Dodge Dealer Sells Demon 170 Out from Under Deployed Soldier
U.S. Marine orders a Demon 170 and it arrives during deployment, then dealer sells it out from under him. Now, they want to make it right.
There’s no shortage of stories in the world that will make you despise car dealerships and their management. From hilariously high markups to stories of folks getting slapped with additional markups once their car is on the showroom floor, there’s more than enough to make you never want to work with a dealership again. If you still had a grain of hope, though, this story is likely going to take it out of you. No matter how much “fixing” this dealership is doing.
Mac Haik is a Dodge dealership in Flowood, Mississippi. In a recent post on the dealer’s own Facebook page, they outline what they’re doing to correct the issue of a Dodge Demon 170 order that was sold out from under an active-duty U.S. Marine who is currently deployed in the Middle East. The dealership even went as far as to thank two different YouTube creators who made videos about the scenario. That begs the question: is any of this a genuine apology?
Typical Unethical Dealership Practice. However, It Didn’t Fly Under the Radar This Time
Unsurprisingly, a dealership with a valuable asset on the lot just couldn’t handle themselves. One of the videos outlining the situation from YouTuber Butter Da Insider shows Facebook comments from the original buyer of the Demon 170. His comments reveal that he’s currently deployed in Iraq. Despite his agreement to pay a massive markup on the car in the first place, the dealership sold the car to someone else. So, he took to the comments section to find out if it was indeed his car, as he was planning on having his wife pick it up after the holidays.
It comes to light that it was indeed his car. Whether there was some sort of miscommunication or not, it’s hard to believe that someone at the dealership didn’t know what was going down. That is, of course, our speculation. One way or another, the deal fell through the cracks as someone else put in an offer and bought the car. The resulting firestorm across social media eventually put Mac Haik under enough pressure to do something about it.
Is this Situation Rectified? Will This Change Anything About How Dealers Operate?
Ultimately, the dealership did wind up getting the car back. In a public Facebook post, they outline how the only person who is eligible to purchase it is the soldier who ordered it in the first place. Should he decide not to buy it, the dealership says they’ll wholesale it and donate the proceeds to a charity of the service member’s choosing. Ironically, the massive markup it could bring would make the most sense in the case of a charity sale. However, we’ll let that one rest.
The Facebook post also states that Dodge and Jay Leno are working on something special for the original buyer, too. That’s all well and good, but we do find ourselves asking a handful of questions. What if this happened to someone who wasn’t an active service member? What if it never got the social media attention it did? Dealerships sell cars out from under buyers all the time. So, it really feels like this is more of a case of “sorry we got caught” than it is a case of a simple “sorry.”
Ultimately, this type of scenario should never be an option in the first place. However, the fundamentally flawed function of car dealerships in this day and age allows it. Without changing the entire basis of operation, this is likely just a case of someone lucky that their situation got all of the attention that it did.
Photos: Dodge
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