513: 129 Cars

This American Life

Society & Culture, News, Politics, Arts

4.6 • 88.8K Ratings

🗓️ 13 December 2013

⏱️ 75 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

We spend a month at a Jeep dealership on Long Island as they try to make their monthly sales goal: 129 cars. If they make it, they'll get a huge bonus from the manufacturer, possibly as high as $85,000 — enough to put them in the black for the month. If they don't make it, it'll be the second month in a row. So they pull out all the stops.

It’s mid-October, 2013. Freddie Hoyt tries to rally his sales staff to sell 129 cars and trucks by the end of the month. Freddie’s the General Manager at Town and Country Jeep Chrysler Dodge Ram in Levittown, NY, on Long Island. Problem is, the customers are not cooperating. (7 1/2 minutes)
Act One: How we found this car dealer. (2 minutes)
Act Two: A quick primer of who’s who, and how the place works. (6 minutes)
Act Three: Salesman Bob Tantillo has the fewest sales of anyone at Town and Country this month. Robyn Semien spoke to him. (4 minutes)
Act Four: Salesman Jason Mascia has the most sales of anyone this month, as usual. Sean Cole spent a week with him watching how he does it. (8 minutes)
Act Five: The next-to-last day of the month. Deals fall apart, but not all of them. (10 minutes)
Act Six: The last day of the month begins. They have to sell nine cars by the end of the day. "God help us," Freddie says. (2 minutes)
Act Seven: Joe Monti’s real name is Joe Montalbano. But when he started in the car business, he didn't want to lose a sale because a customer couldn’t keep his name straight so he simplified it for the job. He's one of the managers of the used cars department at Town and Country. Sarah Koenig reports on what it'll mean if he doesn’t make this month’s goal. (7 minutes)
Act Eight: The last day of the month continues and the truism is accurate: some people get great deals because it’s the end of the month and they have to hit their goal. When you look at the numbers, the average car they sell in the last two days actually loses money. (4 minutes)
Act Nine: Salesman Manny Rosales keeps to himself in the showroom, with his own sales philosophy. He explained it to Brian Reed. (7 minutes)
Act Ten: The last day of the month ends. (8 minutes)

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0:31.2	Hey there, podcast listeners. Ira here. So today's show, the subject of the show, it happens to be
0:36.4	about a bunch of people who happen to curse a lot at their workplace.
0:39.7	On the radio, of course, we have to bleep out their curses.
0:42.9	Here in the internet, we're not going to do that.
0:44.3	We think you get a better sense of the place and of the people when you hear what they really said.
0:48.5	Now, if you're somebody who prefers a bleeped version, you can get one at our website, ThisamericanLife.org. Either way, I hope you
0:55.1	like the fucking show. See, we bleep that one, but after this, we're not going to bleep the rest of it.
1:01.5	Okay, here we go. Freddie is the general manager of a car dealership these days, but he used to be
1:07.4	a car salesman, and he was a good one, probably because he's got what he calls the gift for the gab.
1:12.6	His go-to move in lots of situations is to finish a sentence and then laugh, even when the sentence is bad news.
1:19.3	Like, here he is, assessing his chances of making his sales goal for the month.
1:23.6	I'll give it a 50-50 right now because it's early.
1:27.1	Or this is him talking about a month when the car dealership did not make its sales goal.
1:31.5	And I'm strictly commissioned, so I make nothing.
1:36.0	So when Freddie is not laughing, you know it's bad.
1:39.2	At mid-October, Freddy did not laugh much.
1:41.9	At his weekly meetings with the guys who sell cars for him.
1:46.8	All right, good morning.
	...

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