Burdick creates new high-end car division

CNY Business Journal (1996+), Mar 26, 2004 by Rombel, Adam

CICERO - When a Central New Yorker looks for an expensive, road hugging sports car or a luxury sedan new or used, Burdick Automotive Inc. hopes they'll visit its Driver's Village.

Driver's Village - the sprawling automobile complex at the site of the former Penn Can Mall - has established a new Premiere Collection division at its Porsche store, showcasing high-end cars.

The new vehicles in the collection come from Burdick's various franchises and include the Nissan 350Z, Dodge Viper, Hummer H1 & H2, Audi A-8, Mazda RX-8, Buick Park Avenue, and all the Porsche models.

"The idea is to give the community one place to go for high-line cars," says Terence Brennan, sales manager for Roger Burdick Porsche and Audi.

Right now, the collection has 25 used and 60 new cars positioned in a 60-by-60-foot area outside the Porsche dealership. Later, the cars will be moved inside the mall. The Driver's Village Web site has a section devoted to the Premiere Collection and lists some of the high-end used cars it has available.

A major part of the Premiere Collection strategy will be Burdick's move to take expensive trade-ins such as a BMW Z-3 and sell the used cars directly to consumers. In the past, the dealership used to route the trade-ins to wholesalers for resale.

"The wholesalers were making a lot of money on these cars," says Brennan. "It's been a gap in our business for years, and we'd been throwing business away."

Brennan says he expects the dealership to sell about 50 to 60 used Premiere Collection vehicles this year. That's about the same number of new Porsches the dealership expects to sell in the same timeframe.

George Miro, Porsche sales specialist, will manage the Premiere Collection and be the initial point of contact on all customer inquiries regarding new and used models in the collection.

Burdick had a Premiere Collection kick-off event March 20. The dealership mailed invitations to 7,500 people, asking them to check out the cars, take a test drive, and enjoy a continental breakfast. The invitees included former customers and high-income people; about 15 to 20 people showed up on a day when the weather turned winter-like, says Brennan.

"That's OK. The main thing is we got the word out," says Miro.