enduser

When my order arrived I first asked the dealer if there was any possibility of price reductions, and he said no and that there was a long wait list. I cancelled my order. Its been a few weeks and the car still appears to be on the lot. perhaps more than one. I think it's a line he fed me, and there is likely plenty of inventory sitting on dealer lots due to cancellations. Do you see the same? When are we going to start seeing discounts to unload these?

ted99

I cancelled my order before the car reached the dealership. The reason I gave was "uncertainty about delivery" on the website. This was when it had been in "Leaving Factory" for 6 weeks. The car arrived and is still available at the dealership. I show about 20 e-trons "available" in a 250 mi radius of Houston. None are being discounted on the website. I'm also monitoring the Jag i-Pace on the same website and there are about the same number available, but the Jags are being discounted at least $6K on the website.

enduser

I am wondering if Audi is waiting for all the edition 1's to be delivered before they start dropping prices so they don't create a storm of angry early adopters. I also figure the stats we see reported on how Audio is selling so well relative to tesla is due to initial shipments to dealers, but doesn't reflect actual customer deliveries. I am expecting the shoe to drop for some substantial price reductions.

DMcDnald

I could be wrong, but I don't think there's a huge margin on the e-trons with the way they have the ordering system set up. You can be sure the dealers are trying to maximize their profits. I imagine demand will have to tank before any deals will be made. As long as you're not in any hurry...

ted99

The e-Tron is excluded from the 6% discount from MSRP for Audi club members. Whatever discounts that come will have to have AudiUSA participation for them to be significant enough to get me on board. I'd say watch for the Audi club discount to be applied to the e-Tron as the canary in the coal mine. Q8 is also excluded, presumably because they are expected to sell well. Time will tell on the e-Tron, now that the recall problem seems to be settled. In my test drive of the e-Tron, my wife REALLY liked it and so did I; but we decided that the depreciation was going to be very severe, in the face of the next wave EV's with greater range and we should wait until the end of 2020 to see what is happening. It will be interesting to see how the M-B EQC gets priced. If it's lower than the e-Tron, it could be a real driver. EQC range will be no better than e-Tron and it's another EV on an ICE platform so there is no reason for the two to have a significant price difference. M-B will probably be looking at e-Tron sales very closely. If e-Tron's are piling up at dealers and M-B wants to go for market presence they will price below e-Tron when sales start late this year. If the major manufacturers are serious when they say the future is electric, they will forget about short-term profits and look for market share in the early EV days. Tesla is eating everyone's lunch today and in Houston, Tesla has a higher brand cachet than Audi because of the Model S. BMW is due in the market next year with an EV iX3--another EV on an ICE platform. No where near the brand cachet of an e-Tron or an EQC. Also confused with the prospect of Trump's 25% China tariffs. BMW may need to pivot the iX3 from China to SC production, which will further delay it's introduction in the USA. And pricing: an iX3 cannot begin to get an honest price close to the e-Tron or EQC. BMW will probably use their traditional marketing ploy of offering it with inflated residual values on leasing deals, deferring their day of reckoning to 3 years down the road and meanwhile stacking up market share.

A further thought on Audi's choice to more or less sell direct to customers. A dealer ordinarily has "some" choice on how many dealer stock cars they order from the Mfg. With the e-Tron model, a car "ordered" by a customer and not taken becomes a dealer stock car. One would think that if a dealer has too much stock vis a vis sales, it would taper down on stock orders. The dealers have no control over this with the current methodology. If a customer declines a car, it becomes dealer stock.

Kramer

I am awaiting arrival of Etron premium plus from port. Salesman says current offer 2.9%, claimed to not have heard of 1.9% offer. When I showed him online story regarding 1.9% financing for 66 months online (story back in May) he stated that the website wasn’t credible. Also denies any loyalty incentive availability. Has anyone been successful in getting any sort of incentive(s)?

Larry David

I'll hopefully let you know tomorrow. If there truly is nothing the dealership can do, then my sales rep is correct, they are the middle man and thus provide zero value. If that true and I were them, I'd be looking for a new job.

Tom-ETRON

I cancelled my I-Pace order as the initial review of the car just unveiled too many bugs, and even my Jaguar salesman who went to California for training on the I-Pace said they experienced several anomalies and even one test car broke down. Still like the idea of the I-Pace, but no time to own a lemon... For Jaguar just staying in business looks like an epic challenge as their financials are not terrific.

On the E-Tron I was severely disappointed when the range of 204 miles was announced, and had expected to cancel, but at the last moment I saw the dealer had an E-tron loaner car, so I asked to borrow it for a couple days, which they agreed to... 2 days in the E-tron, and a road trip including an electrify America stop and I was sold. Hoped to get a better price, but I understand its all about supply and demand, demand is strong right now, so I was not able to get much off the price, and this is by far the best "car" I have ever owned. Reliability remains to be seen, but if it holds up well, I will be happy for a long time.

Tronification

That sounds quite shady. Depending on the circumstances, I’d ask to work with a different sales rep.

Tronification

According to cars.com the supply of etrons on the ground is growing by some 20 cars a day. Under normal circumstances, we should start seeing some decent discounts, just as with the Q8.

My guess though is that, as expensive as it is, the eTron is a zero or negative margin vehicle for Audi at the moment and they will adjust supply to meet the demand while they’re working on the bespoke platforms that will presumably lower their unit costs. Those, starting with the Q4, will likely be sold through the normal channel, while the eTron will remain a direct-order model, at least until the next gen models are ready.