Rental Cars Go Retail - Hertz Joins Amazon Autos | Fast Five Shorts
Hertz Car Sales launches on Amazon Autos, bringing thousands of pre-owned vehicles to the marketplace. Sponsored by the A&M Consumer and Retail Group, Mirakl, Ocampo Capital, Infios, Quorso, Shoptalk’s Ben Miller joined Chris and Anne to discuss how this partnership could finally disrupt the car buying experience and what it means for the future of automotive retail.
For the full #fastfive episode head here: https://youtu.be/M4FL5AO9AAM
#retailstrategy #Amazon #Hertz #preownedvehicles
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Transcript
Hertz Car Sales launched on Amazon Autos According to a Hertz press release, Hertz Car Sales has joined Amazon Autos allowing shoppers to browse, finance and purchase from a selection of thousands of high quality pre owned vehicles as Amazon Auto's first fleet dealer.
Speaker A:Man, there's a lot of alliteration in this headline.
Speaker A:Hertz Car Sales is expanding the available inventory on Amazon Autos to offer a wider selection of well maintained vehicles from trusted brands like Ford, Toyota, Chevrolet, Nissan and more.
Speaker A:Customers can now browse Hertz Car Sales listings on Amazon Autos complete with their purchase online and pick up their vehicle at Hertz Car Sales locations.
Speaker A:This will initially begin in Dallas, Houston, Los Angeles and Seattle with plans to expand to hertz car sales 45 locations nationwide.
Speaker A:QUOTE Our goal is to reimagine the car buying experience and meet customers where they are, whether online or in person with convenience, confidence and scale, little ccs, said Jeff Adams, executive vice president of Hertz Car Sales.
Speaker A:Question for you Ben.
Speaker A:Are you buying or selling?
Speaker A:Buying a used car from Amazon.
Speaker B:Oh I'm buying this.
Speaker B:I this is, this is a win win or it could be a win win win.
Speaker B:So look for her they've got, they have these rental cars have got a large number of cars they have to shift.
Speaker B:They have to get as good a price as they can for them.
Speaker B:So for them they just want to this is an opportunity to build off Amazon's traffic rather than doing at the moment they're sending them into auction houses or backdoor into dealers networks often it reduce prices.
Speaker B:So this could be a lovely outlet for them.
Speaker B:For Amazon this is classic marketplace building in action.
Speaker B:It's building a whole volume of inventory.
Speaker B:Drive the search results, drive awareness, drive traffic opportunities for selling more accessories and supplies which is already automated a really big business for the marketplace in Amazon and then I think for the consumers huge potential.
Speaker B:Secondhand car sales is a market absolutely ripe for disruption and Amazon Hertz proposition is strong.
Speaker B:If you go onto the website it's a strong there's inventory there.
Speaker B:It's really simple to navigate.
Speaker B:The finance options are really clear.
Speaker B:Cars get driven unpredictably but they are maintained really well.
Speaker B:Rental companies have to look after their fleet so you're probably going to get a car that's been maintained and cleaned a lot more than your average secondhand car.
Speaker B:You probably at a lower price and then Amazon is offering with a discount so meets the Amazon value prop.
Speaker B:Really clear financing super easy for Amazon, super easy for the clients.
Speaker B:Amazon probably taking a cut.
Speaker B:You know it feels really good.
Speaker B:And then look, I'm buying it.
Speaker B:If Amazon could go one step further and just disrupt the actual higher car business itself, God, I'd be really happy about that.
Speaker B:But, but for now, for the actual secondhand sales, yeah, I think this is a great move for both parties.
Speaker A:Well, so tell them what they want, Bob.
Speaker A:Yeah, so, yeah, so, yeah, and they were.
Speaker A:And they've been trying to do that with Hyundai too.
Speaker A:If I don't, if I'm not mistaken, early on the, based on some of the things they're doing early in the year.
Speaker A:But yeah, this is into the used car sales.
Speaker A:And do you agree with Ben on this one?
Speaker C:I do.
Speaker C:I'm, I'm buying this 100%.
Speaker C:I've said for years the retail experience that I would most like to be disrupted is car buying.
Speaker C:And this is another smart move towards making it happen.
Speaker C:I also, I think the consumer now with Things like Carvana, CarMax and Amazon Autos and now Hertz being part of that, I think they're finally getting over the hump and they're kind of getting into mass adoption of actually shopping for a car this way.
Speaker C:Like people are more comfortable doing the, the selection of the kind of car that they want, the research at home and then this very easy possibility of going to a Hertz test driving and leaving.
Speaker C:I have.
Speaker C:One of the listeners reached out and told me that she bought a car off of CarMax with a test drive in 45 minutes.
Speaker C:Like that is giving people time back, precious time.
Speaker C:And I think that the convenience angle here that Amazon and Hertz are offering car shopping customers is, is, is something that on a platform like Amazon that they're very comfortable with already is what I really love about this and I think has the most potential to see success with, with a campaign like this.
Speaker C:But where, what do you think, Chris?
Speaker C:Are you, are you buying it?
Speaker A:Yeah, I like it too.
Speaker A:I think it's, I think it's so smart and I think, you know, some, some retail listers might be like, why you guys covering this story?
Speaker A:This isn't applicable to most retail, but it actually is.
Speaker A:Because if you think about it, it's not that dissimilar to what Abercrombie Kids is doing with now was Macy's a couple weeks ago.
Speaker A:Now they said it's Nordstrom's and it's even, I think Dick Sporting Goods.
Speaker A:Not mistaken.
Speaker A:Right.
Speaker A:But they're doing that in store.
Speaker A:But they could also be doing it through their digital marketplaces because marketplaces are important because they give you access to more people who like me.
Speaker A:I didn't even think I could go to Hertz to buy a car.
Speaker A:Like I never even.
Speaker A:That Hertz never even entered my consideration set, right?
Speaker A:And now it does.
Speaker A:So I can easily sort through the inventory on Amazon.
Speaker A:Like Ben said, I trust Amazon, right?
Speaker A:Implicitly.
Speaker A:I think that's one of the best things about shopping on Amazon.
Speaker A:And then the other question too that I got going as we were at the Walmart seller conference this week because they're always trying to one up each other is how long before we start seeing Walmart auto sales?
Speaker A:You know, like they're already doing all the automotive angles with everything they do with their, what are those called?
Speaker C:The, you know, the tires, the change.
Speaker A:The auto centers in their stores.
Speaker A:So like, yeah, why isn't this become part of that experience in some way, shape or form?
Speaker A:I don't know.
Speaker A:But yeah, yeah, so smart.
Speaker C:My favorite thing is that I'm still being served up bananas when I go look for the car.
Speaker C:Like the Amazon Fresh cart is still popping up from our story last week about last minute delivery.
Speaker C:Like, what do you need a rental car and some bananas and maybe some toilet paper?
Speaker C:We don't know.
Speaker C:But it's all there and it's all on one platform.
Speaker A:Cue Gwen Stefani.
Speaker A:All right.
