INFINITI on Shifting Luxury Market, Bud Clary Auto on Vid Gen in Service Lane | Daily Dealer Live

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Hey everybody, welcome to another edition of the Daily Dealer Live.

I'm your host, Sam Darkin.

Back with us today is Yuli DiMartino.

What's up, man?

Welcome to the show.

Happy to be here.

By the way, back with us is not right.

I missed Monday.

I felt terrible.

I would have loved to have been here.

And you guys absolutely crushed a cool convo with Cliff

and the other guests.

And obviously, as always, for those joining our live stream,

we're live across all CDG social media platforms,

all of them.

Post your comments into the stream today

because they do change the trajectory of the show

and what a show we've got today.

Nissan and the turnaround in progress.

We've been long talking about that as a topic of conversation

on the Daily Dealer Live.

We've had Vinay Shahani on the show.

Well, today joining us is Tiago Castro.

It's exciting.

Vice President of Infinity Americas.

He's fresh off of a dealer meeting in Vegas

and promises to be a fascinating conversation

on all things in infinity.

So we're excited to be there with him.

Also, Dustin Shuler, marketing director at Bud Clary Auto Group.

Yuli, he's going to expose AI.

He's going to show us what is up with AI in his world

and expose some tips and strategies

to make it go from harmful to helpful.

And finally up today, Anna brings some tips

on closing out the EV rebate era, including, by the way,

there's a dealer with a countdown clock.

Is that helping, hurting?

And what's next after rebates in?

But first, Yuli, let's dive into today's headlines.

Let's go.

All right, first up today, according to a new survey

by Cox Automotive, overall car shopper satisfaction

has risen from 60% in 2016 to 68% in 2024.

Yuli, that's a big jump, eight points.

But it's also interesting to me, I would expect much more.

I'd expect higher satisfaction.

The improvements have come from steps

like test drives, financing, and negotiations,

which are making the process smoother and less stressful

for buyers, according to Cox.

But Cox points out the main pain points remain.

Trade-in offers, F&I product pitches

are still where customers feel the most frustration and doubt.

And dealers who improved satisfaction last year

saw profits jump nearly 90% compared to just 49%

of those who didn't move the needle.

So the secret sauce is focusing on it.

What's the big picture here?

Car buying satisfaction has improved,

but dealers have gaps to fill.

And we will be here covering the filling of those gaps.

Next up today, US ambassador to the EU, Andy Puzder,

told Fox Business that the new US-EU trade deal

will, quote, help rebalance the auto industry by capping

tariffs on European cars and parts at 15%.

What is the US getting return?

Well, Europe will likely reduce tariffs

on key American exports, like pharmaceuticals,

semiconductors, and lumber, while both sides

weigh discounted rates on steel and aluminum

under a quota system.

Puzder framed the deal as finally leveling the field,

but the framework also tackles Chinese trade practices

and energy security issues.

US officials argue are tied directly

to auto market stability.

What's the bottom line here?

Well, the agreement could ease tariff tensions

between the EU, but the EU says its staying power

will depend on how both sides manage

the details in practice.

And finally up today, a new JD Power study

shows AI-driven in-vehicle features

are boosting car owner satisfaction.

AI-driven in-vehicle features with overall tech

experience scores rising as dealers embrace

smarter climate systems, blind spot cameras,

and in-vehicle payments.

I haven't seen the in-vehicle payment part yet,

so I'm excited to learn more about that.

But not every innovation hits the mark.

Features like car wash mode leave nearly 40%

of owners confused.

Meanwhile, biometric recognition and driver monitoring tech

are causing the most reported issues.

Yuli, before I finish this read, car wash mode,

I have a beef.

So I drive a vehicle.

I drive a vehicle.

I'm not going to say here what one, maybe I will say.

It's a Hyundai Palisade.

So I'm in the car wash.

And a couple times, I've actually

gotten towards the end of the tunnel and you're on that track.

And you try to get it into drive before the car behind you

smashes into you.

And all the smart stuff on the car these days,

it puts the brake on.

So you instantly have to figure out how to turn the brake on.

I've googled the video.

I've seen the video.

I know how to get around it, how to put it in car wash mode.

But I always forget before I go through the car wash.

So that's something fascinating.

Car wash mode leaving 40% of owners confused.

Are you an expert at putting a car in car wash mode?

Absolutely not.

No way.

Well, automakers are focusing on useful intuitive AI tools

rather than the tech for tech's sake,

but are seeing stronger results.

So they list Genesis, Cadillac, Lincoln, BMW, and Hyundai top

JD Power's innovation ranking, while Honda, Jeep, Jag,

Ram, and Chrysler landed near the bottom.

Surprised to see Honda at that point,

according to JD Power's.

JD Power notes that while 81% of buyers

saw their car purchases, left them feeling excited,

hopeful, and empowered, frustration

grows quickly when systems are clunky or poorly explained.

That can erode brand loyalty in a highly competitive market.

What's the punchline here?

Well, obviously, AI-powered tech is making cars

smarter and more satisfying.

But if functionality problems grow,

automakers risk trading short-term buzz

for long-term consumer frustration.

I have anxiety going through a car wash.

Someone help.

And not only you.

I mean, I think about my mom, who's brilliant.

How's she going to put a car into car wash mode?

Or even, you know, the auto braking

when you back up, which is a great feature,

unless you back onto, like, a two-way street

and your car hits the emergency brake when you're backing

gently out of your driveway.

Are you comparing me to your brilliant mom?

Because I don't know.

I don't know.

No, listen, you guys are both at the top of the pedestal.

There's no comparison there.

I love it.

So hey, Yulia, as you know, we

get a ton of requests for guests on the show.

Just a reminder out there to every dealer that

has something interesting to say on the Daily Dealer Live,

you make this show awesome by having you here on this show

and sharing your perspectives.

It changes the auto industry.

We get a lot of requests.

Those requests, take them to cdgguest.com.

Go to cdgguest.com.

Fill out the intake form.

You'll meet Michelle, part of the CDG team,

who handles scheduling.

She'll bring you in, and we'll

get to have a fascinating conversation with you.

So go to that spot to learn more.

But let's jump into our show today.

It's action-packed fun.

Let's start out with Vice President of Infinity America's

Tiago Castro.

Tiago, welcome to the show.

Welcome, welcome.

Well, thank you.

Thank you, Sam.

Thank you, Yulia.

Good to see you here.

Thanks for having me.

Thanks for being on the show.

Thanks for coming on the show so soon

after your dealer meeting in Vegas.

We get to talk a lot about some cool and exciting things.

But before we go there, from your perspective,

Tiago, how's BIS in the Nissan Infinity world right now?

This is an exciting moment for Infinity, for Nissan,

and for our whole network.

As you just said, we came back from this dealer meeting.

Things are sort of fine.

We're making a very clear plan on what needs to happen,

how it needs to happen, and really taking time

to improve the present and accelerate the future.

Really, this is the mission.

So business is progressing well.

The QX80, this is our flagship model, full-size SUV,

has done quite well for us.

The last seven months, we hit every year,

year-over-year growth.

It's the best seven months in sales ever

for the history of the company for QX80.

So that's really good news.

QX60, we launched a new one.

It's arriving at dealer lots as we speak,

and we see momentum there as well.

So those are the two key models that we have to sell,

and obviously we're going to talk about growth

going forward as well.

But exciting moment for Infinity and for our leadership team

and for our dealers.

So a lot of change at Infinity,

and you teased a little bit of that with new brands, right?

So since step into your role, Tiago, on April 1st, 2025,

you've overseen Infinity's strategic direction

across the Americas.

What are the top three priorities

you're driving with dealers right now,

especially around product planning, marketing,

dealer profitability, and client experience?

What are the big three priorities you have, Tiago?

You know, I arrived, as you just pointed out, in April.

So think about this.

My second day in the job, we had tariffs arriving.

So it was quite interesting.

And the good news about having experience

in different locations of the world

as well as different functions of the company

is to be able to apply some very calm decision-making process

to maximize everything.

So step number one was to stabilize the operations.

We decided to take advantage of the Mexico production

to Mexico, to Canada.

Use the US footprint to accelerate sales here.

So think about QX-60 made in the US.

We're going to produce more of those while we pause

and slow down the production of the other models.

So this was simple to do.

But our priority number one, I would say,

is to simplify our way to do business with dealers.

How can we be a partner that everybody wants to work with?

And what I say by that is reduce our interference

or our request for dealers to follow our processes,

procedures, and programs.

So my first meeting with the dealer advisory board,

I sat down with them and went over 80 different programs,

activities, or processes that we have available for the dealers

with a simple intention to remove what is not necessary.

If it doesn't help sell cars, doesn't help client experience,

or make anybody make money, we should not be doing it.

So it was very effective.

And this was within 15 days of my arrival.

Obviously, before that, I was able to meet with everyone

from the dealer advisory board, starting with Zoom or in-person,

because I really value that interaction.

We don't know everything here at Infinity.

I don't pretend that I know everything.

What I know is how to work very closely with team members

that are very capable, that can provide us

the input necessary.

I'm also very happy that we have a very nimble organization.

We're small or fast.

We have very talented team members that can adjust.

We just need to spark that desire,

and I think we have done that.

So the number one priority was to simplify everything,

the way we do business with our retailer network.

The number two priority is to make it very clear

to everybody what we needed to do as a team today.

And it was really to focus on client experience

and to focus on new vehicle sales.

So we've done that together with the DAB,

even by adjusting our program that we call Performance Plus.

This is a program that makes it very clear

the two priorities with the companies,

new vehicle sales, as well as client experience.

And the third piece, which is not in order of priority,

but the third piece is ensure that we have a product plan

that supports growth,

that supports the throughput

that all our retailer network is working,

and a product plan that also connects back to our roots.

We don't need it to be apologetic

or try to rethink everything.

Maybe we should go back to our roots

and do things a little bit different.

And I think that's the excitement

that we showed in the dealer meeting

and we collected a lot of good feedback.

So it's interesting.

You mentioned a product that's coming up.

We want to go there in just a minute.

Infinity basically has the QX80, QX60, two current models,

and you're talking about expanding that pipeline.

But before we go there,

you mentioned listening to dealers

and really connecting well

at delivering on what they're looking for.

What, as you listen,

what are some of the biggest asks

that dealers are making?

Do any of them relate to profitability?

How does the state of profitability

in the infinity world look currently for dealers?

What are some of the biggest asks

you hear from dealers today, as you listen?

Well, number one ask,

being completely transparent is product.

More product, what product,

when is the product coming?

We know as a team that if we sell more vehicles,

new vehicles, you will lead to more profit.

That's a given.

Take care of customers and you sell more cars,

more profit.

So we needed to do this.

We need to increase throughput.

And the conversation is how do we get there?

There's many, many suggestions.

For example, market by market,

there's really different demands on incentives

on marketing, positioning on the vehicle.

They wanted us to be more flexible.

We were very national incentive,

national advertising, everything national.

And I think the opportunity

is to regionalize more

and be able to do those tactics in the region.

So you connect better with consumers

in that specific region.

So that's one thing we're working very closely

with the dealer advisory board.

The other ask is for us to pay extreme attention

on dealer profitability,

which is something that for me is crucial.

If we are retailer network,

our dealer network is not making money.

They will not invest with us.

So it's very clear to me that that's the number one item

that we need to be in the end of the day.

It's output of everything we do,

but it's critical output.

So it's interesting, Craig Keyes,

again, talking about models

and inventory and volume production.

Craig Keyes, before you took over for him,

said he wanted to hit 100,000 units sold

by Infinity in 2025.

I don't think he hit that,

even came close, if that's correct.

What is your volume aspiration?

And then what do you have coming up in the pipeline?

Okay, so that's a great question.

It's one that we talked in the dealer meeting.

Couple of things I will tell you.

Number one, it all starts with setting the tone

and delivering a plan that we can all believe in.

What I told you to the retailer network

is this year we're selling about 50,000 units

and we're gonna progress every single day,

every single month, every single year

to a higher volume than that, okay?

So this is, think about this being the Valley

and by 2029, we will be at 100,000 units.

I don't wanna over promise, Sam,

because it's important for all of us

to have a clear understanding

of what the opportunities are

and what the risks are.

So let's make a plan that we all can agree with.

What I also said in the all dealer meeting is this,

we will launch one product per year

for the foreseeable future.

I don't wanna tell you

we're gonna launch 50 products

and try to combine all the small changes

to the one product per year.

We're gonna do less, but we're gonna do very well.

And I think that's one of the themes

that I heard a lot from our dealers,

do less, but do it well.

And that's a mission that I'm taking to heart

and our team is really committed to this

and that's the exciting part.

It's not just, this is not the Tiago show,

this is the infinity show.

This is when we go to market together

with our retail network and we win as a team.

So talk to us about that product

and you've teased it a little bit.

Right now you've got the QX80, you've got the QX60.

When you think over the next two years,

what does the product rollout look like

and how quickly can dealers expect to see

a significant amount of that inventory

to expand the product lineup for infinity?

Yeah, so the product lineup is this.

Today we obviously have the QX80 and the QX60,

the new, they're growing, gaining momentum.

We have the QX50 and QX55 still in dealer showrooms

across the nation and that production ends in December.

In the spring, we launched the QX65.

This is a fastback crossover that looks phenomenal

and if you haven't had a chance to see one,

we just introduced in the motorway car week,

the monograph, QX65 monograph.

It's a concept car but it gives you a very good sense

of what that production vehicle will look like.

As you can imagine, we're very close to that production.

The cars are here, we're driving, we're testing them.

So that vehicle positions infinity in a really good segment.

This is a, we call the D crossover segment,

which is the biggest one in the market.

A two-row, beautifully looking,

well-appointed crossover that will attract

new customers to infinity.

We expect those customers to come from luxury

but also from mainstream brands.

About 60% of all will be upgrade

from a mainstream brand into luxury.

So that's very critical.

So we're preparing the dealer network

for that volume increase.

Following that, our intention is to launch

a new sports sedan,

which is something that really connects

back to the roots of infinity.

We have so many people talking about the Q50,

the G35, the G37,

and that's a model that brings energy back to all of us.

It's gonna be exciting.

It's gonna be available with a super powerful engine.

I mean, I can't wait to drive this thing.

In fact, a little curiosity,

my first vehicle when I got out of college,

I joined Nissan immediately after I joined out of college.

And my first vehicle that I ever signed up with,

my brand new car was a G35.

That was the car.

It was a six-speed manual with summer tires

and I lived in Michigan at the time.

So you can imagine.

Yeah, close by.

See, I go on that vein.

So, I mean, a lot of our dealer friends

are saying the same thing.

Infinity is building a beautiful product.

We know that, right?

We have our fingers crossed.

We want infinity to do well.

We want Nissan to do well.

Aesthetically gorgeous,

but to me, and maybe I'm wrong,

Nissan was kind of built on this very sporty nature.

Like you just said,

this six-speed G35 with that,

what was the VQ35 DE engine, right?

And there was this heart pumping in Nissan and Infinities.

All the luxury manufacturers right now

are still putting some very powerful drive trains

in their vehicles.

We're not really seeing that with Nissan and Infinity.

Now, you're mentioning this sports sedan,

which hopefully has the heart of Godzilla.

But is there a plan to kind of breathe some fire

into the SUV lineup that, again, is stunning?

But where's the competition for an Escalade V

or an X5M comp, things like that?

Yuli, have you been in some of my meetings lately?

Because you sound like me right now.

I agree with you.

We have an opportunity to really drive

some excitement to this brand.

In fact, in Monterey Car Week,

we were at the quail

and we presented the QX65 monograph

that I just mentioned,

but we also had two QX80 concept cars.

So the first one is the QX80 track spec.

The track spec, the idea of the track spec

is a high performance, super fast,

beast on wheels, if you will,

that really gave us opportunity to showcase what we can do.

This vehicle today has a engine that is 3.5 liter,

twin-turbo with 450 horsepower.

We increase horsepower and torque by more than 50%

with this vehicle.

And obviously this is a concept,

but what we wanted to do is to go to a place like the quail

and test the market.

So then once we understand the consumer feedback

in a much faster way than normal research,

we then can use our newly developed fast to market approach

to bring those products to market.

And I can tell you,

the track spec was really well received.

At that same show, we had the terrain spec,

which is completely the opposite proposition.

Think about a off-road overlander vehicle,

you know, going through Colorado roads,

you wanna take off into the snow a little bit and come back,

but you still wanna land in downtown Aspen in style.

This would be your perfect companion.

So two different propositions,

two different alternatives for consumers.

We tested the market.

In fact, I had the honor to present those also

to all the retailers in Las Vegas.

And then we did a test of voting.

I asked everybody to vote.

I want everybody to show and tell me, which one do you want?

I mean, assuming that we have to choose one,

maybe we should have both,

but assuming that we have to choose one,

and we got some really excellent inputs

and we're ready to go.

So I'm with you, Yulys.

We need to bring some passion to everything you do,

not just the product, but also to the product.

This is the opportunity that I have to do this.

And I can tell you also that we have full alignment

across the globe from the global CEO

who joined us in the retailer meeting last week.

Our global CEO was there,

and he wasn't there just to show up and say hello.

He was presenting the infinity business meeting.

He was presenting the all Nissan and infinity meeting.

He sat with the dealer advisory board of infinity

and the Nissan dealer advisory board took questions.

And incredibly in the infinity business meeting,

he sat with us in the Q&A as well.

So him, our chairman of America's Christian Mune,

who you probably know well,

and obviously Vinay Shahani who has been here

in the show as well, full support, we're fully aligned.

We understand that, you know,

in order for Nissan global succeed,

we need a strong infinity brand.

And we're going after this

as one team leadership and the retailers together.

So Tiago Vinay has talked about on this show

and elsewhere that he's instituted twice monthly

dealer calls and deeper advisory board engagement

to rebuild transparency and trust within the Nissan brand.

Will we see a similar kind of cadence

or structure under your leadership dedicate, you know,

perhaps even dedicated to the infinity dealer forms

or regional advisory sessions?

Like what is your,

what is your structure or strategy look like

for increasing that connection back to the dealers

and that transparency?

Yeah, I think there's a few different things

I can tell you.

One is a formal review with the dealer advisory board

every month on what we said we needed to do, where we are

and what else is missing.

So every month there's some tweaks.

So we do that monthly meeting with them.

We do a quarterly deep dive

into all those discussions in person.

So everybody flies in, typically do our headquarters

and we get to sit down and have a conversation.

But more than that, Sam, I can tell you important

for us to stay connected with the retailers.

I speak with the chair of the infinity board twice a week.

Most Saturdays we end up talking to ensure

that we are moving the right direction.

That's where we collected the additional perhaps concerns

that are not for everybody, but there's for some.

I joke a lot about averages.

You know, it's very easy to manage a business

with average.

But if you lay down a body

and you put the head in the oven

and the foot in the freezer,

the average body temperature is okay,

but that person is no longer with us, right?

They're dead, yeah.

So averages don't work.

So I love to hear that the average is okay,

but I needed to know that that's super good

and that's super bad as well.

And that's something that for me, it's very important.

I like to be involved.

And we end up making a lot of nimble, smart decisions

because of this.

And I think that's one advantage that infinity has

that we have a smaller dealer body.

We have a very dedicated team

and we're going after it with the desire to win.

So you've talked about some big plans you have

both with product, with structure, with incentives,

a focus on dealer profitability.

And you've talked about near term and long term.

Longer term is that 100,000 goal

that your predecessor had out there

in terms of units and production.

Tiago, looking over the next six to 12 months,

what dealer centric deliverables

could you expect to see in that near term?

As you, you know, we're here in August of 2025.

What can dealers see from infinity over the next six months

as we close out the year and then the next 12 months

on those points, the different points of focus you have?

Well, you will see obviously the simplification piece.

That's going to be crystal clear.

We launched the program called Performance Plus in July,

which simplified our KPIs from roughly officially 15 KPIs

that we paid on to only five of them.

So it's only focused on sales and client experience

and that's it.

The second piece is a true market by market approach.

So we can do a much better job in model year,

model year changeover.

So as you selling down the model year 25,

how does the 26 come on board?

We lose a lot of momentum not doing this properly

and that's something that our retailer network

will see it and I already alerted them

if you feel like it's not moving the right direction.

That's what we needed to know

because sometimes you're making a change here

from headquarters and it may not have the impact

that we desire, which is okay.

We will change it again.

But you've got a feedback.

Yeah, exactly.

Very much so.

And then the other piece is a double down

on client experience.

We are really serious about client experience.

We have, for example, we tested for QX80,

My Infinity Experts.

My Infinity Experts is somebody available,

the client can set up a one hour meeting

and they can learn everything about the technology

of the QX80 because the vehicle offers so much

that it's so useful.

It's very intuitive overall,

but if you don't know what you're looking for,

you don't look for it.

So we want our clients to experience the full opportunities

that this vehicle provides.

So we tested this.

It worked so well.

We're now expanding to the QX60 as well

and then every vehicle so forth that we launch

that we'll have it,

all the technology and people can learn.

But that's just one example.

The other one would be the valet service.

So we have been very successful

in delivering a program to our retailers

for picking up and delivery of service vehicles.

And that has led into quite a bit of an increase

in retention for our service,

which we all know, right, Sam,

that this pays the bills big time.

We want clients to stay with us.

So people that do valet,

now the 10-year retention goes up seven points,

in average, and I hate to average, just remember,

but I'll use an average just for the sake of it,

but in average one point of retention

is $40,000 in revenue for the US.

So imagine seven points,

that's a lot of money that we can bring back

and valet has been working for us

and there will be more.

But, you know, the recent JD Power study

on sale satisfaction,

infinity was number two, just behind portion.

And we should aim to be number one.

Really, we should aim,

and the reason why I agree

with what we were discussing with the retailers,

when you do less, but you do very well,

that's when you really shine.

And I want us together with our retailers

to do less work,

but then really win in everything we do.

So we appreciate you being on the show

and sharing the perspectives today,

just one last sort of perspective conversation.

So we've reported a lot on this show,

how Nissan and Infinity both are the subject

of a lot of M&A.

There's a lot of new dealers trying to get into

franchise automotive and the multipliers support them

coming into Nissan in particular and Infinity

at a lower multiplier

and getting that experience and growing the brand.

What would you say to dealers

either looking to get in or get out

as it relates to Infinity in the future?

Like, you've got big plans,

you're making a lot of changes from transparency,

from feedback loop to dealers to product lineup.

The future at Infinity does seem bright.

To dealers looking to get into the business

through Infinity or Nissan and or out,

what would you say to those dealers

about the next many years under your leadership, Tiago?

Let's say you're in that position for 20 years,

what do you say?

Well, buy low and sell high, how about that?

So there you go, it's time to buy.

But jokes apart, I think what everybody needs to know

is this, our commitment to Infinity is real, okay?

And it's backed by actions, not just words.

So yes, I will talk and stuff,

but I want you to see the actions.

And I can attest to you

and hopefully you talk to us, there's actions,

there's movement, how we perfect everything we do know,

but we're gonna wake up every day

and we're gonna do better than yesterday

and we know for sure that it's not good enough as tomorrow.

So we're gonna, that's the spirit that the team has.

So that's the number one,

the commitment to Infinity is true.

Yes, we're focused on the future,

the future is much brighter, one product per year,

it will sustain the growth,

a consistent growth,

crazy growth from today to tomorrow, double the sales,

we're not gonna do that,

but we're gonna consistently grow with you

with the profitability in mind, okay?

But we're also making changes every day, like I said before.

And then the last thing I say, if you're a retailer,

I can guarantee evil feel we work with you.

And then when we work together,

there's really no stopping us, it's possible to win.

Well Tiago, really there's no stopping Infinity.

Tiago, we love your vision,

we love what you're looking to do with Infinity as a brand.

And props to both you and Vinay

for coming on this show multiple times

for being on Yossi's podcast as well.

You know, again, the transparency

and the messaging back to the dealer body,

I think really creates a lot of confidence in the brand

and excitement for the future.

I'm excited to see some of that lineup coming out,

in particular, some of the things that's competing

in a serious way with BMW and some of the other brands.

So Tiago Castro, Vice President of Infinity Americas,

thanks for being on the Daily Dealer Live.

Thanks Tiago.

Thanks for having me, thank you.

Thank you.

That's a good combo, it's interesting.

For sure.

Like Vinay, he is interested in reducing

a lot of the noise that's out there.

I love the quote, one of the guys from Shark Tank

talks about one of the great qualities of a great leader,

and I see this in people I work with who are great leaders,

is they can filter out the noise

and they really focus on those most important things

that get the job done.

And this Shark Tank guy on some social media posts

talks about like Steve Jobs was great

at filtering out the noise.

Elon Musk, great at filtering out the noise.

And it seems like Nissan between Vinay and Tiago,

like they are focused on the things that matter most

and they're trying to very quickly turn

some of the systems and processes in simplifying them

so that they get the job done

and props to them for doing that, yeah?

Yeah, I agree.

And listen, I mean, honesty for me

is always the best medicine to have a four-year plan

to get to where they want it to be

as of December of last year.

I think as an honest plan,

is it what dealers would like to hear?

Probably not, but I mean as long as not fast enough.

It's never fast enough, but it's fast.

I mean, based off where they are today.

And I mean, like he said, buy low, sell high.

Yeah, yeah.

And it is interesting to see how many dealers

coming into the space.

All right, let's talk Hague partners.

Hague partners, public retailers cite it, the report.

National media trusted dealers rely on it.

The Hague report sets the standard

for dealership M&A data and trends in auto retailer.

Read the Hague report at Haguepartners.com

slash Hague report or you can click the QR code there

and you can go straight to it and get access to it there.

So we appreciate Hague partners for supporting the show

and all the content that we have on today,

including that interview with Tiago with Infinity

fresh off the meeting from Vegas.

So thanks to Hague partners.

And actually, I think we've got a guest from Hague

coming on in the next couple of few weeks.

So not only is that report fascinating,

it drives a lot of our content and news.

We're gonna be excited to talk to Alan

and the team at Hague, so.

All right, Yuli, let's go to our next guest.

Next up, Dustin Shuler, marketing director

at Blood Clary Auto Group

to unveil secrets of AI in automotive.

You have a strong prediction about AI.

Yeah.

Well, why don't you drop that knowledge

before Dustin comes on?

Let's hear what your prediction is about AI and automotive.

My prediction, and maybe Dustin

can add some color to this.

Maybe we're already there, but my prediction was

that just like people now,

Google is serving up an AI answer

before serving you the links,

when are we gonna get to the point

where you are optimizing for AI, right?

Where the AI engines are going to be crawling the web

and looking for maybe candid conversations

in public forums.

So when you go online and say,

hey, where's the best place to buy an infinity

in my area?

That AI is going to know based off of candid conversations

with maybe people on Facebook.

Hey, I had such a great experience,

not just curated reviews.

So you want AI to dish up super personalized data?

Well, I'm wondering if we're there.

Yeah, that's in the works.

Or maybe it's already there.

Yeah, I think that's what drives a lot of people.

And it's fascinating.

All right, here he is.

Dustin Shuler, welcome to the show.

Yeah, thank you for having me.

This is pretty awesome.

I have a long time listener, first time caller type deal.

So I love it.

I have a lot of my friends on here.

I love it.

Well, hey, before we get into AI,

and you give us your AI unveil,

which we're super excited to hear about,

how's biz in your world, Dustin?

Business is good.

We're about 13% ahead of last month right now

in terms of total volume.

New news cards, both are read about the same percentage

up a month or a month.

So we're really stoked on that,

especially when you look at kind of the DMAs

and how those are performing.

And most of them are going downward throughout the month.

So anytime we can stay ahead of the DMA, we're all for it.

So what do you, first, we know, but define DMA.

What's DMA for our audience?

Think of it like our primary marketing area.

So kind of the zone that you are responsible for as a dealer.

Yeah, now you've got a lot of different brands.

So I'm just going to cite some of them.

Which ones are you most associated with?

Which ones do you work with, Dustin?

Or do you work with them all?

I work with them all.

For the most part, I mean, some of my favorite ones, though,

I'm going to say I do have some favorites.

And I would say that would be Subaru and Hyundai, of course.

You can't have great partners for us.

But where does it where does infinity land in that, Dustin?

We actually don't have an infinity store or Nissan store.

But I do have a Nissan 370Z drift build.

So I'm very passionate about the brand.

So it's definitely exciting hearing what they're saying, you know,

about the new models coming out.

All right. So to pull the thread you gave us on the...

So you say you've seen an increase.

You're beating the market.

You're beating your market area.

Is there one or two things you can point to in August of 2025

that's helping you to exceed production over everyone else right now?

I would say, you know, more effective merchandising.

We're doing a lot of automation in terms of like, you know,

how we photo background our vehicles and also the descriptions

that go into those vehicles as well, which helps us on the third party sites

and also ranking in Google and then also process changes for sure.

You know, being able to go back to the basics,

focus on what's important and being able to serve our customers a little better.

OK. And you was an example of a background or, you know,

optimization that you're putting in like from the merchandising standpoint

from the merchandise standpoint, having consistent backgrounds

and also the lighting and things like that.

So you could there's a lot of different creative ways you could go about it

where you're actually able to color correct the photos before they get,

you know, sent to the websites and also reduce the shadows and glare

that's on the vehicle.

So you look consistent across the board and, you know,

you don't look like a buy here, pay here lot that, you know,

just got off the ground or something like that.

So having proper merchandising and looking like a professional dealership

that people want to work with, it's in our best interest as a dealer.

So we've been attacking that consistently, especially across.

I mean, I've got 14 stores, so at scale, it's difficult to do, but it pays off.

So in the photo world, just drop props to who is there a technology

that you're using in the photo world or are you just going old school

with cameras and just doing it in a more professional way?

What is there a product out there?

Well, actually, we've been transitioning to VINQ,

which has been able to do it for us automated.

We've had some other vendors and other programs

we've built internally to be able to do it as well.

But this just makes it so much easier for us as a group.

Have you tried doing it on your own?

Just didn't work.

And that's why you went this way.

Or what's the ROI of using a tool or a technology

versus a more manual approach with like a VINQ solutions and whatnot.

So we've we've done it ourselves.

There's some free GitHub sources and things like that that you're able to use.

And then you have to set up automations with Power Automate

or, you know, Zap your N8N, something like that.

But we've noticed that there that creates opportunity for things to break.

And so having something that's kind of set in stone,

you know, you might have to pay for it, it helps out

because you don't want to have, you know, 100 cars that don't have photos

or something like that or something's broken or accessories

that are cut off, you know, spoilers on Subaru's, things like that.

Or, you know, ladders on trucks, things like that.

So let's talk. Let's talk AI and marketing.

We teased it and you're ready to unveil it.

So how are you already using AI

to streamline dealership workflows in your in your business and in your dealerships?

So for a long time, we've been automating vehicle descriptions

and that's helped us stay consistent, have descriptions for our vehicles,

including, you know, dealership contact information, address,

phone number and things like that, which is one of the check boxes

for the algorithms on a lot of different third parties helps you rank.

So people actually see your cars on the page one versus page five,

which nobody's going to go to.

And then you're dead on fire.

Yeah, we've been we've been automating other things that, you know,

may not be customer facing, but examples be corporate email blasts

and things like that, going out to employees and stuff.

And really, it's been cutting down our time to market

in terms of graphic design, you know, to push out, you know,

multiple different graphics, try them out different markets and, you know,

not have to pay a fiver or, you know, bog down your internal graphic designer.

OK, so when you say fiver or internal graphic designer, fiver is a gig site

where you can actually go and hire somebody for gig to do a jingle

or do a one-off advertising campaign, you pay a couple of few hundred bucks

and they take care of you there.

So is there a technology or a tool that you're using to better

to speed up your time to line on the advertising and marketing piece?

Well, with chat GPT-5 coming out, rather recently,

I think that was about last week, we've been seeing really good

results using that product in addition to that.

VO3 from Google has been able to create videos and stuff for us.

They're about eight-second clips, but you could string them together.

So you have full scenes, which, you know, as you guys know, with production,

the cost to be able to do something, it's staggering, especially at scale.

If you have to do, you know, times 14 or something like that.

Yes, even voiceovers could cost you a lot of money.

And so, you know, tools like 11 Labs for, you know,

$11 a month, $10 a month, it just pays off, you know, very quickly,

especially as you're able to do things so much faster.

All right, so this Google V3 thing, and then we'll get back into pure automotive.

This is interesting to me.

So I heard about it first.

I was at a Reynolds gig listening to some best practices.

My friend Yuri from Fox Motor showed this to me.

I'd never seen it before, right?

So it's called Google V3.

Is that what it is?

For anybody out there?

VO3.

So Google it VO3 and it can actually create videos

AI driven videos very quickly, very inexpensively, high resolution,

and it can do it based on a description or an existing photo.

And that's what's driving a lot of the photos that you're seeing all over the place right now.

Correct?

Correct.

Yeah, no, it's definitely exploded.

You're seeing a lot of different people using it for memes and other things like that as well.

It's getting pretty scary.

There's a new company.

It's, well, I guess it's not new, but they've been progressing rather rapidly.

And that would be Higgs Field AI.

And they're able to create existing scenes, be able to add props to them.

So if you wanted to add a car or something like that,

you're able to do that where it's actually driving and looks like the actual vehicle versus just a mockup that AI was doing say a year ago.

And then VO3, it has voiceover capabilities built into it and sound effects as well.

So your time to live is very short.

You don't have to go through and be able to edit all these things in or pay for them and stuff like that.

So as a built-in cost, maybe $100 a month or so, it's not bad.

If anyone wanted to see the results of this and how you're using it,

is there a website they could go to to check it out and just kind of see the net end result?

I mean, I'm sure you could find some stuff on our Facebook market, our Facebook ads library.

There's other publicly available stuff such as our YouTube and social media that you could see that on.

So you've talked a lot about AI tools and using for search, for automotive search, listings for vehicle sales.

With AI tools like co-pilot changing how people search, how should dealers rethink SEO in our current day?

Well, I think most dealers aren't really thinking about SEO and they haven't been thinking about it for a long time.

And so this is going to make it a big priority for a lot of dealers to invest into SEO and also invest into proper SEO.

Because a lot of the cookie cutter SEO stuff that you see, you'll find that there's a lot of duplicate content or content that just doesn't work.

You can easily find out using Google Search Console or your Google Analytics being able to see if the page is at least indexed on Google.

And then also, is it getting impressions? Are people clicking on these blogs and content that you're paying for every month, especially if you're paying for SEO as a subscription?

Another thing to note is that the AI tools are actually looking at your rankings or your ratings, I should say.

So your Google business profile, what is your star rating on there?

Because that will be served up in those search results. How do you look on a Dealerator and these other third-party websites for ratings?

These do come into effect.

So it's co-pilot. Go ahead.

No, I was just going to say, so is there a hack? If it's considering these elements and how it dishes up the results, is there a better placement aside from just getting the best reviews and rates?

So I wouldn't say that there's a hack. I think that having proper SEO content that actually serves your customers what they're searching for.

If you're getting customers to land on a page and they're bouncing instantly, it's likely that the content doesn't serve what they're actually searching for.

And as an AI search tool or even a web browser or search engine, you really want to be able to serve your customers as best as possible the first time they come around.

So if they're noticing that you're bouncing from the site, it shows that, hey, this is not a reliable source for people and people are bouncing.

Their whole job is really, they want you to stay on their platforms and use their platforms consistently.

So you get rewarded if you have content that actually serves the purpose of what those searches are.

And so I think that as dealers, we should be creating thoughtful content in SEO and not just checking a box, but there are some tools that you could use.

There's free extensions for like Google Chrome, for instance, View Rendered Source is actually a Chrome extension you could use where you could see what the AI crawlers are actually seeing.

And so there's a difference between what's on your page and then what they're able to see. A lot of our third party tools, scripts, images potentially.

You'll notice that some of those aren't being picked up by these AI crawlers, which might be the exact thing you want to show up in the AI crawlers.

So that's fascinating. So what's the extension called that you use in Chrome?

It's called View Rendered Source.

Viewed Rendered Source. So that's Googleable, downloadable, attach it to your Chrome browser and you can see what AI is going to look at.

So you've mentioned a customer who leased a Jeep Wagoner after using, let's say, Copilot as an example.

That's the Microsoft AI tool. What did that teach you about where Search is headed?

Yeah, this was a very special case because, I mean, it's not often that you actually hear from a customer like this is exactly what I did to be able to find you.

And so we were actually able to get the full prompt. And so they basically asked, I wanted to lease a Jeep Wagoner SEV, one of the best $0 lease deals maximum within 100 mile range of Seattle and one of the dealerships.

And then also asked for the first initial text. And so as part of that, it taught us how people are searching and kind of confirmed our biases.

And then also taught us what is serving up when customers search that way. So your website will actually give them kind of some details about you.

And so it said for us that we have good EV lease support and also showed that we had a $359 a month lease for 24 months, 10,000 miles a year, all those details, and then a breakdown of the cost that would be associated with it.

So total cost of ownership, what the difference is potentially if you were to buy it versus leasing it, and then additional perks like a rebate on home level two chargers, things like that.

And so that was, it was really interesting. And so I have heard different stats, you know, in terms of like AI adoption being such a big thing and progressing in terms of like what the masses are using.

I know that Google as of April started losing market share like people were searching less on Google, which is alarming.

They're going to chat GPT, right?

They're going to chat GPT, co-pilot, Gemini for Google, and one other like really, you know, staggering statistic for me was in Sequoia Capital's call, they had an ascent keynote.

And I think this was in May and it was about one and a half billion AI app downloads worldwide.

So they're just citing just how much people are using it.

And so even people that could barely use a smartphone or actually downloading these apps and using them and, you know, using it as a personal therapist or asking questions.

We see it on the dealer floor, you know, crafting emails to customers, things like that.

Like, help me rewrite this thing for, you know, as I'm sending out to a service customer.

And so seeing that it's made it a big focus for us making sure that our websites are crawlable by the AI search, you know, search or AI tools.

And one of the things that we've been looking at is does our platform allow the crawlers to actually see the websites.

And so as of last week, I can tell you that one of the major website providers made a platform-wide change for all dealers after one of my tickets being that we had a GPT bot crawler that was blocked.

And then also Common Crawler was blocked from all of their websites.

And so that's been reversed.

So some dealers will probably see a spike in traffic from AI searches.

Yeah, who was it?

Website provider.

I don't know if I should really say.

You said they fixed it.

They did fix it.

I could say that.

So let me ask you, Dusta, what would their incentive be to block the AI?

Do they think it guides more traffic directly to the site by not having it go through AI?

And so just not knowing they blocked it to prevent that from happening?

If I had to guess, it was probably automatic based on just server load.

And so it does cost them money.

Obviously, when bots are crawling their websites and things like that, especially how often they're doing it.

And so it was kind of a training moment for them, you know, because these are it was GPT bot and Common Crawler bot, which are actually sites.

I mean, they're indexing it for learning materials.

And so it wasn't actually the specific one used for serving up content.

But as a dealer, especially now, we want to be in that training material.

You know, we want to be the first ones to show up and things like that.

So it's super important to be there.

I haven't gone through all the different web providers that we don't use.

But, you know, there's a chance that your robots.txt file.

So if you type in your website slash robots.txt, you'd be able to find out if you're able to be crawled by AI searches.

Your website.robots.txt.

Correct.

Interesting.

That's fascinating.

Dustin Shuler, absolutely awesome to hear your perspectives on all things AI and tech forward thinking.

Before we go, one last question.

When you look around at your competition in your space, geographically and elsewhere,

what do you think is the number one biggest miss most dealers have as it relates to AI today?

I would say not investing in SEO, proper SEO, 100%.

Yeah.

You're going to have content for you to be served up.

Yeah.

Because if you're not in the SEO, nobody's going to see it.

So it's the, if the tree falls in the forest, nobody's there to hear it.

What does it matter if it fell or not, right?

And that is, that is the case.

Well, Dustin Shuler, marketing director, Bud Clary Auto Group.

Thanks for coming on the show to share your perspectives.

Appreciate you being here today.

Thanks, Dustin.

Oh my gosh, that's fascinating.

You know, it's always learning all sorts of stuff.

I've seen that Google tool and that Google video and audio generation is just very,

very cool.

I watched a woman pet her pet shark this morning.

Right.

And I think there's the AI one of like Shamu eating like a trainer.

Yeah.

Like there's some truly crazy stuff, but it does a really good job of generating

those images.

And I expect before long as automotive understands the power of it,

they're going to spread that more evenly across the space.

We're going to see a lot more of it.

So last up today, let's bring on our correspondent in the field,

our head of editorial content, Anna Del Valar.

Anna, welcome.

We're excited to have you here today.

So Anna, the clock on EV rebates ending is ticking.

It's just weeks away when the EV rebates fall off.

How's the marketplace responding?

I think I heard something about like a clock on somebody's website.

So tell us a little bit about what you're learning at the research.

Yeah, absolutely.

It's great to be back with you guys and Sam, your spot on, you know,

I think the biggest story happening right now is we,

we all know that EV tax credits at the federal level are going to be

ending soon.

But in the meantime, sales are surging as many predicted.

According to Cox Automotive in July,

sales of new EVs reached just over 130,000 units.

That's up 26% month over month and 20% year over year.

And yeah, same goes for used EVs, about 36,000 were sold.

And that's 23 month, excuse me,

23% month over month increase and 40% up 40% year over year.

So big numbers being thrown up right now.

You know, the key drivers of this growth, you know,

I think a deadline is a pretty good motivator, but, you know,

transaction prices are also falling.

There's record high incentives right now.

And leasing is a huge driver.

In fact, nearly 20% of new leases last month were electric.

And that's a jump of 31% month over month.

According to Stone Eagle.

Yeah, but we all know the clock is ticking.

And so I wanted to catch up with some dealers this week to find

out, you know, what's going on right now, what, what could be,

you know, coming down the pipeline.

And I caught up with David Long over at Hansel auto group in

California.

And you're right, Sam,

they're running a live countdown clock on all of their websites.

I would encourage you guys to check it out.

It definitely gets that feeling of urgency going.

But David's also training his team on EV specific sales.

And he's using chat GPT simulations, daily role play

sessions, which we know, we know well, and online modules.

So his salespeople quote,

no, at the very least as much as the customer,

which as David puts it is not always the case.

Yeah, basically his strategy is all about the handoff.

Evie demand might drop after the credit vantage vanishes,

but he said leases, you know,

still cycle back in two to three years as we know.

And smart dealers right now are tagging those vins in the

DMS and tracking them before they flood the market again.

But looking ahead, you know,

we also caught up with CDK globals, Dave Thomas,

and he's betting that EV market share will hold around eight to

nine percent next year.

But, and this is a big but only if the industry sees 30,000 to

35,000 models like the key EV for the redesigned Nissan leaf.

And that's where the real battle is moving forward for EVs,

you know, those affordable get to work cars.

And that about does it this week for the market polls.

Back to you guys.

Anna, thank you for sharing with us.

We're going to watch that website countdown.

It will be fascinating,

Julie, to see what happens to EV supply and demand.

So it's interesting.

Hansel Otto, they're on the coast there in California.

They're in a high adoption state.

The tale of two cities, two states may hold true in EV post

rebates.

California maybe versus the Midwest, the demand curve may

look very different, but it'll be fascinating to see how

as that countdown clock winds to zero, how does all of

automotive response?

Anna, thanks for being on the show.

You bet, guys.

Thanks.

Thanks, Anna.

Well, Julie, cool show.

That's a wrap on today.

A lot of great content between Tiago and some fascinating

perspectives on infinity.

You got to be a little bit bullish on their future with

people like you and Tiago at the helm there and the

things they're doing to connect with dealers and

drivers as quickly as they possibly can.

And then fascinating to hear about all the tech and AI.

It brings me to a quote from a fellow dealer who said

there are some dealers that are out of business just don't

know it yet.

It's tongue in cheek.

But if you're not learning AI and figuring out how and

where to lean into it and what returns well, you're

challenged right now, Julie.

I agree 100%.

All right, to our entire audience, thank you for watching

The Daily Deal Alive where you break down the biggest

moves in the car business as they happen.

Don't forget, we're here every Monday, Wednesday.

We'll be back again, Julie and I will on Friday.

So this is your world.

Hit like, subscribe, turn on those notifications so

you never, ever miss a beat.

And we'll see you next episode, everybody.

Thanks for joining us.

Thanks, guys.

Thank you.

INFINITI on Shifting Luxury Market, Bud Clary Auto on Vid Gen in Service Lane | Daily Dealer Live

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Hyundai Genesis

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Infiniti QX55

Infiniti Q50

Cadillac Escalade

BMW X5M

Nissan 370Z

Jeep Wagoner

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