https://www.dailybulletin.com/2019/09/06/what-is-that-tower-next-to-the-10-freeway-in-ontario-a-car-vending-machine-of-course/ What is that tower next to the 10 Freeway in Ontario? A car vending machine, of course September 6, 2019 Steve Scauzillo
[images https://www.dailybulletin.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/09/IDB-L-CARVENDING-0906-05-WL.jpg https://www.dailybulletin.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/09/IDB-L-CARVENDING-0906-06-WL.jpg https://www.dailybulletin.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/09/IDB-L-CARVENDING-0906-03-WL-1.jpg Carvana, an 8-story glass car vending machine, as seen in Ontario Friday Sept. 6, 2019, is the companys second facility in California, the other is located in Westminster. Carvana has approximately 50,000 used vehicles available online which can be shipped to any location. (Photo by Will Lester, Inland Valley Daily Bulletin/SCNG) ] Online sales site opens vehicle-delivery tower Vending machines typically dispense coffee, soft drinks, chips, candy — and some at airports can drop a smart phone or a pair of earbuds. Now, an e-commerce car company based in Phoenix has super-sized the concept, taking it to a whole new level. On Friday, Sept. 6, Carvana unveiled a car vending machine in Ontario, the first one in the Inland Empire and the second in California. That’s right, a machine that spits out automobiles. [image] Carvana employees Amy OÕHara demonstrate how a purchased vehicle is lowered to the ground floor in Ontario Friday Sept. 6, 2019. The 8-story glass outlet is the companys second car vending machine in California, the other is located in Westminster. Carvana has approximately 50,000 used vehicles available online which can be shipped to any location. (Photo by Will Lester, Inland Valley Daily Bulletin/SCNG) This gleaming glass tower that stands eight stories tall opened for business Friday, a week after the grand opening of the one in Westminster off the 405 Freeway. The Ontario edifice looms over the busy eastbound 10 Freeway just west of the 15 Freeway. As drivers gazed up at the magic machine loaded with 27 cars, they wouldn’t be able to exit and buy one. The cars are reserved for those who’ve already pressed “buy” on their computer or mobile device. “Well, those cars driving by can see the cars in the tower but all of the vehicles will already be spoken for,” said Amy O’Hara, associate director of communications for Carvana, during a vending machine demonstration on Friday, Sept. 6. Car buyers don’t show up with rolls of quarters. Carvana requires shoppers to pore through the approximately 15,000 used cars for sale pictured on its website (carvana.com), where the customer buys a car sight unseen. The customer meets a Carvana employee at the nearest vending machine at an appointed time. The rest is like a delivery side show that puts an exclamation point on this non-traditional way of buying a car. “The customer advocate will hand you a commemorative coin that is about the size of a hockey puck. You drop the coin in the slot. A lift will go up in the tower and grab your vehicle and bring it down into a delivery bay,” O’Hara explained. The customer can drive the car for up to seven days. If he doesn’t like it, he can return it, she said, although mileage restrictions apply. Buyers get a 100-day warranty. When O’Hara dropped a coin into the machine’s lighted pedestal, the hydraulic lift found a blue Subaru WRX, put the hooks into the elevated cargo bay and pulled it into the center, then lowered it down to the ground floor. The demo was repeated for the red, 2017 Nissan Leaf, an electric vehicle. “It is fun, memorable, unique,” O’Hara said. “The other option is to have your car delivered to your home. You can have the bragging rights to say you bought your car from a vending machine.” Online car-buying is a growing business. Carvana, which started in 2012 and went public in 2017, is one of more than a dozen similar companies. Using the symbol CVNA, stock is traded on the New York Stock Exchange. Carvana joins a host of other online companies such as cars.com, cargurus.com, ebaymotors.com, vroom.com, carsoup.com and others, including CarMax, which has both online and physical sites. Carvana claims its prices are set $1,000 below Kelley Blue Book values. “We don’t have sales reps or a large overhead,” O’Hara said. A car can be purchased in as little as 30 minutes, that includes time online buying the car and picking it up at the vending machine, she said. Prices are fixed. Haggling and negotiating are a thing of the past. But there is some fine print. First, Carvana sells used cars only. The company is picky about what cars get listed on its site. Usually, the cars are no more than 3 or 4 years old. Often, they are cars given back to banks when the lease runs out. Second, the buyer doesn’t get to drive the car until the deal is consummated. When asked if that’s a problem, O’Hara said that’s what the seven-day return policy is for. “You have the time to take it on your commute or install the child car seats to make sure it fits your life,” she said. When not dispensing cars, the tower can become a light display. In Nashville, Carvana lit up the vending machine during Halloween to resemble a giant bag of candy. In Tempe, Arizona, the company honored the Major League Soccer team Phoenix Rising Football Club with an animated display matching the team’s colors — brick red, said David Briggs, vending machine service manager. One day, Carvana may light up the Ontario machine in Dodger blue or Laker purple. But Briggs was keeping those design plans under his hat. Perhaps the car vending machine can honor the Ontario Reign, the minor league hockey team playing in the nearby Toyota Arena, someone suggested. Even without the concert lighting, the tower — a curiosity to freeway gawkers for months — resembled for the first time a car storage or delivery system, albeit eight floors in height. Some say it looks like a life-sized Hot Wheels set. “We’ve had people coming in and looking,” Briggs said. “We even had people circling our parking lot wondering what that thing is.” [© dailybulletin.com] + https://www.djournal.com/news/nation-world/for-the-second-time-ever-zero-labs-has-transformed-one/article_94302db2-afda-53fd-b67b-3f292bcc4f30.html For the Second Time Ever, Zero Labs Has Transformed One of the World's Most Legendary Off-Road Vehicles Into a Fully Premium, Classic Electric Vehicle Sep 4, 2019 Zero Labs Automotive, the first to transform a first-generation (1966-77) Ford Bronco into a premium classic electric vehicle ... https://bloximages.newyork1.vip.townnews.com/djournal.com/content/tncms/assets/v3/editorial/1/7b/17b65106-8ba2-5b32-bfbf-5584859c98cb/5d6ff8691f4d7.image.jpg ... http://electric-vehicle-discussion-list.413529.n4.nabble.com/template/NamlServlet.jtp?macro=search_page&node=413529&query=%22Zero+Labs%22&days=0 search evdl on "Zero Labs" zerolabs.com For EVLN EV-newswire posts use: http://evdl.org/archive/ {brucedp.neocities.org} -- Sent from: http://electric-vehicle-discussion-list.413529.n4.nabble.com/ _______________________________________________ UNSUBSCRIBE: http://www.evdl.org/help/index.html#usub ARCHIVE: http://www.evdl.org/archive/index.html INFO: http://lists.evdl.org/listinfo.cgi/ev-evdl.org Please discuss EV drag racing at NEDRA (http://groups.yahoo.com/group/NEDRA)
