Valet Software Blog

Customers are increasingly demanding a service experience from their dealership that mirrors the rest of their retail experiences - omnichannel, convenient, and with home delivery at the center. The primary goal of young professionals, busy parents, active retirees, and others is to spend as little time and energy as possible interacting with their dealership. To be successful in this emerging market, dealerships will need to fundamentally rethink their existing processes, workflows, technologies, and systems to meet customer expectations. 

Nobody actually likes getting their car, truck, SUV or van serviced or repaired, and they like paying for it even less. That's why most people will grab the chance to get it done for a cheaper price, but the one way a dealer can win back a lost customer without capitulating on price is to make the whole experience as smooth, easy, convenient and stress-free as possible for the customer.

Dealerships need a radical approach to address a common problem in a new way. The future is in virtual service powered by a valet operation. Having a valet service gives you an advantage over dealerships that do not offer this service and will definitely make you stand out.

We surveyed 500 car dealership customers with a simple question. How would you rate your service experience with your car dealership across 3 touchpoints a) scheduling a service appointment, b) convenience of shuttle rides. c) understanding the bill. The results were surprising.

Because dealerships typically don’t track the overall cost of their shuttle operation separately, it would be easy to make the mistake of thinking using Uber or other taxi services such as Lyft instead of an internal shuttle service would be cheaper.

Some dealerships may well have some sort of formal system in place that at least puts some focus on managing the pick-ups and drop-offs of customers, vehicles and drivers, but far too many still use a system which is essentially sheets of paper on clipboards.