cborgrx

Way back in 2005 when I was considering museum delivery for my C6, I was told that I would have to pay $$$ for museum delivery PLUS $$$ destination charge (for a car that wasn't going anywhere)! Is that still the same today for a C7? $990.00 + $995.00 Thank you

Bill17601

Yes.. Some say the experience is well worth the expense. Actually since everyone pays destination charge the actual cost for the museum delivery is $995

Pres712

Destination charge? Thank the Teamsters for that!!!

Bill17601

I think they have families and medical bills like the rest of us. From what I have read the delivery drivers take great care of our cars. Professionals delivering Corvettes. The cost is the same if you live in Memphis or San Francisco. I think that is fair.

Dicecal

Eleventh

Why do people keep claiming the Teamsters are to blame for this one? Everything else, yes, but the "Destination Charge" is a sop to the dealers. They level the delivery charge so that dealers with lower costs of delivery due to geographic proximity and/or the number of vehicles they are taking at a time don't get a pricing advantage over higher delivery cost dealers.

AORoads

I agree with the above and Eleventh's post.

BIg Wash AZ

Delete the UAW from the Museum delivery equation, GM could delete the $995 GM destination charge. The Museum could scoot the cars across the street on a rented U Haul trailer for $18 per day. An all you can haul. Union rules say all cars leave the factory on a union truck. So across the street or across the nation, one price fits all.

Bill17601

Maybe we can figure out how to cut expenses everywhere. It may come as a surprise but unless people make a decent living the economy will collapse. No money to spend and no money for manufactures then no job. Same with retail. I have found that everyone makes to much money if they make more then you do.

Eleventh

You are confusing two different points:

a) Fee level: union trucking may be required and that raises the cost of delivery. Therefore the $995 fee might be higher than needed. (I don't dispute this, but it is not relevant.)

b) Flat fee for all destinations: GM and the dealers have agreed to a flat delivery fee to avoid giving a pricing advantage dealers that have geographic proximity to the plant or other delivery efficiency (close to the rail yard).

Union drivers or not, we all acknowledge that it is obviously much less expensive to deliver to the museum rather than the average dealer that is further away. But the Museum acts as a dealer (on behalf of the ordering dealer), and therefore PER ITEM B, they have to charge the same destination fee.

GM and the Dealers make the decision on B, I don't see how the unions would influence it. Let's say non-union delivery was on average 1/2 as much and GM was able to switch to it and lowered the destination charge to $495. You'd still have to pay the same flat destination charge, regardless of whether it is going to the Museum or California.

If the Dealers didn't have such a racket with their franchise laws, we might be able to have a true factory delivery option, like the European manufacturers have. We could buy it straight from GM, vs. the legal gimmick of making the museum a dealer and selling it through them.

Look at the length Dealers are going to try and prevent Telsa from establishing a direct distribution model. I believe the NY dealers lost their effort to stop Tesla, but the TX dealers won.

Tonyman262

While the whole idea of museum delivery is pretty cool;
Call it whatever you want, but being charged twice for delivery at over $900 is a crock.

MThomas

First off let me say I am a supporter of the Corvette Museum. Having said that, I understand where some people believe the cost associated with Museum Delivery, Buyers Tour and Photo Album have increased to a price point which exceeds their limits. First off, the museum has not had a price increase for these services for years. If you have never participated in any of these programs you are missing out. You will remember your experiences for a life time. I have done them several times myself.

I have made the recommendation to the museum they come up with an "Actual" cost for these services. For example, lets say for the buyers tour "Actual" cost to pay for the employee to monitor your cars status leading up to production along with the amount they have to pay the employee to provide the tour is $400. The museum currently charges $800 for this service. Therefore, when you pay the $800 fee you receive a "Donation Letter" for the $400 which exceeds the museum's "Actual Coast" for this tour. You could use $400 donation on your tax return. This might ease the pain for some people. The museum currently does this with other donations we make to the museum.

The museum could do the same with the Photo Album. However, I don't see anyway around the Museum Delivery charge since that is included on the Window Sticker and we are not paying this fee directly to the museum ourselves. This is JMO.

BigJoe

Not true. Everybody has to pay the destination charge, $995. Only those that wish to have the extra benefits of the buyers tour and all the other things that the Museum does for you pay the $990 Museum delivery charge. The $990 is not the same charge doubled.

Eleventh

This is definitely worth exploring. End result might not be as big as you hope, but it could work.

a) on R8C, GM charges that , not the museum. I would suspect there is a dealer and OEM margin built into it, probably only 1/2 the fee goes to the museum. (cynically, I'd say GM wanted to raise the fee for C7, added the plaque for C7, raised the price, but still pays the museum the same amount as C6 and kept the whole price increase for themselves.)

b) on the other buyers tour and photo album, the museum is setting the price on that, and you might be able to split the costs. I'm not a tax expert, I think the rub is that you'll need to find a fair-market value comparable to compare against, you can't just subtract the raw material costs.

Bill Dearborn

The destination charge for any GM vehicle is the same for any delivery in the US including dealers that might only be walking distance from the plant. A long time ago it had to do with the distance from the plant to the point of delivery but they changed that several decades ago. I have window stickers from two different Oldsmobiles delivered in the US in the 60s and the delivery charges varied considerably based on the delivery location. When they made the change the explanation was it included all of the shipping of parts to the plant and that way they could have a standard charge.

Bill

TC50AEV

Well said, this is a common process for many products that are delivered nationally.

Eleventh

I totally agree, museum delivery is awesome. So we can we agree that the Museum isn't just charging you delivery twice, but actually doing some cool things that have value to those of us that chose R8C (the plaque in the car, etc.)?

So, then let's talk through the alternative story. GM doesn't charge the $995 destination fee on top of museum delivery, but charges it for all other dealers. All other dealers complain, and then GM is forced to shutdown the museum delivery option.

Yes we can quibble over whether the $995 is over-charging for the services provided in the museum delivery. Might as well argue as to why it costs $595 to put in calipers painted a different color, that's like $0.50 worth of paint and maybe $25 worth of extra logistics costs. Think there is a little profit margin baked into that one as well?

BIg Wash AZ

Of course the UAW has something to do with it. Any suggestion to the contrary is shortsighted. Yesterday, there were three cars on Museum webcams. They could have transported those cars across the street for $100 total. And that is being generous. So why didn't they? Has nothing to do with dealers. Has nothing to do with the Museum. It has everything to do the UAW contract. Not knocking it, just calling it like it is.

So long ago, that I hardly recall I was a kid. I worked for a union electrical contractor doing commercial work. I was on a Davis mini trencher with a 3' boom digging a 25'x3'x6" trench to lay some 3/4" thin wall conduit. The operator's union shut down the job over this sleight. A single picket sign they had on hand was displayed. Every trade maybe a total of 500 guys quit working immediately. My boss was livid. The solution: he took the 12" square padded seat off the trencher. I dug the identical trench walking beside the machine instead of sitting on it. No seat no contract issue.

Charging $995 to load cars on an interstate car hauler to cross a highway is all about ludicrous.

TBIRD57

gm would pass on any savings to the buyer

Eleventh

Please read the other posts in this article. You have completely missed the point.

No one disputes that it costs less than $995 to ship the cars across the street. I'd bet, even with union labor, it's still only about $200. It simply doesn't matter*, union or not. GM charges the same 'destination fee' to all dealers, independent of delivery location, so that the received by dealer pricing is the same. If they didn't, it would **** off the dealers, not the union.

* In theory, if it were not for union rules, maybe GM could allow the Museum to come over and pickup the cars for delivery themselves. Even in that case, I bet GM would still have to charge the $995 destination charge, to keep it 'fair' for all dealers.