WIPER BLADE PRICING

[gordyw]

I would like to know what others are doing for pricing for items such as wiperblades. I
would like my advisors to upsell items like blades, but customers find it very outrageous to pay prices like $26.00 for a set of wiper blades (not winter blades either). Our parts department doubles the cost on blades which they show at a cost of
$6.50 (which I truly beleive is lower) double that for sale and we have a $26.00 set of wiper blades. Of course the customer balks which in this case I truly can not expect my advisors to try to sell the customer on the "value" of our blades. We also do not charge labor to install blades to keep the cost down. What are others charging fo blades and are you charging labor?

[Gary J. Naples]

Hi gordyw,

Here is a suggestion which may help. Get together with your parts manager and shop the other businesses in your market for price comparisons on the products you want to sell. Price dealerships like yours and also aftermarket installers and aftermarket parts suppliers. Once, you have the comparison prices, make yours lower if possible or at least try to be on par with the competition.

Once you have established your prices, and you feel they are both competitive and profitable list the comparisons either on a poster in the shop or on a sales sheet readily available to the advisors.

Then when the advisors try to sell the customer they can point out how your prices compare to other choices in the local market. Whatsmore, you offer an added service to the customer by saving them the time of checking other places.

If you can't beat the competition's price on items you want to upsell, then try selling from a quality standpoint. For example, the competition's product may not carry the same warranty or fit may be compromised. In any case, the first rule is to know your competition.

Hope this helps!

Gary J Naples

[MH]

Gordy,
You did't mention what franchise's you have but we are a GM, MB, Volvo, Nissan and Mazda dealer. We are able to price out wiper INSERTS for $17.00 per pair as a menu item with a few exceptions which we list on the menu. Most times the service advisors put the blades/inserts on as a no charge to the customer in the lane. When we install them as part of a "safety check" service, the tech receives .2 for the operation but as this is usually part of a larger service (15/30K), the pricing to the customer does not reflect the installation of the blade as such on the RO.
Are you selling inserts as opposed to the complete blade? You may wnat to investigate GM's line of AC-Delco blades which are reasonably priced. The quality on these is not quite what the OEM blades are but they are generally OK. They have applications to cover many vehicles other than GM including imports.
If your dealership utilizes parts transfer in their accounting processes, I don't know why the parts department would not want to adjust the pricing to be more competitive especially on a price sensitive part.

MH

[Doug]

Iwould work very closely with the Parts Manager on his pricing matrix. We sell most maintenance items at a very low mark-up (cost plus 20 or 25) but then really get bold with actual repair parts. Most consumers have an idea of what a "good" price is for an oil filter, spark plugs, or wiper inserts but have no idea at all what constitutes a "good" price on, let's say, a CV joint or heater core. We often go cost plus 250%-300% on such items. Works for us, just common sense.