No More Factory Deliveries!

I just spoke to Missy at SRT to see if they could give me any info on my snake, no luck. I also asked if I could arrange to pick it up at Conner and she said no more deliveries from the factory. Even letting her know I'm a VCA member, no help. No reason.

*** ????????????????

Capt Van said:

I just spoke to Missy at SRT to see if they could give me any info on my snake, no luck. I also asked if I could arrange to pick it up at Conner and she said no more deliveries from the factory. Even letting her know I'm a VCA member, no help. No reason.

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WHo did you purchase the car through? Contact them and see if they can be any assistance. I bet thats just a blanket answer from the factory and the dealer has to arrange the factory pickup.

This is very dissapointing.

I went through this with my car it was always to be a plant Pick up by Prefix and at the last minute they said there lawyers said no more and they shipped my car.

that really *****.

This is disappointing. What's the real cost to SRT to have a factory delivery? If countless other manufacturers are able to do factory deliveries it should be an option for the Viper. Charge for it, who cares! They're already charging people who order a GTS who want the SRT hood, what's a little more for the memories of picking up your car where it's heart and soul were assembled?

I DO NOT understand this decision at all. If its a cost issue charge for it. If its a legal issue paint a yellow box on the floor that people have to stand in while in the factory to make the lawyers happy. Geesh, figure this out!

Buying a Viper is a few small corrections away from being a buying experience that could be just as satisfying as some exotics. I've met with Bernie at Tomball. Top notch, period. He's got the dealership and service aspect figured out. Why won't SRT just pay a guy like that, or the Woodhouse guys as consultants to say "look, your a few small steps away from knocking this out of the park." I guarantee that you'd be hard pressed to find a bigger Viper fan than me, but I can't help, but feel that for everything good SRT does, they get in their own way just the same. This is just another example.

I'd bet it is nothing more than a logistics issue.

To date, I think there have only been 3 of us that picked our cars up at the plant. It does disappoint me that they do not make it easy to do so. They even have a nice lady that handles the paperwork for this sort of thing. The plant is already set up to do tours, it already has the striped safety zones and such. It already has the large conference/welcome room where they show you a few safety and Viper videos before entering. I don't see why they can't just schedule a normal tour once per week, and have any owners pick their cars up during that tour.

Of course, this could be a temporary thing also. They are developing/building cars right now that aren't to be seen by public. (vert and ACR, examples). Maybe once all the body styles are unveiled, they won't have to fear the security leaks. I did see some stuff under development that I wasn't allowed to photograph, and won't disclose details about them. That could be their main concern.

Tony

We were told at a recent plant tour that they are not logistically setup to accommodate factory pickups this year but plan to reinstate this option for the 2014 model year.

They only allowed a few this year for special photo/press ops.

Yeah I was bummed tried to fly in an pickup July 5th and was going to drive the car back to Phoenix. I understand the policies but I would of been fine with someone handing me keys maybe a high five or quick handshake and I would of been on my way.

Folks, let's try to take a step back and think about this with a little common sense. First , stop and think how many automotive Plants you can do this at, or pick up your vehicle and it becomes apparent this is a very rare occasion. Also please remember that in the past there were often only one day on each month that a factory pick up could be done , and then it went for long periods when one could not get it accomplished for any reason. Currently the process is in flux as the Plant is looking into legal requirements and is hoping to implement a program where a factory pickup is something one can pay for in the order process and it can be done like a few other manufacturers as a special delivery.

With safety concerns, commercial intelligence issues, Plant downtime or personnel concerns, along with changing State rules ( there have been three changes in State requirements to do a factory pickup over the years I have been doing them) it has not been as easy to accomplish as we would all like. SRT wants to work out something that is more efficient and can accomodate the customers of the Viper, but the roadblocks are not all of their making , nor are they as easy to open as we would like to believe.

There have been some very, very severe Commercial Intelligence issues over the years, and we went through a period where the Plant was flat Area 51, so let's try to be patient and understand the Plant has just reopened and they have to get a program in place that meets numerous criteria, and absolutely must meet the legal concerns of a major corporation. SRT wants this as bad as you do, but they have to get it done right or it could be stopped completely as it once was.

Bill, I for one, certainly appreciate all your input and knowledge about all things Viper but I have to take exception to some of this. This will be my 4th Viper but my first new one and frankly getting a little tired of the "being left out in the cold" feeling I keep getting from SRT. They have been building them long enough to get some of the issues worked out and the one that bothers me most is the lack of communication from Conner. I had a 13 on order and canceled, this will be a 14. I can't even get and update on VOTS, it said to call SRT and I did. Missy says she will get back to me about the factory pick up and any update on production "in about 4-5 days".

As for all the bla bla bla about no tours, no plant pick up, I have picked up my last 5 Corvettes at the Museum and had a great experience for each one. Hell I even flew to Wixom, MI and built my own ZR1 motor, then went to Bowling Green for the build and again went back to get it at the Museum.

I hate to say it but the lame excuses are getting pretty long in the tooth.

PS I drove a Mclaren mp4-12 in Vegas yesterday and all I can say is WOW!!!

Capt. Van,

Every State is different and there are some tricky legal issues to get this accomplished and having gone through the hoops over the years , I realize how difficult this can be. They want to set up a program like the Vette , but that too, did not just happen overnight when GM set it up.

As for calling SRT , that is just a call center like all the others with corporate , and if you want to know what is going on with your car just call your Dealer -- it takes a few minutes and he can check it ( I do it daily as it is so easy). VOTS was shut down because it was so inaccurate for Vipers. The program is designed for the mass produced cars and the letter designations for the cars/trucks does not follow the same pattern for Vipers. It has always been an arcane Art to understand the build process for a Viper , and it has constantly changed over the last 15 years I have been selling Snakes.

The Plant has never talked to customers and rarely to Dealers, it is a Plant, and Representatives are our access to more information on the Dealer basis, your Dealer should be working to get you information. The 13s are not done, so there is not much to tell you about a 2014. The Call Center will just view computer scheduling and try to ascertain an answer, but you need to realize you can not contact Ram, or Chrysler, or GM , or Ford Plants ,and find out when your car is being built exactly. Folks ( at Corporate ) view the screens and work to get you build dates when they begin.

You are spending alot of money, so put the onus back on the one who should be responsible, your Dealer. He can give you daily reports , weekly reports, whatever you ask for, but at present there is not much to ascertain other than whether your car has been established as an early build ( set in D or D1 listing). That still does not have a definite start date, but a tentative build that only the Plant has at present , since they are not exact on a starting date for handbuilt cars. Hope this helps and the wait is worth it.

All the vehicles the car manufacturers have out there in this game are very powerful and despite some design differences, are starting to all kind of be the same in certain areas. Can probably thank regulations for that but to hook in the buyers and fans of the Viper and other SRT products, SRT HAS to find a way to make it a very unique, memorable and confidently enjoyable experience. In a sea of familiarity, being different in a good way is a major differentiator and value add. Most of the people interested in these cars and expecially the retired crowd want to have a story with their purchase. Everyone wants and special and unqiue car to them.

The kind of buyer SRT looks at is not the buyer that picks up a car sight unseen on a build it now website application. They want a very personal and intimate connection with the car, they want pictures of the build, they want history and a personal car story for pride as if it was another member of their human family. SRT needs to cater to this and embrace it. It does not take much and as one person on here stated, the right consultant or experienced passion and Viper educated individual leading this and a program to cater to this can make all the difference in the world.

As Capt Van stated on the ZR1 motor build, that is a wonderful way to cater to this and I am willing to bet it was an big factor in some of those ZR1 purchases. My Dad, who is not a huge modern Corvette fan was blown away with the idea when Corvette announced that motor build plan, was seriously considering a new ZR1 because it personalized the car and experience in a way that was priceless. Go down to the coffee house in his retirement community and in a sea of collector cars, etc. how many of those guys can say they built their own motor in the factory? Not many at all. The $5,000 or whatever price to do so is actually priceless.

Hopefully SRT can get their hands around this for a unqiue experience. Every Viper that leaves the factory should come with unique still pictures, a small video of certain locations that are of interest and a portolio which shows the actual people who worked on that car. Option to factory pick-up, take a tour, maybe meet some of the people who built your car and shake their hand or get a picture with them. These details are priceless in the process and if no one else is doing them, then all the more reason to do them. Don't do what everyone else is doing.

To trivialize it, though you would want much better equipment, most of this can be accomplished with Go-Pro Cameras mount to a pole if need be. They all feed to a server and everything is tied together via databases anyway. We are not talking about millions of dollars of investment but if it helps you to sell 10 more Vipers which is over $1M in revenue, it is not even a question of should you do it, you just do it.

Hopefully SRT is thinking outside of the box for these things. A simple factory pick up in the future is great, but an SRT Experience with an intimate and personal flavor is light years ahead and WILL sell more cars.

To be fair, it was hard to expect them to be doing this when they have had trouble getting cars out the door. First year growing pains - I'd wager you'll see it return eventually.

I think an "engine building" program would cool, but we all know people would complain in that $5,000 price tag was "too much"

Hopefully they can accommodate in the future. It would have been fun to do plant delivery, but such is life. At least it was t something promised And take away.

As it has been reported prior and I mentioned , SRT is in the process of setting up a factory delivery process one pays for and is part of the ordering process - yes , it will likely be done similar to Corvette. It is simply not an instantaneous program , but they want to do it as much as we as owners would like it -- SRT listens and they want to get it accomplished too, but it is the Legal Dept. working towards implemation, at present.

who the hell wants to pay a 2k shipping fee and not have the thing shipped? oh, right three people. Front door delivery please

Coloviper said:

All the vehicles the car manufacturers have out there in this game are very powerful and despite some design differences, are starting to all kind of be the same in certain areas. Can probably thank regulations for that but to hook in the buyers and fans of the Viper and other SRT products, SRT HAS to find a way to make it a very unique, memorable and confidently enjoyable experience. In a sea of familiarity, being different in a good way is a major differentiator and value add. Most of the people interested in these cars and expecially the retired crowd want to have a story with their purchase. Everyone wants and special and unqiue car to them.

The kind of buyer SRT looks at is not the buyer that picks up a car sight unseen on a build it now website application. They want a very personal and intimate connection with the car, they want pictures of the build, they want history and a personal car story for pride as if it was another member of their human family. SRT needs to cater to this and embrace it. It does not take much and as one person on here stated, the right consultant or experienced passion and Viper educated individual leading this and a program to cater to this can make all the difference in the world.

As Capt Van stated on the ZR1 motor build, that is a wonderful way to cater to this and I am willing to bet it was an big factor in some of those ZR1 purchases. My Dad, who is not a huge modern Corvette fan was blown away with the idea when Corvette announced that motor build plan, was seriously considering a new ZR1 because it personalized the car and experience in a way that was priceless. Go down to the coffee house in his retirement community and in a sea of collector cars, etc. how many of those guys can say they built their own motor in the factory? Not many at all. The $5,000 or whatever price to do so is actually priceless.

Hopefully SRT can get their hands around this for a unqiue experience. Every Viper that leaves the factory should come with unique still pictures, a small video of certain locations that are of interest and a portolio which shows the actual people who worked on that car. Option to factory pick-up, take a tour, maybe meet some of the people who built your car and shake their hand or get a picture with them. These details are priceless in the process and if no one else is doing them, then all the more reason to do them. Don't do what everyone else is doing.

To trivialize it, though you would want much better equipment, most of this can be accomplished with Go-Pro Cameras mount to a pole if need be. They all feed to a server and everything is tied together via databases anyway. We are not talking about millions of dollars of investment but if it helps you to sell 10 more Vipers which is over $1M in revenue, it is not even a question of should you do it, you just do it.

Hopefully SRT is thinking outside of the box for these things. A simple factory pick up in the future is great, but an SRT Experience with an intimate and personal flavor is light years ahead and WILL sell more cars.

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^the bolded is exactly what SRT wants from their buyer. Sight unseen and no test drive, just give them the money and deal with the delays it seems. I think the corvette idea is brilliant for that motor build plan. Though to me I don't think I'd pay 5k for that experience. But I know a lot of other people have way way more emotional attachment to these cars than I so it is good for them. Also as your idea with the pictures and video and such that was done for some of the people during the building of the Ford GT. So if Ford and GM can do it, I don't know why it is taking viper 20 years to do something similar.

I am familiar with regulation as I do work with those as well, and it is a slow process but most of that is at the federal level not the state level. If this is something chrysler just started with then people just relax and wait till next year to start complaining. If they have been doing this for a while now then there is some incompetence going on.

Think these are all pretty great ideas.

As Bill says, over the years, this factory pickup has been an on and off thing. SRT is really interested in enhancing the Viper Delivery Experience, but with such a large corporation their hands are often tied.

I remember when they had regular plant tours, and when they were totally locked down. I remember when they had a camera attached to a special edition, with employees taking pictures as it went down the line. This camera was then given to the new owner on delivery. Really personalized the uniqueness of the special edition.

This stuff has been on and off ever since the Vipers began rolling down the line at Conner.

Now I understand that everyone wants the best possible experience, but also know that sometimes we can be kind of a pain in the butt to them. Constant calls, wanting to know every detail. Want to know who built the engine, what the date stamp is on the tires, what the specific dyno results were, how the engine was broken in, and want to optimize every possible item. We want to know what products were used on the paint, if it needed to be touched up, and that the assembly was absolutely perfect in every way. This level of intimate embedment into the assembly process would be really distracting to the people that need to get them out the door to keep the company in business.

One of the problems with this involvement by the customer is that in a typical plant environment things happen that are outside their control. A part is back ordered, something goes wrong, a panel needs to be replaced, final inspection discovers something that needs to be corrected. If any of these things happen to a car that is date certain scheduled for a factory pickup, they would have to notify the customer that the car will not be ready for them at the specified time. This could cause some anguish for the customer that has already bought plane tickets, scheduled a hotel, and told all their friends to expect the car to be home on a specific date. Maybe we are asking more than we think.

I would suspect that SRT is currently looking at ways they can involve the ViperNation more closely. Factory pickup is certaintly an issue that they are discussing.

I, also would love to experience a factory pick up.

SRT should be BEGGING people to come to Detroit and spend money, not the other way around IMO. God knows the city needs the money!

blah blah blah, the fact is SRT ***** at the moment.

Understood Paul, but it would be crazy for them to schedule delivery on an unfinished car. Complete the car and then call the buyer to scheudle a time for factory pick up. The cars sit around and wait for regional transport to fill up anyway. As far as the normal issues of a build with parts delays, etc. the cars must pass all station QA/QC checks before it moves on so just provide the pictures, etc. after the station is completed and checked off. No concerns! Overall the SRT Experience can be complex or simply. In the middle is a happy medium that provides the new buyer something of a personal experience without inviting them to put the overalls on and completely build it along side the workers from start to finish. 1% of the buyers are probably loking for that but not the vast majority. The majority are just looking for something special to go along with a story of their new toy. If they have a great experience they will want to repeat it if they want a new car.

It is kind of like why you want to hire the best front desk girl in your business and pay a bit more to get the right one even though a less expensive individual can just as easily answer the phone. The right one has company and client knowledge, experience getting things done, is trustworthy and everything in it's right place. The negative impression people can get of an entire business because of a casual temp up front who is not with it, is very, very prevalent. Personal service is extremely important and businesses seem to still be struggling to learn this lesson over and over the past 50 years. Great personalized service is remembered and that almost always leads to very high repeat business in ANY industry or market.

Fact? We the VCA had an influence in previous Viper pick up at Conner. True or false?

I just feel the SRT is seperating itself from we the VCA..... True or false? (If True... I can't figure out why. Too much history with Dodge? Dunno)

SRT brand president Ralph Gilles talks about the SRT series and its club mentality.

http://on.aol.com/video/ralph-gilles-on-the-srt-club-mentality-517143248

I think it's time to change the VCA brand to the SRTCA so we can get some love...

been lucky enought to do factory delivery three times!! i did it for my '01, '02, '03, a great experience, i only live 25-30 min from CAAP. I actually went down there a few times while each of my cars was being built and took pics of my car going down the line the days prior to it being done. Like mentioned above its a great chance to do something that can only be done in very few places around the world for only a handful of cars

Voice of Reason said:

SRT should be BEGGING people to come to Detroit and spend money, not the other way around IMO. God knows the city needs the money!

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Good point. For those who haven't been to the Conner plant, I'd venture to say that the majority of you wouldn't feel comfortable driving a Viper out of there. The plant itself is nice, but it is surrounded by miles of "questionable" areas full of graffiti, barbed wire, and mega-potholes. When I was riding up to the plant, I was thinking we made a wrong turn somewhere. For those who have been, you know what I'm talking about

Nine Ball said:

Good point. For those who haven't been to the Conner plant, I'd venture to say that the majority of you wouldn't feel comfortable driving a Viper out of there. The plant itself is nice, but it is surrounded by miles of "questionable" areas full of graffiti, barbed wire, and mega-potholes. When I was riding up to the plant, I was thinking we made a wrong turn somewhere. For those who have been, you know what I'm talking about

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See, thats the beauty, you get to test out the top end speed by **** as fast as you can!

Like Mad Max!

Heh. I was well armed, and MI has conceal-carry reciprocity with TX. Wasn't worried.

UPDATE

Here is the email I got from Missy

Good morning Capt Van,

I have researched the question you posed to me about the Viper Plant Pick up. Chrysler does not allow for customers to take delivery of there Vehicle at the plant. This was something that was done in the past, but is no longer an option as of this time.
I have also been tracking the progress of your Viper, and at this time there is no new updates available. once there is an update I will give you a call with the updated information. If you have any further questions or concerns please contact me here in the SRT department @ 855-778-8326 EXT: 4720387, or you may respond to this email.

Sincerely,
Missy SRT