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When I first came to town, the dealership, which
evidently has consistently been a MOPAR place, had an Hispanic name, Torino or
something like that. It then became a Red McCombs outlet and now is
called, I'm pretty sure, Lone Star. The MOPAR Club used to have its annual
car show there. They would clear the lot for the day.
Hugh
----- Original Message -----
Sent: Thursday, July 12, 2007 7:40
PM
Subject: Re: IML: dealership attitudes to
Imperials back in the day
The part aboiut the difficulty in working on these cars struck a chord
with me. My dad
took a 59' Imperial 2HT in midnight blue in trade for a valve job back
around 1977. I was
enamored with the car even though they were considered ridiculously
flamboyant at the time. A few years later, as it sat in the field (still
in fairly good shape at that point), I would make trips out to work on it and
attempt to resurect it back onto the highway. It was an incredibly
difficult car to work on under the dash and the electro-mechanical gremlins
that accompanied such things.
I conveniently forgot that part several years ago when I started
to look for another 57-59 Imperial. Having one in the garage now, I
have to say that they can be a real pain w/ some of the oddball-complex stuff
that doesn't interchange to other mopar.
Not to mention the brakes and of course working under the dash
again. Not easy for someone who is 6'10".
"Hugh, 58 Imperial" <imperial58@xxxxxxxxxxx>
wrote:
While
I briefly sold new MOPARS a few years ago, I was working with a
semi-retired former dealership owner whose establishment was in Karnes
City,
Texas, the county seat of Karnes County, a rural and none too
affluent part
of the state maybe half way between San Antonio and Corpus
Christi. His
business dealt mainly with Plymouths. It is important to
note that Chrysler
Corp. never had a separate Imperial distribution
chain. Imperials were
tacked onto existing dealerships. The guy who
started this thread actually
enlightened me as to who sold Imperials in
San Antonio as I could not find
that out going through old business
directories and stuff like that. Often
there was some arm twisting
involved in getting a dealer to carry, and
therefore service,
Imperials.
My friend from Karnes City refused to carry the name plate
for a number of
very good business reasons. He mainly sold Plymouths. A
Plymouth buyer
knew he was at the low end of the spectrum and his or her
demands were
relatively manageable. An Imperial buyer was a different
breed altogether.
Much fussier and more particular about every aspect of
the car. It took far
more time and effort to sell an Imperial than it
did to get a Plymouth off
the lot. I went through this myself with the
Dodge Viper. In my seven
months at possibly the worst job I ever had in
my life, I could sell new
Dodge Ram pick ups all day with little hassle.
I finally managed to unload
the dealer's one and only Viper, but it took
months and months. Loads of
rotten test drives involving way too much
testosterone and far too little
actual skill but that's a different
story. The second reason why selling
Imperials was bad deal was
servicing them. He would have to send his
mechanics for additional
training, at his own expense, plus carry a whole
different set of parts
in his already crammed service area.
So, even back then, dealerships
were trading off the prestige value of
carrying the Imperial against
considerable additional extra costs. The
dealership where my car was
originally purchased sold Plymouths and used
cars. I was told by the
niece of the original owner he bought a new
Imperial every year, which
made the additional effort worth it for the
dealer.
Hugh
Hemphill
58 Imperial
San Antonio, Texas
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