It amounted to a hundred dollars reduction of the end price. As he switched off, Smokey appeared amused.
Moments later, the salesman knocked on the office door and came in, a filled-in sales contract in his hand.
“Hi, Alex.” Smokey took the proffered contract and introduced Adam, adding, “It’s okay, Alex; he’s one of us.”
The salesman shook hands. “Nice to know you, Mr. Trenton.” He nodded to the booth below. “Were you tuned in, boss?”
“Sure was. Too bad, ain’t it, this is one of my sharp days?” The dealer grinned.
“Yeah.” The salesman smiled back. “Too bad.”
While they chatted, Smokey made alterations to the figures on the sales papers. Afterward he signed, then glanced at his watch. “Been gone long enough?”
“I guess so,” the salesman said. “Nice to have met you, Mr. Trenton.”
Together, Smokey and the salesman left the office and stood on the open mezzanine outside.
Adam heard Smokey Stephensen raise his voice to a shout. “What you tryin’ on? You wanna make a bankrupt outa me?”
“Now, boss, just let me explain.”
“Explain! Who needs it? I read figures; they say this deal means a great fat loss.”
In the showroom below, heads turned, faces glanced upward to the mezzanine. Among them were those of the elderly couple in the first booth.
“Boss, these are nice people.” The salesman was matching Smokey’s voice in volume. “We want their business, don’t we?”
“Sure I want business, but this is charity.”
“I was just trying …”
“How about trying for a job someplace else?”
“Look, boss, maybe I can fix this up. These are reasonable people …”
“Reasonable, so they want my skin!”
“I did it, boss; not them. I just thought maybe …”
“We give great deals here. We draw the line at losses. Understand?”
“I understand.”
The exchange was loud as ever. Two of the other salesmen, Adam observed, were smiling surreptitiously. The elderly couple, waiting, looked perturbed.
Again the dealer shouted. “Hey, gimme back those papers!”
Through the open doorway Adam saw Smokey seize the sales contract and go through motions of writing, though the alterations were already made. Smokey thrust the contract back. “Here’s the very best I’ll do. I’m being generous because you put me in a box.” He winked broadly, though the last was visible only on the mezzanine.
The salesman returned the wink. As he went downstairs, Smokey reentered his office and slammed the door, the sound reverberating below.
Adam said drily, “Quite a performance.”
Smokey chuckled. “Oldest ploy in the book, and still works sometimes.” The listening switch for the first sales booth was still on; he turned the volume up as the salesman rejoined the elderly couple who had risen to their feet.
“Oh, we’re so sorry,” the woman said. “We were embarrassed for you. We wouldn’t have had that happen …”
The salesman’s face was suitably downcast. “I guess you folks heard.”
“Heard!” the older man objected. “I should think everybody within five blocks heard. He didn’t have to talk to you like that.”
The woman asked, “What about your job?”
“Don’t worry; as long as I make a sale today I’ll be okay. The boss is a good guy, really. Like I told you, people who deal here find that out. Let’s look at the figures.” The salesman spread the contract on the desk, then shook his head. “We’re back to the original deal, I’m afraid, though it’s still a good one. Well, I tried.”
“We’ll take it,” the man said; he seemed to have forgotten his earlier doubts. “You’ve gone to enough trouble …”
Smokey said cheerfully, “In the bag.” He switched off and slumped into one of the green leather chairs, motioning Adam to another. The dealer took a cigar from his pocket and offered one to Adam, who declined and lit a cigarette.
“I said a dealer has to fight,” Smokey said, “and so he does. But it’s a game, too.” He looked at Adam shrewdly. “I guess a different kind of game than yours.”
Adam acknowledged, “Yes.”
“Not so fancy pants as over at that think factory, huh?”
Adam made no answer. Smokey contemplated the glowing tip of his cigar, then went on. “Remember this: a guy who gets to be a car dealer didn’t make the game, he doesn’t name the rules. He joins the game and plays the way it’s played—for real, like strip poker. You know what happens if you lose at strip poker?”
“I guess so.”
“No guessing to it. You end up with a bare ass. It’s how I’d end here if I didn’t play hard, for real, the way you’ve seen. And though she’d look nicer ’n me bare-assed”—Smokey chuckled—“so would that sister of yours. I’ll ask you to remember that, Adam.” He stood up. “Let’s play the game some more.”
He was, after all, Adam realized, getting an untrammeled inside view of the dealership in operation. Adam accepted Smokey’s viewpoint that trading in cars—new and used—was a tough, competitive business in which a dealer who relaxed or was softhearted could disappear from sight quickly, as many had. A car dealership was the firing line of automobile marketing. Like any firing line it was no place for the overly sensitive or anyone obsessed with ethics. On the other hand, an alert, shrewd wheeler-dealer—as Smokey Stephensen appeared to be—could make an exceedingly good living, which was part of the reason for Adam’s inquiry now.
Another part was to learn how Smokey might adapt to changes in the future.
Within the next decade, Adam knew, major changes were coming in the present car dealership system, a system which many—inside the industry and out—believed archaic in its present form. So far, existing dealers—a powerful, organized bloc—had resisted change. But if manufacturers and dealers, acting together, failed to initiate reforms in the system soon, it was certain that government would step in, as it had already in other industry areas.
Car dealers had long been the auto industry’s least reputable arm, and while direct defrauding had been curbed in recent years, many observers believed the public would be better served if contact between manufacturers and car buyers were more direct, with fewer intermediaries. Likely in the future were central dealership systems, factory-operated, which could deliver cars to customers more efficiently and with less overhead cost than now. For years, a similar system had been used successfully with trucks; more recently, car fleet users and car leasing and rental companies, who bought directly, were demonstrating large economies. Along with such direct sales outlets, factory-operated warranty and service centers were likely to be established, the latter offering more consistent, better-supervised service than many dealers provided now.
What was needed to get such systems started—and what auto companies would secretly welcome—was more external, public pressure.
But while dealerships would change, and some fall by the way, the more efficient, better-operated ones were likely to remain and prosper. One reason was the dealers’ most commanding argument for existence—their disposal of used cars.
A question for Adam to decide was: Would Smokey Stephensen’s—and Teresa’s—dealership progress or decline amid the changes of the next few years? He was already debating the question mentally as he followed Smokey from the mezzanine office down the stairway to the showroom floor.
For the next hour Adam stayed close to Smokey Stephensen, watching him in motion. Clearly, while letting his sales staff do their work, Smokey kept a sensitive finger on the pulse of business. Little escaped him. He had an instinct, too, about when his own intervention might nudge a teetering sale to its conclusion.
A lantern-jawed, cadaverous man who had come in from the street without glancing at the cars displayed, was arguing with a salesman about price. The man knew the car he wanted; equally obviously, he had shopped elsewhere.
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br /> He had a small card in his hand which he showed to the salesman, who shook his head. Smokey strolled across the showroom. Adam positioned himself so he could observe and hear.
“Let me see.” Smokey reached out, plucking the card deftly from Lantern Jaw’s fingers. It was a business card with a dealer insignia on the front; on the back were penciled figures. Nodding amiably, his manner robbing the action of offense, Smokey studied the figures. No one bothered with introductions; Smokey’s proprietorial air, plus the beard and blue silk jacket were his identification. As he turned the card his eyebrows went up. “From an Ypsilanti dealer. You live there, friend?”
“No,” Lantern Jaw said. “But I like to shop around.”
“And where you shop, you ask for a card with the best price difference between your trade-in and the new car. Right?”
The other nodded.
“Be a good sport,” Smokey said. “Show me the cards from all the other dealers.”
Lantern Jaw hesitated, then shrugged. “Why not?” From a pocket he produced a handful of cards and gave them to Smokey who counted them, chuckling. Including the one he already held, there were eight. Smokey spread the cards on a desk top nearby, then, with the salesman, craned over them.
“The lowest offer is two thousand dollars,” the salesman read out, “and the highest twenty-three hundred.”
Smokey motioned. “The report on his trade.”
The salesman passed over a sheet, which Smokey glanced at, then handed back. He told the lantern-jawed man, “I guess you’d like a card from me, too.”
“Sure would.”
Smokey took out a business card, turned it over, and scribbled on the back.
Lantern Jaw accepted the card, then looked up sharply. “This says fifteen hundred dollars.”
Smokey said blandly, “A nice round figure.”
“But you won’t sell me a car for that!”
“You’re damn right I won’t, friend. And I’ll tell you something else. Neither will any of those others, not at the prices they put on their cards.” Smokey swept the business cards into his hand, then returned them one by one. “Go back to this place, they’ll tell you their price didn’t include sales tax. This one—they’ve left out the cost of options, maybe sales tax, too. Here, they didn’t add dealer prep, license, and some more …” He continued through the cards, pointing to his own last. “Me, I didn’t include wheels and an engine; I’d have got around to it when you came back to talk for real.”
Lantern Jaw looked crestfallen.
“An old dealer trick, friend,” Smokey said, “designed for shoppers like you, and the name of the game is ‘Bring ’em back later!’” He added sharply, “Do you believe me?”
“Yeah. I believe you.”
Smokey rammed his point home. “So nine dealers after you started—right here and now—is where you got your first honest news, where somebody leveled with you. Right?”
The other said ruefully, “Sure looks that way.”
“Great! That’s how we run this shop.” Smokey draped a hand genially around Lantern Jaw’s shoulders. “So, friend, now you got the starting flag. What you do next is drive back to all those other dealers for more prices, the real ones, close as you can get.” The man grimaced; Smokey appeared not to notice. “After that, when you’re ready for more honest news, like a driveaway price which includes everything, come back to me.” The dealer held out a beefy hand. “Good luck!”
“Hold it,” Lantern Jaw said. “Why not tell me now?”
“Because you aren’t serious yet. Because you’d still be wasting my time and yours.”
The man hesitated only briefly. “I’m serious. What’s the honest price?”
Smokey warned him, “Higher’n any of those fake ones. But my price has the options you want, sales tax, license, a tank of gas, nothing hidden, the works …”
Minutes later they shook hands on twenty-four hundred and fifty dollars. As the salesman began his paper work, Smokey strolled away, continuing to prowl the showroom.
Almost at once Adam saw him stopped by a self-assured, pipe-smoking newcomer, handsomely dressed in a Harris tweed jacket, immaculate slacks and alligator shoes. They talked at length and, after the man left, Smokey returned to Adam, shaking his head. “No sale there! A doctor! They’re the worst to do business with. Want giveaway prices; afterwards, priority service, and always with a free loan car, as if I had ’em on the shelf like Band-Aids. Ask any dealer about doctors. You’ll touch a nerve.”
He was less critical, soon after, of a stockily built, balding man with a gravelly voice, shopping for a car for his wife. Smokey introduced him to Adam as a local police chief, Wilbur Arenson. Adam, who had encountered the chief’s name frequently in newspapers, was aware of cold, blue eyes sizing him up, his identity stored away routinely in the policeman’s memory. The two retired to Smokey’s office where a deal was consummated—Adam suspected a good one for the customer. When the police chief had gone, Smokey said, “Stay friendly with the cops. Could cost me plenty if I got parking tickets for all the cars my service department has to leave on the street some days.”
A swarthy, voluble man came in and collected an envelope which was waiting for him in the main floor reception office. On his way out, Smokey intercepted him and shook hands warmly. Afterward he explained, “He’s a barber, and one of our bird dogs. Gets people in his chair; while he cuts their hair, he talks about how good a deal he got here, how great the service is. Sometimes his customers say they’re coming over, and if we make a sale the guy gets his little cut.” He had twenty or so regular bird dogs, Smokey revealed, including service station operators, a druggist, a beauty parlor operator, and an undertaker. As to the last, “A guy dies, his wife wants to sell his car, maybe get something smaller. More often’n not, the undertaker’s got her hypnotized, so she’ll go where he says, and if it’s here, we take care of him.”
They returned to the mezzanine office for coffee, laced with brandy out of a bottle produced by Smokey from a desk drawer.
Over their drinks the dealer introduced a new subject—the Orion.
“It’ll be big when it hits, Adam, and that’s the time we’ll sell as many Orions here as we can get our hands on. You know how it is.” Smokey swirled the mixture in his cup. “I was thinking—if you could use your pull to get us an extra allocation, it’d be good for Teresa and them kids.”
Adam said sharply, “It would also put money in Smokey Stephensen’s pocket.”
The dealer shrugged. “So we help each other.”
“In this case we don’t. And I’ll ask you not to bring it up, or anything else like it, ever again.”
A moment earlier Adam had tensed, his anger rising at the proposal which was so outrageous that it represented everything the company Conflict of Interest committee was set up to prevent. Then, amusement creeping in, he settled for the moderate reply. Clearly, where sales and business were concerned, Smokey Stephensen was totally amoral and saw nothing wrong in what had been suggested. Perhaps a car dealer had to be that way. Adam wasn’t sure; nor was he sure, yet, what he would recommend to Teresa.
But he had gained the first impressions which he came for. They were mixed; he wanted to digest and think about them.
13
Hank Kreisel, lunching in Dearborn with Brett DeLosanto, represented the out-of-sight portion of an iceberg.
Kreisel, fifty-five-ish, lean, muscular, and towering over most other people like a collie in a pack of terriers, was the owner of his own company which manufactured auto parts.
The world, when it thinks of Detroit, does so in terms of name-famed auto manufacturers, dominated by the Big Three. The impression is correct, except that major car makers represent the portion of the iceberg in view. Out of sight are thousands of supplemental firms, some substantial, but most small, and with a surprising segment operating out of holes-in-the-wall on petty cash financing. In the Detroit area they are anywhere and everywhere—downtown, out in suburbs, on
side roads, or as satellites to bigger plants. Their work quarters range from snazzy compages to ramshackle warehouses, converted churches or one-room lofts. Some are unionized, many are not, although their total payrolls run to billions yearly. But the thing they have in common is that a Niagara of bits and pieces—some large, but mostly small, many unrecognizable as to purpose except by experts—flow outward to create other parts and, in the end, the finished automobiles. Without parts manufacturers, the Big Three would be like honey processors bereft of bees.
In this sense, Hank Kreisel was a bee. In another sense he was a master sergeant of Marines. He had been a Marine top kick in the Korean War, and still looked the part, with short hair only slightly graying, a neatly trimmed mustache, and a ramrod stance when he stood still, though this was seldom. Mostly he moved in urgent, precise, clipped movements—go, go, go—and talked the same way, from the time of rising early in his Grosse Pointe home until ending each active day, invariably well into the next. This and other habits had brought him two heart attacks, with a warning from his physician that one more might be fatal. But Hank Kreisel regarded the warning as he would once have reacted to news of a potential enemy ambush in the jungle ahead. He pressed on, hard as ever, trusting in a personal conviction of indestructibility, and luck which had seldom failed him.
It was luck which had given him a lifetime, so far, filled with the two things Hank Kreisel relished most—work and women. Occasionally the luck had failed. Once had been during a fervid affair in rest camp with a colonel’s wife, after which her husband personally busted Master Sergeant Kreisel down to private. And later, in his Detroit manufacturing career, disasters had occurred, though successes well outnumbered them.
Brett DeLosanto had met Kreisel when the latter was in the Design-Styling Center one day, demonstrating a new accessory. They had liked each other and, partly through the young designer’s genuine curiosity about how the rest of the auto industry worked and lived, had become friends. It was Hank Kreisel whom Brett had planned to meet on the frustrating day downtown when he had had the parking lot encounter with Leonard Wingate. But Kreisel had failed to make it that day and now, two months later, the pair were keeping their postponed luncheon date.