The business models of many of today's "disruptive" industries is based on changing the way everyday goods and services are sold. Want to watch a TV show? Turn off the cable box and log into Netflix. Need a deal on a pair of sunglasses? See what Amazon has to offer. Want a a driver to pick you up at your exact location? You get the point. Thing is, the auto industry hasn't changed much because unless you're buying a Tesla, you still need to go to a dealership and haggle before sitting in the driver's seat of a new car.
According to Reuters, there's a dealership in Singapore called Autobahn Motors that's attempting to change that, not with in-company stores like Tesla, but by selling vehicles out of vending machines. The concept isn't new at all, a company named Carvana previously opened an online store where buyers can purchase a vehicle using the Internet and pick up the car at a large vending machine-like building. What's different about this concept is that it will exclusively sell supercars and luxury vehicles like Bentleys, Ferraris, and Lamborghinis to the wealthy who presumably are tired of dealing with high-end dealerships. The building itself is 15 stories tall and has slots for up to 60 cars.
It's billed as the "world's largest luxury car vending machine," but its very existence comes out of the need to save space in crowded Singapore rather than out of demand for a new method to purchase an Audi R8 or McLaren 650S. "We needed to meet our requirement of storing a lot of cars. At the same time, we wanted to be creative and innovative," said Gary Hong, general manager at Autobahn Motors. That's not to say that the party trick helps Autobahn Motors stand out from the competition. To buy a car, the customer interacts with a touchscreen display on the ground floor, shuffling through everything from the latest and greatest exotics to classics like a 1977 Ferrari Dino GT4.
Once a selection is made, a mechanical system takes around one to two minutes to retrieve the car and deliver it to the customer on the ground floor. The building's inventory management system is apparently so intuitive that the company has been approached by developers looking to use it for their own parking structures. If the future of the dealership isn't a vending machine, at least we know the future of the parking garage might be.
Check out how the system works here and if you have the means, get to Singapore to experience the most interesting buying experience yet.