986 Forum - The Community for Porsche Boxster & Cayman Owners - Is auto-temp control good, or a waste of money?

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- - Is auto-temp control good, or a waste of money? (http://986forum.com/forums/boxster-general-discussions/7984-auto-temp-control-good-waste-money.html)

I have it and I like it!

It is only usefull with the top up.

Buying options is and always will expensive with Porsche just the priice of entry.

It is still an option on the 07 987.

Quote:

Originally Posted by z12358

Rome, whatever the case, you can't call it "profiteering" which refers to a situation when someone profits from charging exorbitant prices to buyers which -- due to sircumstances -- do NOT have the freedom to refuse the deal.

I prefer the transparency of the a la carte where all prices are there for you to see vs lumping things in as standard. It's a free market, and the buyer has the ultimate freedom to walk away from a deal that doesn't make sense to him. When I talked to dealers, I even told them what options are valuable to me and which ones aren't so most of them were ready to discount those options much more. Anything works in a free market.

My 06 S has the "prefered package" and I don't have the "auto" (I have the "max" button), so they must have included the auto-climate in the pref package for the 07. I agree, most cars I saw when I was looking came with the pref package, but I didn't mind it as it had features I'd have ordered anyway.

Z.

Hi,

I think that you're getting wrapped up in semantics here. You cite Freedom, but this can be broadly or narrowly defined. You have the Freedom to walk away from the deal - to play or not play. That's a very narrow choice. You're also losing sight of the fact that this was a Standard Feature on US Market Cars from '97-'04 (maybe '05? not certain). I'm not sure your arguement about it having been included in the MSRP of the car is necessarily valid, because the 987 MSRP is higher than the 986, and at least in terms of Climate Control, you get less.

When establishing an MSRP, it's not a process simply the summing up of all the components at Retail pricing. The Market sets the target for MSRP. The Manufacturer plays with the margin of individual components to match this target MSRP, so you're most likely not paying retail for a Standard Feature either.

If you want to talk freedoms, you are only free to choose those options which Porsche makes available. You have no freedom to order the car with an M96/05 (3.6L) engine for instance. So your freedom(s) are fairly limited, take what they offer or walk away, not too much choice here.

Boxster sales have been declining every year since the '01 Model worldwide and in the US. I suspect this fact has more to do with making Climate Control an option, a sort of Get it While You Can mentality, than concern for the freedom or choices of the Buyer...

Happy Motoring!... Jim'99

Rome, just a clarification. I got mine from stock in May. Just couldn't imagine not having it for the summer but probably (and by a very slight decision margin) would have waited and ordered an 07 had I known about the impending 3.4L engine update.
Z.

Quote:

Originally Posted by MNBoxster

I assume by MSRP you mean Base Price (BP). Whether auto-climate came standard or not in 986 or 987 is still irrelevant. If the BP of the 987S + $500 for the auto-climate is too much of a difference from the BP of the 986S (with the auto-climate included) given the design and performance improvements, then by all means refuse to pay it and walk away.

We can get philosophical here... The freedom to walk away is as much freedom you will ever get in a market of free agents. No one is going to offer you more freedom and options (all worth $) than neccessary to win your business. And whoever loses your business because he miscalculated and did not throw in a "free" coffee, cookie, auto-climate, or whatever, then he will be out of business, and he won't have that problem anymore.

My point is, things are the way they are because the market forces found an equilibrium there -- and not because someone is bad, stingy, greedy, or profiteering.

Z.