Page 32 - BusinessWest December 21, 2020

most all others as well.
Indeed, while it’s easy to reflect on 2020, pro-
jecting what will happen in 2021 is much more difficult, said those we spoke with. Generally, there is optimism — or guarded optimism, which is the popular phrase at this time of year, and this time in history especially — but still some concern.
Overall, those we spoke with said trends and sentiments that took hold in 2020 — from less reliance on public transportation and services like Uber and Lyft (fueled by pandemic fears) to peo-
“Given the circumstances and what happened, we feel really good about how we finished in 2020. When you look back to how everyone was feeling in March, we feel really appreciative of how we finished the year.”
ple gaining more comfort from (while also put- ting more resources into) their vehicles — should continue in 2021, and that bodes well for the year ahead.
But, as this year clearly showed, things can change — and in the time it takes for one of these new models to go from 0 to 60.
Changing Gears
Looking back on 2020, the dealers we spoke with said it was a trying year in many respects, and, over- all, a time of adjustment — for both those selling cars and buying them — because of the pandemic.
Many of those adjust- ments involved the pur- chase or leasing process, with much of it, as noted, moving online. But the pandemic also forced most car manufacturers to shut down for weeks or months, eventually leading to those half-full (if that) lots at the dealer- ship that became one of the enduring, and very visible, symbols of the pandemic.
Peter and Michelle Wirth say their Mercedes-Benz dealership managed to hit most of the set goals for 2020 despite the pandemic.
Thus, instead of going
to the lot and picking out what they wanted, as they had become accustomed to doing for years, many more customers had to factory-order their vehicle and wait, usually several weeks, for it to arrive. This meant extending leases in some cases, said Wirth, adding that the factory-ordering pro- cess took longer, in general. Overall, he noted, customers and his dealership adjusted, and there wasn’t a significant loss of business.
That’s because demand was consistently high, for a number of reasons, starting with some pan- demic-fueled reliance on the family cars — yes,
even as people were driving less, and consider- ably less in some cases — and a greater desire to take care of that car or trade up, something made more feasible and attractive by everything from incentives from the manufacturers to stimulus checks from the federal government, to the fact that people weren’t spending money on vacations or many other things.
Indeed, Michelle Wirth said 2020 was a year
Autos
Continued on page 34
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32 DECEMBER 21, 2020
AUTO SALES
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