Dealerships Up, Franchises down, Rivians Bricked, Human Models Replaced

The Automotive Troublemaker w/ Paul J Daly and Kyle Mountsier

Welcome to another rousing week in Retail Auto. Today we review the annual Automotive News Dealer Census. We also talk about one Rivian owner who isn’t so excited to be an early adopter, as well as a new AI implementation at Levi Strauss that has mixed enthusiasm.

• The latest Automotive News annual dealer census shows an increase in the number of franchised dealerships in the US for the first time in three years. The count rose to 18,271, marking a 0.4% increase from the previous year. The total number of franchises dropped by 54
  • Ford lost 31 franchises and Lincoln dropped 54:
    • Ford Motor Co said many multi-franchise Lincoln stores were dropped to focus on one brand. They had no comment on the drop in Ford stores
  • Genesis dropped 36 franchises
  • Overall Domestic badged stores decreased by 66, while imports gained 12
    • Notable that Polestar add 26
  • Avg franchise sold 425 new-vehicles, an 8.8% decline

One Upstate NY resident waited 3 years for his Rivian R1S and then it promptly bricked in deep snow. Chase Merrill was driving on an unplowed road in the Adirondack Mountains when the R1S got stuck in a snowdrift. Attempting to rock the car out of the snow bank, he triggered a safety feature that got the car stuck between the park and drive gears and it completely powered down

• • He called Rivian service and ultimately had to pay $2100 to have it towed to the nearest service station hundreds of miles away in MA
  • Later he found out a simple reset would have solved the issue, but this wasn’t presented as an option on the service call
  • Rivian executives have stated that the R1S did what it was programmed to do in a dangerous slide-away situation, but are brainstorming responses to improve the product
  • At first they only offered to pay for the repair work and not the tow bill, but, after Business Insider reached out, they offered to pay for the tow as well

As ChatGPT and AI continue to dominate the culture conversation, one visual form of AI is making deeper roads into retail as clothing maker Levi Strauss is partnering with AI Amsterdam-based startup, LaLaLand.ai, that claims to create “hyper-realistic models of every body type, age, size and skin tone” to model clothing on its website.

• • The company pioneered AI tech last year to show clothing on models of a shoppers particular size
  • Some advocates celebrate the opportunity to show consumers someone who looks like them in the clothing, however, there is also concern for the authenticity brands seek to create as well as the careers of models

Hosts: Paul J Daly and Kyle Mountsier
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