Hello everyone, if I could I'd like to share my experience from last year when I tried to buy a new car for the family. I walked into a Dodge and Chevy dealership to buy a small SUV type car and received the worst customer service I had ever experienced at a dealer. Neither shop wanted to give me a fair price for my trade in and each place I went to acted like they were doing me a favor. No one wanted to negotiate on the sticker price and all I heard from the sales people was, "these sell like hot cakes, I don't have to go down on price to sell one." Frustrated and tired I left both dealerships and went home.

I later went to a Honda dealer and was treated very well, I was given a fair price on my trade in, and I was able to negotiate a really good price on the car. I wanted to buy American but it just didn't work out for me. A good attitude is what some of the American companies may be lacking. I'm just saying.

Having run the sales department of a new car dealer for 16 years I can speak from experience as to the complexity that causes one dealer to be able to show bigger discounts than another. There are factors created by the manufacturer which might have tied the hands of the domestic dealers. Somethings like a bigger markup build into the price of the import car or factory to dealer incentives may allow a certain dealer to show more for the trade than another dealer can.

The reality is that a trade is only worth what it worth and dealers have lots of tools available determine that. All dealers no matter what brands they sell buy and sell their used cars at the same auctions or from the same wholesalers. If you saw more for the trade at the import dealer, it just means that he had more to give and for all you know the import dealer may have made more profit off you than the domestic dealer would have if you took his best deal.

I've been a "Pontiac Guy" for almost 50 years. Second car I ever drove was my dad's '62 Star Chief. In 1963 (at age 17) I bought my first car, a 1958 Bonneville convertible, factory Tri-Power/automatic, leather interior, more chrome than you can imagine. Since then I've owned a '66 Bonneville 4-door (inherited from my father), a '66 Catalina coupe, factory 421 H.O. Tri-Power/4-speed, and my current '65 2+2. So I've got a serious spot in my heart for the marque.
Pontiac's performance reputation was critical in it's climb to America's #3 best seller in the mid-'60's. One sad aspect of Pontiac's history was the negative influence that Chevrolet exerted over their smaller cousin. Hard to believe, but back in the "Glory Days" GM's brands would compete with each other almost as aggressively as with Mopar & Ford. Because Chevy was such a huge part of corporate revenues, they could dictate to GM management the rules of that competition. Pontiac had to call Tempest's 331CI V-8 a 326 so as to appear less than Chevy's then-new 327. Pontiac had to discontinue it's famous Tri-Power set-up when GM banned multiple carburetors after 1966 (but the 427 Corvette's were exempt). What did we miss out on in muscle car development because of Chevy's jealous interference?
Many Pontiac enthusiasts would claim that the brand really died after the last Pontiac engine was produced in 1981. Not many people would include any cars manufactured after that time on their list of Top 5 Pontiac's. Now that the brand is no longer produced, any future resurgence of this great part of American car history is gone.

My list of the Top 5 (biased, of course, by my personal history):

1. 1963 "Swiss Cheese" Catalina - only 12 manufactured, only 9 known to exist
2. 1958 Bonneville - a nostalgia thing
3. 1965 Catalina 2+2 - a great combination of highway-gobbling Land Yacht, personal luxury, and great performance
4. 1964 GTO - the first muscle car, an absolute game changer
5. 1962 421 super Duty Catalina - double threat, dominating the drags & NASCAR simultaneously

For those interested in Pontiac history, I host a site at http://www.Pontiac2plus2Registry.com

Jack Anderson