[zvezdah1]

HI All,
Saw this posted on Roadfly, interesting if true!
Chris
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Hey all...
The other thread was getting a bit low, so I'll post the mysterious reason why Tonkin didn't take orders.
I spoke with one of their sales reps today (a guy I've known for a while). He said that Lotus USA wanted all the Elise dealers to intake a remaining Esprit in exchange for their first ten orders. Tonkin decided that it was not financially viable.
I didn't follow the logic, but maybe someone with more knowledge of the car biz can comment on this. Apparently they would have had to mark up the Elises to compensate for the hit that they would have taken on the Esprit.
His take was that there may still be a slight mark-up anyway, but he wasn't sure now that the Esprit issue was over.
Lotus USA put Tonkin in the "penalty box" apparently and pushed their first 10 cars back about 6 to 8 weeks.

If anyone else can independently confirm or comment on this info, I'd appreciate it.

Good news for me since I have no idea what color and options to order. Leaning towards dark silver or red with the touring options and hardtop.

Paul
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[babak]

That explains an offhanded comment my dealer made. They just took delivery of their 'last' Espirit, in CO, something about the way he phrased it and his tone of voice was odd, now it comes together.

 

[cantwaitforelise]

My dealer at Overseas Motors told me something similar a while back. She said that they had to have an Esprit on the lot for sale to be able to sell the Elise. I think I recall her saying that sales of the Esprit were usually rare. This is why I believe sales of the Esprit has nothing to do with allocation for the Elise.

 

[tylers65]

I just spoke at length with a salesman at Tonkin Gran Turismo in Portland. He confirmed the Esprit rumor/fact. He also stated that the waiting list at their dealership was at about 20 and that they required a $2500 to $5000 deposit to be put on the waiting list. He told me that they were told that they would be given Elise's but was not sure as to when. They had an agreement with the president of Lotus of North America, but a couple of days later, the president was let go and replaced. I am not too sure of the validity of this particular statement. But because of the change in guard, he was uncertain as to the status of their ability to retain any Elise unless they were to purchase it from another dealership and charge an additional $7000 for the car.

 

[Donovan]

I can confirm it - me and my brother recently got our deposits back at Tonkin. Luckily we also had deposits at Park Place. The owner Ron Tonkin refused to take an Esprit so Lotus said see ya!

Lotus doesn't really need them as a dealership anyways - Tonkin dropped Lotus a few years back at the request of Ferrari apparently. Now with the Elise coming they want back in the game yet don't want to pay the "entry fee" of taking on an Esprit.