I have a 2020 Lariat on order that I ordered from a small town family dealership. I emailed what I wanted to four Ford dealers in my area ( about a 20 mile radius). Two were Ford dealers that were part of big auto groups selling multiple brands One was a big Ford Lincoln dealer and the small family Ford dealership. I found the family dealer to be more responsive much easier to deal with and got me the best price and and lowest loan rates. One of the dealers from the big auto group never responded to my email! You would think that they would respond to someone looking to purchase a $63,545.00 vehicle. I had expected to get the best price from a larger dealer. I am curious to other buyers experiences,

 

It varies.

Its worth shopping like you did.

 

Smaller dealers may have longer wait times for orders. I ordered Jan 2, and the dealer says Ford still hasn’t even picked up my order. It’s kind of a bummer seeing other people who ordered mid-late Feb already having their truck in production.

 

Best deals I have received were from small town dealerships. Big volume dealers don’t give a sh!i if you walk out the door because you’ll probably be holding the door open for someone walking in.

 

We order 100+ fleet vehicles at a time through a local dealership here. The dealership is so small they only have enough room for 30 units of public sale units. However because they are just a middleman and take a cut of the profit they have nothing into these trucks. Works out in our favor, the dealership doesn't have to ever see or touch them as they are all sent as "ship through" to an upfitter. The price is approximately 3% less than any of the big dealerships.

 

My experience in shopping online (viewing a vehicle in their inventory and clicking their “contact us” button) with local dealers is that they ignore them. All that happens is that you end up on an email advertising list.

 

Small hometown dealer worked best for me too. I tried a couple of big city dealers but they scoffed at my price and said it was completely unrealistic and there’s no way they could run their business if they sold at that price. I walked into the small town dealer, gave them my build sheet and price I would pay. The guy went to the sales mgr and came back in about two minutes, shook my hand and said they’d call me when the truck arrived. On the downside, it took four months for the truck to arrive. But I had my old blue F250 to drive so it wasn’t a big deal to wait for the new blue F250!

 

I started with a large auto group dealer when I bought mine in 2017 as my friend had recently purchased a Raptor there. I was basically told to buy what they had as they didn't want to do a custom order. As I wanted exactly what I wanted, I told them I would do a build and price online and get back to them with exactly what I wanted in a few days.

When I tried to go back, I was told they didn't have time. If you don't have time to sell me a $70,000 truck, what happens if I have a service issue???

Went to local family owned dealership, walked in, showed them my build and price, they did the build, their first offer was what I was expecting to haggle to. Got another $1600.00 off, had them process the order. Everything was awesome. They told me it was the most expensive truck they ever sold and were happy for my business.

 

The local dealer here (Brandon Ford) has been great and continues to be great. They haven't sold out to the big chains and sales/service have been spectacular to say the least.

It has been a while since I checked but I remember they were #1 in Florida and something like #7 in the country sales volume wise. Any other nearby blue oval dealer I checked with had like 5-10 super duties on the lot. This place had 150 and has always said, if we don't have it and it exists, we will get it for you.

 

My small local dealer would not go below invoice! ended up 4000 under not using my 2500 pco at another dealer.

 

It depends...…..on what I don't know. But I have way better experiences if I call the dealer rather than shooting off emails. Once I negotiated a good deal to order a new truck. Went to the dealer in person and asked to speak to the person in charge of Fleet Sales. Ended up getting the exact same truck ordered for a $1,000 less.

 

In my opinion, dealership size is only relative to how the store is managed

Ordering a truck is a whole different world then ordering a car or an suv, just like the difference between a sales person and a order taker.

Living in a huge metropolitan area with many Ford stores to choose from I started with the ' Build Yours ' feature, the store that came the closest
to my build is a store that I've bought a non Ford from before however they are on the opposite end of the valley but have another Ford store closer
to me. I called and asked if they would do a dealer trade on a no trade deal. They had no problem with that and would call the other store to verify
it was in stock. In less then 5min. I received a call back stating it was a ' Fleet Only ' unit and the very next question from the sales rep was
" What are you using the truck for ? " I thought someone's on their A game here ! after an explanation of my intended use I was asked to send
over my build and I did. less then 10min I get a call back that had two different units were being sent for my review with the only difference being
an add for the Up-fitter Switches was suggested based on our conversation. this is where having two ears and one mouth makes a difference !

I then explained that I'd prefer to buy locally and I'd had no issues with my other brand bought from them as well as the service dept, then I brought
up that their Ford store service dept. QCP was at 4.9 out of 5 and this was another reason I'd like to do business. However it all boils down to the bottom
line and I was willing to call in a marker back east and drive it back just to avoid the usual Dog & Pony Show. I was then ASKED if I could be called
back in a few moments with a " Out The Door Number " I said sure. In less then 5min. The OTD number was presented, I accepted, and said I was
on my way with a deposit. Arriving I was greeted with a warm smile and a firm handshake all the paper work was done and added a few dealer installed
items, it was a Win Win for everyone !

So as a response to mtnbob's question, It all boils down to Customer Service and with that comes referrals and the gross's usually go up as well

 

I did the same as the OP...I built the truck on Fords website, printed it out and sent it to 4 dealers...the bigger dealers were horrible, very slow response times to acknowledge my email and took a week to provide a price...all dealers gave me the same invoice price...except a small town dealer which was 500.00 more. Considering the pricing I went with the small town dealer. It took 8 weeks to get my truck. when we went to close the deal after the truck arrived, they gave me 2500.00 off ( 2000.00 ) if you account for the higher price. But they beat my credit union rate of 4,6% for 84 months. They gave me 3,9% which made my payments for a 70k truck of 683.00 per month. I will pay off the truck in 2021 just needed a low payment

so if you have the patience to wait 8-10 weeks..go with the small dealer build a relationship with a few oil changes. I think you have the opportunity to build a relationship that could benefit you with future recall or issue your vehicle may have. I noticed if you bought a truck from abc dealer and take it to xyz for service or repair work..youre not their priority, they act offended.. technically they shouldn't but it happens

GOOD LUCK and Congrats !! you will feel like a kid waiting for Christmas everyday for 8-10 weeks

 

Bought at my small town dealer. Invoice. Not great. Took almost 5 MONTHS to get my truck from the day the order was placed . . . . .

 

Like the above I got the best deal from a small dealer. They didnt even have a showroom. Just 2 offices with desks and a counter.... prob a total of 15 new cars and 2 trucks on the lot. My wait was 6 weeks. I got 850 under invoice, all the incentives and my 3k pco.