You've read Buying a Bike, Part I and Buying a Bike, Part II, the first two installments in this series and you've decided that buying somebody else's used bike doesn't appeal to you. This is understandable; you never truly know where that thing's been. People sell bikes that were raced, stunted, crashed, abused, and all kinds of awful things. And one guy's idea of "well maintained" might not be your idea of well maintained. For instance, my idea of "maintenance" is to lube and adjust the chain every few thousand miles, change the oil when I feel guilty enough, and sell the mess before it hits 20,000 miles.

The main objection folks have to buying new is price. Motorcycles are expensive, especially compared to home appliances like dishwashers or microwave ovens. However, when you adjust for inflation, a good 600cc sportbike is only about 1,600 bukcs in 1970 dollars. Of course, the 1970 sportbike had spaghetti for a frame, horrid brakes, crummy electrics, shook like Ray Nagin in the Superdome, and made all of 35 horsepower on a good day. When you consider what you get when you buy a modern motorcycle, it's a pretty good value regardless of model or brand.

But I don't need to talk you into this, right? You've already committed to purchasing a new motorcycle, so let's figure out how to do this right. Naturally, you want the best price, but most consumers don't buy just based on a Pentagon-style "lowest bidder" scheme. Service, selection, and being acknowledged as an equal are very important to people. Remember that you can't ride a price tag.

Like any other retailer, motorcycle dealers make their living by purchasing motorcycles from a manufacturer or a distributor and then selling them to the public for a profit. In general, motorcycle dealers are not wealthy people. Few make a million bucks in the motorcycle industry. Most of them are very hard working people with an expectation to live a comfortable life while doing something they enjoy.

Of course, there are exceptions. Every one of us has had a negative experience at a dealership. Maybe you were ignored for a while, even though you were a serious buyer. Perhaps an inexperienced salesperson made you lose all confidence in that dealership. Or you might just have realized the dealership was taking advantage of buyers by overpricing their products to an extraordinary degree. Horror stories abound, but for the most part, motorcycle dealers just want to make you a happy customer while making enough profit to stay in business.

How do you make customers happy? Just offering the lowest price is a slippery slope for dealers. Somebody can always beat you on price, and in any case customers don't buy based on price alone.

How much they pay for the motorcycle is a closely guarded secret that you have to pay an intelligence service to leak this proprietary information to you. I can save you some money right now: there's a 12-18% margin on new motorcycles not counting such things as added margin on freight and vehicle preparation or the "holdback". Aside from making a profit on the vehicle's margin, dealers also make money on financing and "add-ons" like extended service contracts (also known as extended warranties). In addition, the dealer usually tries to make as big a profit as possible on your trade by getting it for as cheap as he can.

How much they will make on your trade is easy to figure out: go to Kelly Blue Book online and look up the difference between your motorcycle's wholesale or trade-in value and the suggested retail price. Used motorcycles can be a tremendous profit center for motorcycle shops; they offer a better margin than almost any other product or service the dealer offers.

That's what the dealer is hoping to get from you: some profit, return business to his service and accessory departments and plenty of referred customers. He'll have to balance those three goals off of each other. To do this, he relies on a team of professionals called a sales department. Like any professionals, they follow rules, practice their procedures and have regular goals they aim for. You should know more about these people and how they work before you go face off with them.

The Salesperson

Your salesperson is the most important part of this team, as they interface directly with the customer. The salesperson is in a tricky position, as they have to balance your interests against their own and the dealership's, and generally all three are at odds with each other! It's a tricky job, so in my experience less than 20% of them do it with any level of brilliance. There's a lot of turnover here, and a sales floor crawling with lots of inexperienced people you don't recognize from a month before is a sign the dealership might not be the best place to work if you're a salesperson, which means it might not be a good place to do business in overall..

Isn't it better to have an inexperienced salesperson? You would think he'd be more likely to cave in to give you a better deal. But that could backfire: you could spend a lot of time while he gets dressed down by his managers, only to have to go back on what he told you to make you happy and interested in him. If you have a "green pea" salesperson, be patient and expect him to be a slow-transmitting mouthpiece for management.

Will you pay more to have an old hand at the wheel? All a professional salesperson does is remove obstacles to your goal of purchasing a motorcycle at her shop. To do this, she will use clever language and techniques, honed over thousands of years, to get you to purchase the vehicle the same day at the highest price you can stand. If your price isn't high enough for the shop to want to sell the bike, they won't sell it and you won't buy it. You might be more experienced than many buyers, but you aren't more experienced than a seasoned salesperson. Not understanding this can make you an overconfident mark, a chicken ripe for plucking, or something that rhymes with "plucking."

The Sales Manager

The Sales Manager is a seasoned sales professional, if the shop is lucky. One thing that seems true about sales managers everywhere is that they are very busy, usually doing three things at once, especially on those busy days in a dealership like Saturdays and Sundays. That's why when the salesperson goes to talk to the manager it sometimes takes a long time.

This person's responsibility is to make sure the store is selling motorcycles at a profit while keeping the customers, the service department and the DMV happy by following all the rules.

In larger dealerships, a sales team leader will be keeping the junior salespeople in line, but will usually stay out of the picture, until the salesperson feels he's losing the customer: then you will be introduced - "turned over" or "TO'd" in sales parlance - to him. He'll ask you questions to determine if there's any chance of salvaging your sale, and what the salesperson did or didn't do that caused you to attempt walking out the door.

Here's something to keep in mind about all these players: they do this a lot. I've been riding for 18 years and have bought about 30 motorcycles for my personal use, which is a lot, I think. But in my first eight weeks of selling motorcycles at a small dealership I sold 30 vehicles, and I probably talked to about twice that many serious buyers. If a salesman's been working for ten years, he's done it thousands of times! You might be more experienced than many buyers, but you aren't more experienced than a seasoned salesperson. Not understanding this can make you an overconfident mark, a chicken ripe for plucking, or something that rhymes with "plucking."

And certainly no shop that makes a profit allows the customer to make the rules and play his own game.

I know many customers wish they could just waltz into a shop, pick a bike, get approved for credit, pay the invoice price, and ride off. But according to the sales profession, if that were allowed, mayhem would ensue. And certainly no shop that makes a profit allows the customer to make the rules and play his own game. There's a sales process that every salesperson, in every industry, follows.            

1. The Greeting:

If you get this when you walk in to a shop, something is wrong. I would leave or look for a real salesperson for help. "May I help you" is going to trigger an automatic "just looking" from the customer, so a salesperson using that as an opening has no idea what he or she is doing.

An efective salesperson will approach you as a fellow motorcyclist, interested in you as a person. The greeting is designed to build a little rapport between customer and salesperson and should not involve anything about selling or buying. The salesperson wants you relaxed, and there's nothing wrong with that, so relax.

2. The Probe:

Here the salesperson will be trying to find out what sorts of things you want, and what kind of buyer you are. By the end of this step, she should know what kind of motorcycle you want, how much research into his brands and his competitor's you've done, how much you know about motorcycles, and anything else you've let go.

You can approach this two ways: with honesty or secrecy. The latter approach will almost guarantee you don't purchase a motorcycle, where the former will usually result in a sale. Be prepared, and if you know what's going on, you won't be putting yourself at a disadvantage by being open and honest with the dealership.But if you're unprepared, if you haven't done your research, if you don't know if you can be financed or not, you will be throwing yourself on the shop's mercy. Be prepared, and if you know what's going on, you won't be putting yourself at a disadvantage by being open and honest with the dealership. After all, don't you expect the same from them? Use this session to find out about the salesperson, the dealership, any any other background you want to know.

3. The Demonstration:

Here is where the real salesmanship starts. The salesperson will try to get you to sit on the bike while she points out the features she thinks you're interested in. Each feature will have an advantage to it, with a benefit to you. For instance: "The 250 Ninja weighs just 308 pounds dry. This means very light and responsive handling, which means you will ride faster, smoother and safer." It's like the 250 Ninja is custom built for you, right? Don't you feel special?

A good salesperson should have tailored a demonstration to you with the bike you want, discussing only the features you're interested in. This is where you can tell if the salesperson has been listening to you, or if he just wants to show off how much he knows. Listen to him, and don't try to show off how much you know. You might learn something - something that might keep you from buying the bike, or committing as much money as you thought you wanted to before.

4. The Trial Close/Close:

At this point, you are so consumed with retail excitement that you are ready to sign anything to take that shiny new bike home today. You know you'll be able to talk them down to your price once you show them how serious you are in the sales office.

The salesperson can sense this, so he will use some kind of assumptive language to measure your buying resistance. He will say things like, "Do you want us to deliver it for you?" or, "Aren't your neighbors going to be surprised when they see you rolling up on this thing?" or my personal favorite, "Are you going to finance or pay cash?" (I like the classics).

If she is saying this kind of thing, and she is a good salesperson, it means your buying resistance is about zero. Be careful! Or don't: if you are ready to buy, you're ready to buy. It's time to go into the office to talk about money.

5. Sit Down/Write-up

Now you are sitting in an office or cubicle on the sales floor and your intrepid salesperson is busily scribbling your name and contact information onto a worksheet. You might be wondering why this person doesn't just tell you what the shop's best price is so you can go home and mull it over.

Believe me, you won't get this information out of your salesperson without a large commitment of time and effort in most cases, so don't get frustrated when they tell you they have to get this form filled out or that application signed before they can discount the vehicle. Any other response would see them disciplined or fired by management.

Modern communications have helped and hindered the motorcycle dealer's mission of making maximum profit on everything they sell. On one hand, they have a better idea of what the competition is doing right and wrong. On the other hand, customers can often access information that can cost the dealer much of the profit, or even the entire sale. Customers often call a competing dealer while sitting in the sales office!

The problem with shopping by phone or internet is that a salesperson can - and will - say anything to get your boots in her showroom. Getting you there is half the battle: once you are inside, the chances of selling you something increase to something over 50%, even if you have a negative perception of the salesperson or the shop. They can tell you half-truths by not quoting certain fees like freight and set-up, or they can just quote you a price on another model and say they misunderstood you. Most commonly they will just give you a bit of a run-around when you try to get a firm price: "just come on down, we'll work you a hell of a deal" was my response. Still, how a salesperson answers the phone can tell you a lot about the shop, how they do business, or what kind of inventory they have, so don't hesitate to call them up. Once you are in the shop, make sure you talk to the salesperson you spoke to on the phone. She will be grateful and more inclined to work harder to save a deal from going bad. The Internet is basically just another form of telephone for sales purposes. However, a printed-out email or price-quote is much easier to prove than the word of an anonymous salesperson talking on the phone, so make sure you print it out and bring it in!

At some point, the salesperson will present you with a piece of paper called a "worksheet" or a "four-square." It will most likely have the full MSRP of the vehicle, with all taxes and fees. If you told him you were financing, there will be a huge down payment and an unaffordable monthly payment next to that. He will ask you to sign so he can "start the paperwork."

This is where your measly experience as a vehicle buyer is clashing with thousands of years of experience selling vehicles. You will make an offer much lower than MSRP, with a lower down and monthly payment. The salesperson will make huffing and sighing noises, and say something like, "I don't think we can do that - there's not a lot of room in these things, but let me see what my manager has to say." He will then walk out, promising to be "right back."

This might take a while, especially on a busy day when two or more salespeople might be clamoring for his attention, so be patient. They usually want your business! Don't schedule anything else to do that day, and for the love of God, please leave your dogs, cats, children, golfing partners or other non-decision makers at home. Bring a book, video game or something to do while you're waiting. Expect a vehicle transaction to take at least four hours.

Where did he go, anyway?

He really did go to the sales office to talk to a sales manager. In the office, he will explain some details about you and what you want, and the sales manager will do a little research into the unit you want and your relationship to it, as well as how his month is progressing, how much money your salesperson has made or will make, how easy the bike is to get, etc. He will then formulate a bottom line for this particular sale, and then take $75 off of MSRP and send the salesperson right back to you.

What the...? $75! Are they serious? That's not negotiating! But it's a wise tactic. You were probably asking for an enormous discount, usually $2,000 or more. But how are they to know that you really want all of it? Did you truly give them your "highest price?" This way, any concession they give you will seem more signifigant than if they had knocked $500 right off the top, just for asking.

In Herb Cohen's famous 1980 book, You Can Negotiate Anything, he outlines a great many strategies for getting your way, and I recommend you check it out. In the book, Cohen points out that you get your way if you have some power to wield. Power can manifest itself in many ways. One is in having information. Know how much they can realistically sell the bike for. Another is that of investment. The more time and energy the dealership spends with you, the more they will invest to "win" your business. Yet another is risk-taking. Don't be afraid to stick to your guns, if you have done your homework and know it's reasonable. Just remember, they want this sale as much as you want the bike, so be honest about what you want and don't be afraid to ask for it.

And finally, don't be afraid to walk out. Unless this is the last bike in the last dealership in 500 miles, another opportunity will present itself.

And finally, don't be afraid to walk out. Unless this is the last bike in the last dealership in 500 miles, another opportunity will present itself. Being prepared to truly walk out the door, even with four or five hours invested, gives you a mighty weapon against the sales department. The time and energy of the sales team and the dealership are valuable and expensive, but your time is free, if you had a day off anyway. Don't be surprised if you get a phone call soon after you walk out with a surprisingly generous last-ditch effort to salvage the sale.

6. F & I;

After you say "yes" to a price, you might be ushered into a room with a whole other person, the F&I Manager. This stands for "Finance and Insurance", although it is less and less common for dealers to offer          insurance for their customers. This person will explain your financing terms, do your DMV paperwork, and sell you some add-on products.

One of the biggest issues customers have is financing rates. They are usually shocked, after years of being bombarded with ads for low auto financing rates, to find that motorcycle loans are often at much higher rates. Make sure you ask if there are any special rates available for the make and model you want, as factories offer special deals for the bikes they want to move, and find out if your own bank or credit union will finance for less. But also keep in mind that a point or two of interest on a $6,000 loan will only save you a few hundred dollars over five years, much less over three.

Some of the add-ons you will be offered include:

* Gap Insurance: Gap Insurance is worth it, especially if you have a small down payment. The insurer will pay the "gap" between what the vehicle costs to replace and what you owe on the loan, rather than just paying off the loan like your comprehensive insurance will do. This means if you total your bike, you will have some money left over after they pay off the bank to get into a new bike so you can do it all over again.

* Extended Warranty: Sometimes this is a good deal, sometimes not. Some brands tend to have a lot of warranty issues, some not. The price of your warranty will reflect this. Also, make sure the extended warranty is transferable and useable at any dealer. And keep in mind that you can "cash in" the unused portion of your warranty if you change your mind or sell the bike later on.

* Service Plans: This is an opportunity to pre-pay your vehicle's serviceing at a lower rate. This is a good deal if you plan on staying near this dealership and keeping this motorcycle for the length of the plan.

Lastly, all these "add-ons" have profit margins built into them. How much depends on the product, but don't be afraid to walk away from it if they don't move on the price. Extended warranties can be purchased at other dealers, or you can purchase it in a reasonable time if you change your mind. There's a tendency to overbuy once a customer is approved for financing, so try to stick to your budget!

I hope I've given you some ammo to use against a very wily and competitive industry. Remember to do your homework, don't take anything personally, and that motorcycles are fun, so have a good time shopping!