Two stories, one kinda funny the other about a good dealer:
I may have told this story before. Back in 2003, wife and I were in the market for new cars and both of us had fallen in love with the MINI. We drove 100 miles to the local dealer (at the time) and took test drives. I wanted a standard Cooper (for H-stock), she wanted an S. We were probably sold before we showed up, but test drove them anyway. My test drive is first. Sales guy in the front seat, wife in the back. Sales guy tells me all about the car the whole time I'm driving. Not annoyingly, as you could tell he liked them. Then we get in the S. Wife's driving, me in the back. Wife peels out of the lot and proceeds to keep it on full boil the whole time, just driving the snot out of it. Sales guy hasn't said a word other than, "left here, right here" etc. Coming back towards the lot, there's a short lot road and and 90 degree right onto the lot. She's still accelerating and she's at about 60 before stomping on the brakes, downshifting and cranking hard into the turn. As it happens, there was a puddle of water in the corner, so the car does a four wheel, "chirp, chrip, chirp" as it bounces sideway. Tires catch grip and pulls onto the lot at a bit of a hot pace. The only sound she made during the entire drive was at that moment, when the most deep guttural pure pleasure "Huh, huh, huh, hahaha" came out. She was grinning ear to ear and turned back to me and said, "Oh, I gotta have this!!" Sales guy was actually pretty calm.
We put deposits down and ordered two cars that day....
Second story, I was in the market for a truck to haul my kid's kart all over Texas in '08. Specifically wanted an extended cab, V6 Silverado with cruise and power windows/locks, black bumpers and grill (basically, the old WT package) and tow package. Black was my preferred color, but would take any color if the deal was right. Did the whole email dealers with what I wanted thing. Most either hard loaded trucks or were only about a grand off of sticker. One guy sent me a quote of $15.5k on a $24k sticker. Replied back for a VIN and equipment list he replied with the list and an OTD price of $16.1k. I had already arranged financing, so I drove the 60 miles to the dealer, expecting to be baited and switched. I wasn't in a rush. When I got there, I found him and he said they were in the back, but didn't have a black one like I wanted. We went back to check out the trucks. One was tan with the black bumpers and grill, the other was black, but with the $400 chrome grill and bumper. I chose black and he laughed that he figured I would, even though I'd said I wanted the WT package. He knocked $170 off the chrome pack and we did the deal. Probably took longer to sign the paperwork than doing the deal. Nice and easy. Turns out they'd bought the inventory of a bankrupt shady GM dealer in Houston. The Houston dealer sticker was still on the truck and was almost $30k after their paint protection, VIN etching, upholstery stain coating, etc....No wonder they'd gone bankrupt.
3 years and 65k miles later (I'd added a black camper shell during that time), I was thinking about trading up to a V8. For fun, had CarMax give me a quote on my truck. Their $15.5k offer is how I ended up in a Tahoe.
-Rob