This past week I’ve been in the USA attending the NADA annual conference. We’ve also taken the opportunity to visit several dealerships along the way. To compare I’ve got to say that the major difference is most obviously size & scale. Two of the dealerships we visited sold in excess of 6,000 cars per year with Longo Toyota (LA) selling over 28,000 in 2006! Cars, and especially trucks, are literally huge over here, fuel is cheap at around 85 cents per litre, when we mentioned the price of petrol back home in Oz most Americans were gobsmacked.

In Los Angeles there were whole lanes dedicated to car pooling and hybrid vehicles, (there were heaps of these on the roads)... they also enjoyed eight lane freeways which despite their size were still gridlocked just like the M5. What have we learnt so far? Mainly we miss home, we know that Aussie dealerships can measure up to the best over here, and most of all we are lucky to be Australians....