[flybigjet]

So, my car made it to the dealer-- It was just a bit lost, as the delivery system from the port to the dealer is a bit of a scramble right now.

Anyhow, I talked to the GM/finance guy/sales reps for a bit today:

- They're surprisingly still selling a fair number of cars-- he estimates about half of normal volume. He was a bit surprised about that.

- Said lack of volume is impacting prices, but not in a good way. They are normally able to discount due to volume, but with no volume, no real discounts (at this point).

- Half of the staff has been put on "leave of absence". The other half of the staff is only working part time.

- The dealership (in Denver) is set up for "no-contact" sales-- there are barricades everywhere and areas taped out to stand in, avoid, etc.

- The "BMW Guru's" who give you the new car tour have been given leaves of absence. The finance guys said they were deemed "nonessential".

- I set up my loan paperwork today but didn't activate it-- The finance guy couldn't match the rate/term from my credit union, but he recommended we wait to finalize until Monday. He implied that BMW might be coming out with new rates/goodies in the finance area and we would know something on Monday.

- The I8 is a *damn* good looking car. And the M5 wheels are tasty as well.

- On a completely unrelated note, he said that the M2C prep took about 2.5-3 hours once they got it up on the lift.

- I talked to the tech for a while. I told him whatever you do, don't drill the front bumper. His response? "We NEVER drill M cars." He was pulling down the shipping blocks on the struts so we chatted a bit. I told him that I'd ordered the car in December. He said he'd figured it was a special order because they rarely see a MT M2C. Yay me.

- They had no problem installing a few goodies for me-- the steering wheel cf trim and the euro spec aspherical mirrors. I thought I'd get a bit of pushback from the mirrors as they're not DOT spec, but they truly didn't care. So again, yay me.

That's about all I remember. Picking up the car on Monday, doing a bit of work to it on Tuesday, dropping it off for detailing/paint correction/PPF on Wednesday, picking it up on Friday.