Buick offers to buy out dealers who don’t want to make the switch to electric cars - The Verge

Buick is offering to buy out franchise dealers who don’t want to make the investment to shift to electric vehicle sales. The GM brand is switching to EV-only sales by 2030.

Buick is offering to buy out dealers who don’t want to make the necessary investments to upgrade to electric vehicles, The Wall Street Journal reports.

In an interview with WSJ, Global Buick chief Duncan Aldred said that all 2,000 Buick franchise dealers in the US will be given the opportunity to take a buyout. Taking the buyout means the dealer will no longer be affiliated with the Buick brand and can no longer sell Buick vehicles, although they can still sell other General Motors vehicles.

Buick is in the midst of rebranding as EV-only, with the goal to make the switch to 100 percent electric sales by the end of the decade. That will require dealers to spend a lot of money on upgrades, like chargers and EV-specific repair equipment. It will also fundamentally change how dealers do business — and many dealers have expressed trepidation about the shift to EV sales.

It’s a bit hard to gauge how dealers broadly feel about EVs, but some evidence suggests they are less than thrilled about having to upend their business to accommodate a new class of vehicles. Many car dealers are old school and tend to be stuck in their ways, for obvious reasons.

An Auto News 2022 Dealer Outlook Survey of 196 dealers and dealership managers found that the majority of respondents were unhappy with President Joe Biden’s full-throated support for EVs, noting that EVs still represent less than 10 percent of overall sales.

https://www.theverge.com/2022/9/6/23339031/buick-buyout-dealer-ev-only-2030-gm


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Updated: 1 year ago
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