If you are old enough to have a driver’s license, you might remember that buying a used car meant a trek to a dealership or lot. It ain’t necessarily so now with online car-selling. As just one example Carvana is allowing consumers to shop and purchase a vehicle via the internet (http://www.carvana.com/how-it-works). It is also letting buyers pick up their vehicles at a fully automated, coin-operated car vending machine in Nashville. Yes, the Horn and Hardart’s automat has come to car buying.
This is just the latest blow to middle class jobs as “unattended buying” expands into many sectors across the U.S. – a key issue in the U.S. presidential election.
Ernie Garcia, founder and CEO of Carvana, says integrating the vending machine concept into vehicle buying makes for a “one-of-a-kind experience that mirrors just how simple and easy we’ve made it to buy a car online.”
On average, customers spend about 30 minutes purchasing a car through the online car-selling startup in Tennessee. Customers can complete all the necessary paperwork, submit down payment information, review contracts and sign for everything electronically.
When the time comes to pick up their vehicle, they visit a multi-story glass structure with 20 cars inside, select their name from a kiosk, enter the coin into the vending machine, and then the vehicle is instantly retrieved through the use of robotic platforms that can move a car thanks to automated parking technology.
