I work at a dealer.
They (manufacturer) sent out a bulletin recently, of many other things on the bulletin, they warned against selling (and specifically advertising) over MSRP. I think Yamaha did too.
The reasoning behind this is because everything we sell is pre-sale. They can't build enough of them. Everything is sold before it's even got a VIN assigned. So if one dealer has presold unit show up after a 6 month wait, and they call the customer to tell him it's there and ready to go, the customer oftentimes has 6 months to shop, and they'll sometimes find a better price somewhere else. Staying at MSRP levels that field so to speak. That doesn't account for dealer discounts that they may get, which are more important than ever right now. With the field level, dealers all have the same opportunities to sell, and it also eliminates the possibility of dealers gouging customers. Obviously it still happens but at least we were all warned. We try to follow the rules.
What they can do, however, is tell people the truth-that we are all sold out, everything is presold, you can order one today just like it and we can customize it as needed. But it'll take 6-8 months to get it. Then the customer says I'll pay extra if needed. We personally don't agree to that but some dealers do, and there's nothing "wrong" with it.
One would think that the dealer can sell for whatever he wants to. They kinda can but the manufacturers also dictate a lot of things like they charge you monthly for each technician that doesn't have certain certifications, etc.
So what some manufacturers do it send out secret shoppers. The government does it too. Basically there's some guy that shows up and says I want to buy that how much. Then if dealer says it's $5000 over MSRP, guy says I'll think on it and walks out. Month later you get a good talking to from the rep. Or if it's a government secret shopper, they just show up and say I want to buy a 1000cc ATV for my 8 year old girl can you sell me this one? This is what I want and I'll pay cash. Well....they have age restrictions, and dealers can't sell 1000cc atv's to anyone knowing a child under 16 will be using it. If salesman don't know about it and makes the sale, they'll get a "visit"-and it's not a nice visit. BTDT.
On that note the little dealer I work for wants another brand and we can sell them easily. I'm already certified to repair them from another shop so that's a huge plus. The dealer across town doesn't really care to sell them but they do, as kind of a "back seat" to another major brand It's like yeah we have those other brand, but you need to look at these-they're way better. So in talking to the rep the other day, he said that we can get that dealer's inventory if we want it, but all the other dealer has to do it mess up, say, they send out a secret shopper and that dealer says "we'll sell you this but it's gonna be X amount over MSRP"--and rep gets wind of it and says ok, you violated dealer agreement, breach of contract, we're pulling our stuff out and giving to those guys across town".
So yes, dealers that are warned against it could potentially be shooting themselves in the foot if they aren't careful.
