service departments. It offers the Nissan REO buyers, three year 36 mile 36,000 Miles scheduled maintenance including tire rotations, air filters, fluid replacements, right because EVs still have fluids. There's I don't know what the maintenance schedule is. But you know, like the thermal coolants for the battery trays, and I guess they still break like fluids, man. Yeah, but I mean, I mean, granted with an Eevee the brake fluid might need to be replaced before the pads do. Yeah. Because it's all about I mean, it's tires and brakes. Like that's what you're dealing with with windshield washer fluid. Yeah, well, it also comes with 100,000 mile battery warranty and uh, you You're free access to the Eevee go public fast charging network, which I checked and they have a lot of locations. So I was like, Alright, what's this EB go network, they got quite a few. And this is in an effort because data shows that evey buyers are much more likely to keep bringing the vehicle to the dealership because of the like, this is new. It's complicated. It's new technology. So even for simple things like tire rotations, it's showing that consumers are like, Hey, I'm gonna bring it back to the dealership, which is good because it can drive more dealer visits, build loyalty?


Kyle Mountsier  05:32

Well, it's because Because honestly, like the Evie game right now, I think still a lot of people are like, the consumers are already less loyal to products and brands. But when you kind of get into a new product line or a new a new development, you're you're willing over the first couple purchase cycles to kind of go, Hey, should I go over here? Should I go over there. And so we know that when people visit dealerships three times or more in their service lifecycle, they are actually 3x more likely to come back to that not just dealership but brand for their next purchase. So it's it's a, it's a serious move that that Nissan's playing and I think other manufacturers are going to be looking to keep market shared, not just now, but in that like 2027 timeline. Yeah, because that's I mean, if you want to be fully electric and have X percentage of your vehicle sales by 2030, in that in that range, and that lights coming back, right, you have to get that retention game, right. And so I think Nissan's making a really smart, smart play on this. This is really like when you think about Hyundai Kia coming to market, it's actually the same kind of play, because everybody's coming to market at this point, like Eevee is just a new startup for all of these companies. And even some of these companies are splitting it off. And so thinking like that Hyundai, Hyundai Kia come to market with that high warranty with with maintenance included. This isn't right. Yeah, it just mumbled. And


Paul Daly  07:05

no one's really like you think none of the third party independent service stations have done anything really to like show like, Hey, we're the place to bring your Eevee at either like none of the Firestone is good yours, etc. So I think there's just for that. Yeah, very few independent shops. I mean, one concern that's coming up is this does take away the dealers opportunity to sell like a maintenance product in the f&i office, right? Because it's bundled. So it's almost like, it's almost feels like a giveaway. You know what I mean, when you're the consumer, so I guess can't have it all, but something that Nissan is trying and, hey, hats off to them for trying to try to drive some loyalty get people? Yeah, I mean,


Kyle Mountsier  07:40

when the Toyota has been doing their two year maintenance for a Hotmail account, know, any two Toyota dealerships that are struggling finance, so yeah, you know, true. So,


Paul Daly  07:53

speaking of struggling, I love the story so much service manager Elliott silk and his team at SunTrust. Kia and Hyundai in St. Louis, grew tired of their customers cars being the targets of theft, and no one was doing anything. So they were like, Okay, we're gonna fix this problem. So apparently, 27 vehicles a day are stolen in St. Louis, which is 75%, more than the previous year. And Mr. Silk says probably about eight months ago, it started coming in faster and faster. And then of course, customers are calling me all the time saying what are you going to do about it? Right? Their card is getting stolen, they can't get a replacement things are getting? Well, no one's done anything. So me, my guys thought about it. And we took it upon ourselves to come up with solution. So what they did was develop this Bluetooth interrupter, right goes on the keychain, they install something in the ignition chain. So unless you press the button on the Bluetooth interrupter key chain, the vehicle will not start. You can do everything you want to like you know, hotwire the ignition and do all that it's not going to start without the interrupter releasing, it's a $200 fix, look.


Kyle Mountsier  09:02

Here's right here, watch this. Direct to consumer Oh no, develop your own thing, solve customers problems be the intermediary the thing that the OEM is not going to do, because the problems, you know, maybe the localized, more localized, yeah, much more localized. It's like a problem in St. Louis, solve that problem for consumers. And you will be the way that they have to and want to buy cars, because I guarantee you, all those customers that were like, hey, you know, what are we going to do about it? And you solve the problem for them, you know, where they're going back to? Yeah, yeah. I mentioned like Nissan might


Paul Daly  09:40

those guys and they turned it into a marketing benefit because now they're installing these in every single vehicle they sell. So you buy a vehicle from them, and you can rest assure that, you know, while someone could still break in the vehicle breaking window, grab some stuff, but no one's taking your vehicle and in this day and age, this inventory situation, you know, they're 27 people A day in St. Louis being stuck with that. So it's so awesome to watch a dealership


Kyle Mountsier  10:06

the car getting videos, the Tick Tock hurry that can come out of stuff


Paul Daly  10:11

straight to Dockery.


Kyle Mountsier  10:12

They they can Marine in amazing. Well, speaking


Paul Daly  10:17

of tick tock, hurry, Subway, close enough, close enough. We'll give it to you listen in a move that isn't surprising at all to the hosts of this show. You got it. Sony and Honda are reportedly considering incorporating a PS five directly into the vehicle that they're working on together. This joint venture, we've talked about it several times on the show. So in the Honda mobility says the ideas in consideration, you know, obviously they're trying to compete with Tesla,


Kyle Mountsier  10:47

right? Yeah, absolutely. And here's the thing, the genius of this partnership will come when Honda is like, you know, what, we kind of stink at technology will make the car go forward, backward, and drive things. Sony, you handle the technology side, you want the experience, you want to do the infotainment center


Paul Daly  11:07

UI UX, we all have it, we're good. Like


Kyle Mountsier  11:11

if Honda just throws up their arms in that and says, You guys see, I don't think it might it might not particularly be a PS five. But I think leaning on that platform is genius, because people are going to, like they understand. It's like, it's like why Apple CarPlay works so well. Because an Apple user understands the interface and can maneuver no matter what the buttons are to control that. And so a psi,


Paul Daly  11:40

like it's driven by I mean, you just think of the insane amounts of data that Apple and Sony have on how people interact with the UI, right? Like they just no think people go that they turn left they don't turn right and here they press this button, they don't want to press that button. They know it they know it all they have just millions and millions and millions of interactions that they can track I am still waiting for the moment they announced you kit. They're going to merchandise the car on the PS five console I can't that's gonna happen. That's coming without click the purchase, right? Just put in your little four four symbol code. Yeah, I can't my credit, my credit card gets pink because my kids are downstairs buying a vehicle, like the Hummers


Kyle Mountsier  12:18

in call of duty and they're like, oh, sweet car. Bye.


Paul Daly  12:23

Bye now IRL. So obviously, there's some concerns over safety. Right? Same concerns in Tesla, you can't play unless the vehicle stopped, you know. So the same thing here would only be available if the vehicle is not in motion, or there's little or some level of autonomous driving, just so things get a little bit shady. But Honda individually, they've been very vocal about their commitment to safety. And say, I didn't know this, they have a stated goal of having zero traffic related fatalities by the year 2050. So it's a while out there, but they've actually made it a goal. Like if you're driving a Honda bike, we want zero people to die and I don't know how you could do that. But hey, it's a good goal and you're gonna have to reconcile that goal with having a live PS five happening in the car at any given moment. Yeah, okay.


Kyle Mountsier  13:13

Good goal for when you won't even be working in


Paul Daly  13:16

2050 That's great. I by 2050 I probably won't be recording this show every day anymore. Not I hope you have a great Thanksgiving. Drive safe out there. Eat a lot of Turkey. And don't forget to listen tomorrow.

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