Nice unveiling nite at the dealer

Took my invitation and headed to the jeep dealer to score my compass/stop watch. When they found out I had 3 jeeps they thru in a 24 piece cased jeep barbacue set....
The compass/stop watch is one nice piece of hardware too, all steel no plastic, on a par with a pre 80's issue m1 or m2 compass. Looked at the new 5.2hemi grand too as well as the OD 'Willys' retrojeep. In a moment of weakness I said if they had a solar yellow unlimited w/6 speed I'd buy it on the spot :scared: and figure out what to say to the wife later :doh: Lucky the only one they had was an auto in solar yellow.

yea, i am going to head down to my dealer in a bit here after I eat.

-Scott

Big night at my dealership. They had run out of compass/stopwatches by the time my brother and I arrived. We had to settle for vouchers.

The Unlimited was nice. Less driver legroom than I like or would prefer, but I could live with it ... with the seatback reclined quite a bit to get the steering wheel out of my shirt pocket. I was surprised that there is considerably less cargo space behind the rear seat than in an XJ, but it appears to be as much as or more than a Liberty, so it's a move in the right direction.

The new Grand was singularly unimpressive. It's a nice "car," but it ain't no Jeep. 'Nuff said.

Good sandwiches, great cookies. Brother wwas unhappy 'cause they ran out of coffee before he got to it.

damn thanks for the reminder... off I go

I was surprised to find the compass weighs so much. Nice piece of equip though. Had a great time at the dealer. They had a rubicon flexed up on the hood of an old banged up skylark. Test drove the new GC. Impressive for a DD. Not a trail vehicle though. Personally, I liked it. Also test drove a few wranglers... The free coffee and shrimp was a nice touch, to bad i dont like seafood....The willys I saw last year, nice color, nice camo seats, same TJ.
The best was listening to the salesman atempting to defend the KJ as I verbally destroyed it in front of the dealership.

I just got back a little while ago from our local one, no Hemi GCs and we weren't too impressed with the 3.7l ones we saw. I did like the Unlimited though, confused the daylights out of one of the salesmen when I told him I was glad they kept the solid axle and 4.0l in it, he just looked at me blankly and said that I had him there. I thought the flip and fold seats in the Town and Country was pretty neat, too. I haven't had a chance to play around with the compass or atlas cd yet. My sister also picked up a T-Shirt that says, "I still stomp in mud puddles!" :yelclap: They also had a 2.7L V-6 powered 300 with a "cloth top" and Vogue's uke:

yea i just got back from the deal. I was less then impressed. I got my compass, which is nice, very nice for something free. They had one unlimited, with the 6speed. Got a chance to beat up on the new GC with the 5.7 liter hemi. I kinda moves for such a big car (yes, its a car). Anyways, What really ****ed me off was how retarded the sales people are. They really dont know their ass from a hole in the ground. I was not impressed with their general lack of knowledge at that place. I was suprised the things this guy said, tons of half truths just to sell a car. Needless to say i went for my compass.

-Scott

It was a nice time. Coffee was a nice touch and that compass is great for a freebie. I just can't bring myself to find anyhting I like about the Grand Cherokee other than the HEMI. I like the new Rubicon Unlimited, and for some reason the new KJ seems even uglier and less jeep like than the first one. I do have to say the Grand is comfy.

jeepguy97 said:

It was a nice time. Coffee was a nice touch and that compass is great for a freebie. I just can't bring myself to find anyhting I like about the Grand Cherokee other than the HEMI. I like the new Rubicon Unlimited, and for some reason the new KJ seems even uglier and less jeep like than the first one. I do have to say the Grand is comfy.

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JP Magazine was at the one I went to: they had the J truck out there as well as couple rigs from boulder bars and one of those offroad tent trailers. Nice touch was that they had the advance screening passes for "Ray" which I got a pair of for my folks. ALso met couple guys who got their XJ's recently and I gave them some cards, and invited them to our upcoming SoCal meeting. Unfortunately though I did get there late and my compass will have to arrive by mail

RichP said:

Took my invitation and headed to the jeep dealer to score my compass/stop watch. When they found out I had 3 jeeps they thru in a 24 piece cased jeep barbacue set....

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I'd kill for that All I got was the skullcracker compass/stopwatch, which is actually a pretty nice piece of kit. Good Lord, is that thing *solid*. When they handed me the box, I figured that most of the weight was the box itself. Boy was I wrong.

Looked at the new 5.2hemi grand too as well as the OD 'Willys' retrojeep. In a moment of weakness I said if they had a solar yellow unlimited w/6 speed I'd buy it on the spot :scared: and figure out what to say to the wife later :doh: Lucky the only one they had was an auto in solar yellow.

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I checked out the Unlimited (drove it) and the new GC (climbed all over it, didn't drive it). I liked the GC despite the IFS - looks good, and is OK for the market segment it's aiming for. Seems like it's had something of a price hike, though.

The Unlimited's a big improvement over the regular TJ IMHO (quieter, more load area, etc.) - but it's not up to the XJ in terms of road manners. I hit a mild pothole that the XJ would've just sort of gone through with some feedback from the steering, and it crashed over it like a regular TJ. Noise levels were definitely lower than on the SWB version, though, and the pitching characteristic that they have was vastly lessened. By no means am I knocking it, but for anyone considering it as an XJ replacement or supplement: don't expect it to behave as well on-road as an XJ does. Oh, and measure the load area carefully - it's bigger than a regular TJ's, but not as large as in an XJ. A good workhorse vehicle, though.

I think they also had some of those KJ things there too, but as they were painted a nice shade of Soccer Mom camo it was hard to tell

what are you guys talking about? I own three jeeps and have never heard of anything going on at the dealers? What I miss?

sintax said:

I was not impressed with their general lack of knowledge at that place. I was suprised the things this guy said, tons of half truths just to sell a car. Needless to say i went for my compass.

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Yeah, this was pretty much the same as my experience (Alhambra Chrysler/Jeep). The sales guy noticed that I drove up in an XJ, and immediately tried to sell me a KJ. When I pointed out that the only way I'd buy one was if DC stuck a live axle under the front, he proceeded to tell me that 'all Jeep vehicles have live front axles, 2WD or 4WD'. The look on his manager's face when I schooled him on the error of his ways was priceless.

Then there was the other sales guy who tried to tell me that 'nobody in California but people who tow or go off-road want diesels' after I asked if the Liberty CRD would be CARB-certified anytime soon. When I pointed out to him that 25mpg was a lot more appealing than 16mpg at damn near $2.50/gallon and that yes, I *do* take my Jeep off-road, he just stood there with his hands in his pockets staring at the ground.

I'm pretty well convinced that DC has no clue as to why a large percentage of their customers buy (or perhaps more accurately, bought) Jeeps.

casm said:

Then there was the other sales guy who tried to tell me that 'nobody in California but people who tow or go off-road want diesels'

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Tell that to my friends with TDi VW's...

That's one more reason I love the Colorado law that keeps dealerships closed on Sundays. I can go in during daylight hours and look at the new stuff without those morons breathing down my neck.

Edit: What was the deal? I hadn't heard anything about 'unveiling' either...

Yucca-Man said:

Tell that to my friends with TDi VW's...

That's one more reason I love the Colorado law that keeps dealerships closed on Sundays. I can go in during daylight hours and look at the new stuff without those morons breathing down my neck.

Edit: What was the deal? I hadn't heard anything about 'unveiling' either...

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I think that if you ever bought one new you are on a 'list', ever get that publication from jeep, comes like every 3 months or so 'jeep news' IIRC ? I think you gotta be on that list to get the invites or maybe it's the work I get done there every once in a while cause I get coupons monthy from my dealer for oil changes and such. At any rate I'm glad I went to this one. Thank god they did not have that solar yellow 6 speed or I'd be sleeping it, or the shed, what was I thinking....

Yucca-Man said:

Tell that to my friends with TDi VW's...

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Amen to that.

I turned out for my free compass as well, and Casm's right - "skullcracker" is a good description. You probably could kill someone with the thing, given the proper windup. Very nice freebie, though, and far more appropriate for a Jeep event than a coin like Dodge and Chrysler did.

All my dealer had that I was aware of was KJs(all V6, all autos) and a TJ-U. The Unlimited was in the showroom, and it had the 30-inch tires and D44 rear option. All in all, a nice-looking vehicle. Small sunvisors, though.

Asked about the CRD, and the salesman said he could order one if he had a serious customer but with the limited production this year it would be unlikely he'd just get one. He did say that he'd seen one up by the Meadowlands at some DC function for dealers, and that the engine was very quiet from 50yds away.

Anyone else watch the video of the new Grand climbing the side of the skyscraper and notice the winch line?

Rob

Anyone want to sell their compass?????!!!!!!

AZ DESERT RAT said:

Anyone want to sell their compass?????!!!!!!

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Not me, that little gadget is nice enough that it will stay in it's metal box and get put on the shelf with a couple of nice kershaw and randal knives I bought years ago. The barbacue set on the other hand will get used at least 3 times a week matter of fact I think I'll head out to the food store and get the makins for breaking in the 2ft long shiskabob stickers that it came with... :lickout:

Geeze, theres already one on ebay for $49 bucks.....not a bad buy, don't know what DC paid for them but I think $49 is kinda low.

as an ex Jeep salesman I can atest to the fact that the average salesman or sales maneger is totaly out of touch with the offroading community.Oor local off road shop used to have a weekly meeting at hooters.The dealership would send me up there in new wranglers to try and sell them.The one that sticks out in my mind was a new rubi that they had chromed out put a 4 inch RC lift under and cheap33s That were Ats not MTRs the local soldiers from the 101st slammed the jeep told me what a bunch of moroms that were fixing up the Jeeps at the dealership.How embarrasing.After I called the mgr out on this he toud me he knew wht sells and to shut up and sell cars.I quit shortly afterwards.The Rubi is still there after over a year .

Boatwrench and I went last night too! They had run out of the compass and handed us an IOU. I did manage to get one of the silver dollars out of them. It is suppose to be worth $25. They had only Grand Cherokees in the show room. There was only one Liberty and one Unlimited and they were hid out in the lot. Seems they wanted you to go for the GC. It was nice and would pull my trailer but wow $54,000!!!! I think I will keep my Tahoe for that duty.

Mary

rightseatsis said:

Boatwrench and I went last night too! They had run out of the compass and handed us an IOU. I did manage to get one of the silver dollars out of them. It is suppose to be worth $25. They had only Grand Cherokees in the show room. There was only one Liberty and one Unlimited and they were hid out in the lot. Seems they wanted you to go for the GC. It was nice and would pull my trailer but wow $54,000!!!! I think I will keep my Tahoe for that duty.

Mary

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Did you guys goto Albera Brothers Jeep on 16th ST.? I was there around 7ish. Enjoyed looking at the Crossfire and that big bling Chrysler sedan more than the new Jeeps.