jappler.com: random and opinionated thoughts by Jennifer Zelazny

If anything – I am a loyal customer. Once I find something I like and trust – I generally stay with it for the long haul. I have been nothing but happy with my Volvos and my Volvo service experience with Patrick Volvo in Schaumburg, IL.

When it came time to upgrade our 2002 Land Rover Discovery – we decided to give the Patrick Land Rover dealer in Naperville, IL. Within moments of getting out of the car – we had a friendly salesman come over and not hassle or hurry us at all. He was extremely interested in buying the Discovery we drove there (they are hot items) and we took a few test drives in some of their LR3s. The LR3s are basically an upgraded version of the since discontinued Discoveries which are much more elegant than the Discoveries but still built for the off road adventures that Land Rover is known for.

Once we found the one we wanted to buy (2008 LR3), the manager took a look at the Discovery and offered a very reasonable offer on the car we drove in, and I actually got him to go up $500 – which I would have been fine if he did not. There was no long drawn out back and forth – and we were able to move through the process. We then moved over to the finance manager which was very nice and we moved through all the paperwork very quickly.

Over all process was completely stress and hassle free – and I appreciated that. If you are from the Chicagoland area and looking for a new car – check out the Patrick dealer group before going anywhere else. The level of professionalism was and has been top notch.

Side Note:
While we were going through the process I realized that the LR3 did not have any floor mats (a mistake I made with 2 previous car purchases). Knowing the driver side floor mat retailed for $267 (there was an ad on the car salesman’s desk we were at) – I knew if I wanted to purchase Land Rover floor mats – I would have been out another few hundred dollars easily. I mentioned it to the salesman and he told me to bring it up to the finance guy. I told the finance guy and he told me to go talk to the salesman who promptly told me it was up to the Business Manager.

I walked into the Business Manager’s office and said “I was told you were going to give us some floor mats since they were missing from the vehicle”. He looked at me and told me I was crazy because that was easily and extra few hundred dollars. I did not give up and told him that he was going to make a few thousand on the car we traded in and that this would be nothing compared to that. I think I caught him off guard because he stood there for a moment and then came back with “if I make $1500 on it after commission, etc I will call you”. I said great – I will expect a call in a few days since our car salesman already had someone picked out for the Disco we brought in. I told him I would be checking inventory daily.

I think he was getting tired of me – and so he asked me (to change the subject) if I had ever taken the Land Rover to one of the Land Rover events (they set up off road courses). I told him no and so he went over and got a book to show me the photos from last year’s event. The first page included a few Land Rovers covered in mud and I said “wow – it really looks like a lot of fun…and it looks like I will certainly need some floor mats for that!”. He laughed and kept going through the book. A few pages later he was showing us a LR3 on a “teeter totter” and the winner of this balancing event won prizes. I said – “wow – that is really cool. I hope the prizes included floor mats”.

After that – I finally broke him down and guess what? I got the floor mats Phew.