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Oh, you're NOT going to believe what just happened to me..

200K views 1K replies 264 participants last post by  Boraxo 
#1 · (Edited by Moderator)
So, I take my car to Flow BMW (the one that's on Peters Creek Pkwy, in Winston-Salem) to have my tire looked at. Sitting in the lounge, reading my book. A pleasant looking fellow comes out.

- Hi, I'm the general manager, please come with me.

I'm a little apprehensive but follow anyway. Racking my brain, trying to figure out what I did wrong. I don't have a chip in my car or anything, everything is stock... Walk into his office. Dimly lit, there's another dour-looking dude sitting in the corner. He's not smiling, kind of gives me a menacing stare.

- Have a seat.

Ookay then. I sit down.

- Is your alias c-o-o-n-t-i-e on bimmerfest?

I go, "HUH?"

- ARE YOU COONTIE?

I stammer, "Uh.. no." (OK, I wasn't gonna crack on the first question! Once the cattleprods were to come out, maybe then but surely not immediately. Plus, I think I'd be less flabbergasted if he had said, "We have a new M3 we don't need, it's your to keep.")

- Well, we have a reason to believe you are.

Then, he takes out a manila folder and (looking at it upside-down), it's full of my bimmerfest print-outs, certain passages highlighted. He takes a page out.

- It says here you once referred to buying a car at our dealership as "like being sodomized with a broomstick."

I squirm a little and go, "So, you have your own little Gestapo research unit, is that it?"

The sullen-looking dude in the corner (at this point they got the whole good cop/bad cop production thing going on here) says, "We don't like it when people maliciously slander our dealership."

I kinda stammer.. "Well, it wasn't slander, really, I just told people the truth. I didn't like being treated like an idiot by your saleswoman, it just wasn't a pleasant experience. Especially that when I offered $1k over ED invoice to your sales lady over there, she laughed in my face and said she's worked for 15 years and never did ED and no way would I get a 3yr lease for less than $700/month. I then went to Ricki in NY @ DiFeo and leased my car in 10 mins! For the price I wanted! AND! She didn't laugh in my face! So, how about that?!"

The good cop says, "So, you like Dunkin Donuts?"

I go, "what?!"

He says (taking another post from the folder) - right here, you said, "There's a Dunkin Donuts across the street, you can wait there during service."

I'm like, "Ok. SO?" (trying to see if these two really, REALLY hate Dunkin Donuts for some reason. They didn't look like it though.)

(cue in the bad cop)

- Well, when you go buy a donut that costs $3.50, do you offer them three dollars?!

I go, "A car is not a donut, first of all. Second of all, if you're so concerned about good image, why not just offer people fair prices, instead of putting on a whole dog & pony show?"

He says, "Because buying a car is like buying a horse. People have been doing it for centuries. It's called, 'NEGOTIATION.'"

I'm like, "Well, why would you waste my time in the name of this 'negotiation' instead of just selling it for a fair price and be done with it?"

Anyway, this "Waiting for Godot"-like back & forth theater continues for a little bit. Then the bad cop says, "OK, if you hate us so much, you can't come here any longer" or some such thing. I took my book and left, basically.
___

Thinking about it for a bit, I'm sure they were gunning for me for a while. I'm stunned that a dealership would have this Stasi-like group of people, trying to flush out whoever's posting bad reviews about them.

What do you guys think? Incredible, eh?

[Note from Moderator: The owner of the dealership, Mr. Don Flow, first replies to the OP in post #835.]
 
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#356 ·
Gentlemen... let's keep this on topic.

You know, broomstick, 3 Series, etc...

- Mike
 
#377 ·
Great post. :thumbup:

- Mike
 
#367 ·
I would wager that they ran out of file folders today for some reason.
 
#372 ·
So far the story has had all the ingredients of a good e-thriller: it started innocently enough with a test drive only to immediately spin out of control with a sodomizing broomstick, followed by intense covert internet investigations, a surreal interrogation chamber, bad coffee, a sprinkle of legalese that nobody understood, a vocal representative from the Canadian I'll-shove-it-up-the-Customer's... association, panned out to the world of rich dealership owners and ended on the powerful note of public outcry.

Can't wait for part two where the coffee machine gets fired.
 
#385 ·
To be fair to Mr. Flow (the owner), he may have no idea how his managers are running things in their backroom. It looks like Flow owns numerous dealerships, so I doubt he's aware of the day-to-day operations of all of them. (Particularly, it's unlikely he knows about the "covert sting operation" that these 2 FBI-wannabe managers have been up to. Heck, maybe their whole motivation was to keep Mr. Flow from hearing any complaints about how they run his dealership.)

If Coontie cared, he ought to contact Mr. Flow himself, who would likely be shocked and dismayed at what these managers did. And to those who keep emphasizing that Coontie "isn't a saint" and took advantage of free carwashes & coffee; he's posted several times that he called ahead and got their ok, even after telling them he didn't buy his car there.

I admittedly skipped over the tire backdating discussions -- anyways, what we really need are more anecdotes about dealerships, broomsticks, and the use thereof :D
 
#387 ·
To be fair to Mr. Flow (the owner), he may have no idea how his managers are running things in their backroom. It looks like Flow owns numerous dealerships, so I doubt he's aware of the day-to-day operations of all of them. (Particularly, it's unlikely he knows about the "covert sting operation" that these 2 FBI-wannabe managers have been up to. Heck, maybe their whole motivation was to keep Mr. Flow from hearing any complaints about how they run his dealership.)

If Coontie cared, he ought to contact Mr. Flow himself, who would likely be shocked and dismayed at what these managers did.
+1

That is an excellent point. The dealers around here make a big deal of having their "personal" info public. Flow may be the same.

If I were he, I would want to know what happened and I would definitely want to know that the dealership is getting a blackeye on the internet (among BMW enthusiast)

Has this thread been cross-linked to the other car forums?
 
#395 ·
ln the future, I'll remember to put my little Nikon voice activated recorder in my pocket before I go to a dealer for any purpose. An audio track online of this reported dealer/customer exchange would be very entertaining.

Also, can a dealer "refuse service'' to anyone just 'cause they want to?
 
#419 ·
This thing is a runaway downhill freight train with a tail wind, engine on fire, brakes glowing red, and still gaining speed.

Brittany Spears got her kids back this week, but FLow BMW is having THE BEST WEEK EVER!
 
#401 ·
Great thread!
 
#404 ·
The two Flow Nazi's will have a lot to discuss when they open for business tomorrow. Over 400 threads to go through to determine who thinks they should be fired and where those people live.

Flow Gestapo.........I'm in Leesburg, VA. I bought my car from BMW of Sterling and I'll be happy to send you the VIN number. Please give me the pleasure of denying service to my car when I'm next in Winston-Salem. :loco:
 
#405 ·
The two Flow Nazi's will have a lot to discuss when they open for business tomorrow. Over 400 threads to go through to determine who thinks they should be fired and where those people live.
I was thinking, is there any chance of sending an e-mail with a link to this thread to old man flow? Something along the lines of 'do you know what your employees are doing to benefit your business?'

If it is possible (the question is whether it would be possible to guess at an e-mail address based on what is published for other addresses at the dealership), there may be 2 ex-employees by COB on Monday. BTW, that might be the only way for this little pimple to be lanced. If it goes viral (it may already be in viral territory), flow is not going to like the outcome.
 
#414 · (Edited)
The boss is Don Flow... (second generation.. looks like the old man handed it over to him)

Chief Executive Officer
Flow Automotive Companies
Headquarters Address:

2565 Peters Creek Parkway
Winston-Salem, NC 27127
USA

Phone: (800) 801-9539
Fax: (336) 784-2940

Here's what he looks like:

The 'Don'

His current interests are in bringing World Class Tennis to Winston-Salem (Davis Cup) . So he's not packing wrenches in any of his francises, for sure.

Don's pet interests

That's after 2 minutes. Welcome to the 21st century..
 
#415 ·
And none of them are wearing the black uniforms of Hitler's SS!!! :rofl:
 
#417 ·
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