Found out they closed late last month. Kind of disappointed. They were a nice place, well the last time I was there was over the summer. Supposedly someone else will take over (probably a big local place that owns everything).

Supposedly their sales were down, I can think of a few reasons, seemed like advertising dropped off around mid last year when they should been pushing 4wd, seemed like they were focusing on used cars too much instead of hawking the Outlander. People are buying Outlanders somewhere too because I’ve seen quite a few newer ones meaning it’s probably the other dealer.

When I went they were low pressure and it seemed like they sold quite a bit that year regardless of incentives. In fact they were still doing pretty well around Memorial Day it seemed last year. Then I noticed more used cars up front, then they hang it up a few months later, no real Facebook push after early last year.

My guess is they goofed, not on the cars or opening the dealer but selling a few hundred cars and not keeping the push when you’re up against a few places that own everything wouldn’t cut it. It would take a continued agressive push to build that reputation and they would needed lots of Outlanders on the lot. Went to the auto show and people didn’t seem disinterested in the cars themselves at all, if anything the opposite.

I bet the big dealer moves in, continues their pressure tactics, hush hush, wheel and deal. They’ll likely have more cars than you’d think possible for a Mitsubishi dealer (they did this to a Kia and Toyota dealer after they bought them under similar scenarios). They’ll fill vacated store lots with cars. If 150 cars is good for a Mitsubishi dealer they’d try for 1000.

Guess the nice guys don’t win here. Guess the G4 and Outlander are on hold for now. Glad I parked the F150 for the winter, might need another year or two out of it.