If I were any Stellantis dealer I think I’d look warily at used car chain Carvana, which has been allowed to purchase CDJR franchises. It’s all sort of weird, and recent reports show just how strange the whole relationship is, including an Arizona dealership sending a bunch of cars to a small market in Pennsylvania.
The Canadian trade war continues at a quick pace, and it’s such an incredibly shoot-your-dick-off moment that I sort of don’t believe it’s going to really happen. But what do I know? Me only toil part time at jah Morning Dump. The UAW, automakers, pretty much everyone seems against it, though.
If there’s one winner here, it’s not America, or Canada, but China, and BYD is showing the way with a lift in profits thanks to exports.
That’s heavy, I’m going to end with shooting brakes, because I love shooting brakes and it’s a Friday.
The Carvana-Stellantis Thing Is Odd
I know there’s not always a lot of sympathy for dealers on the web, but I do feel for your average CJDR dealer. After years of being starved of products, marketing, and support from a bizarrely, seemingly antagonistic CEO it’s gotta suck to hear things are going to turnaround and then have to watch the company buddy up with one of your biggest rivals.
Peter went out to see how Carvana plans to sell CDJR vehicles in June, and the answer was a lot of cubes and a lot fewer sales people. In theory, Carvana has to follow the same franchise rules as other dealers when it comes to only having a certain number of stores in a certain MSA. However, nothing stops the company from selling a car to another MSA. Normally, this is rare, because if you live in Minnesota why would you drive to a Hyundai dealer in Arizona to get a car you could easily get at 50 dealers in between the two states?
Carvana, though, doesn’t work that way. Carvana is a national retailer and it regularly ships cars to the customer (national chains like Hendricks or Penske will do the same, though typically for one-off cars purchased from someone far away).
This came up in a report from trade publication SavvyDealer, which found that the Casa Grande, Arizona store owned by Carvana sold 29 cars within a 50-mile radius of the local CDJR store some 2,000 miles away (or, five more than what the local dealer sold that same month):
We pulled the RDR-based sales reporting for one small-market Pennsylvania CDJR store, the same data the factory uses, covering every new vehicle reported sold to a buyer within 50 miles. Here is what July 2026 looked like: 693 new CDJR vehicles sold into that radius, split across 99 selling dealers. The number one seller was the region’s biggest local auto mall with 40. Number two was Carvana Chrysler Dodge Jeep Ram of Casa Grande, Arizona, with 29. The store that actually holds the franchise for this market sold 24.
Read that again. In this market’s own factory sales data, a single Carvana rooftop in the Arizona desert outsold the hometown franchise dealer, and only one of the 98 other selling dealers beat it. The 29 units were not one fluke model either: Ram 1500s, Wranglers, Gladiators, Compasses, Cherokees, Durangos, a Ram 2500.
The trend line is the scarier part. That same Carvana store put 11 new units into this market in February, 2 in June, then 29 in July. Over the trailing twelve months it totals 42, which means most of it happened in the last 60 days. This is what a national e-commerce machine scaling a new business line looks like from inside one small market.
This is extremely unusual. Car dealers have a primary market area (PMA), and while they’re allowed to sell outside of it, that’s where most of the sales come from. Carvana doesn’t operate by those same rules and, because they have access to inventory through multiple stores, they can offer way more options, as Savvy Dealer points out:
Small markets may actually have it worst. A small store stocks a handful of heavy-duty trucks at a time, in the configurations the dealer principal thinks will move. Carvana lists all of them, everywhere, and delivers. Call it targeting or call it scale, the result at the store level is identical: your PMA obligates you and protects nothing.
That’s a huge benefit that Carvana has, though in theory Carvana is also responsible for the same local service. In theory. According to an Automotive News report, Carvana might be a little less interested in that:
One dealer told Automotive News that a sales manager who called one of Carvana’s seven Stellantis stores posing as a customer with a “check engine” warning light got surprising advice: Just take it to an independent mechanic.
“That is just not what our network needs,” said the dealer, who asked not to be identified. “You do that, you’ll sell someone one car, and you’ll never sell them a car again.”
This service issue seems to be a real thing, and Car Dealership Guy called the seven Carvana-owned dealerships to see if they could get service work and it didn’t go well, with more than half of them having either no working number, a long wait, or not answering at all. Ohio was maybe the worst:
In Ohio, none of the listed phone numbers were working when called, and multiple visits to its website on multiple days showed no available service appointments well into 2027, even for a quick fix such as a tire rotation.
Carvana is still getting this project going, so it’s possible all of this gets resolved. In the Automotive News article, a Carvana spokesperson says the company “has improved and expanded the service operations of the stores it bought.”
That same article goes onto note some other strangeness about Stellantis Chairman John Elkann:
Elkann is CEO of investment firm Exor, which owns Lingotto Investment Management, which he also chairs. As of late June, Lingotto owned more than 9 million shares in Carvana valued at $611 million.
“Lingotto/Exor holds a less than 2 percent minority stake in Carvana and has no involvement or visibility into the company’s management,” a Stellantis spokesperson said.
Is it odd for the chair of a car company to also own a small number of franchised dealers? That is a little strange.
The UAW Also Would Like This Trade War With Canada To End
In theory, if the Trump Administration really wants to deprive Canada of an automotive industry, then the United Auto Workers could benefit from more jobs. However, for that to work, the White House might have to back off some trade deals it’s already made/is making with other countries.
That seems to be the take from UAW President Shawn Fain, who asked for a deescalation of the growing trade war between the two countries:
The UAW rejects any escalation on Canada, a country with strong unions and labor standards. If we’re going to increase tariffs anywhere, it should be on countries where automakers continue to offshore jobs because they can pay workers $3 an hour, force them to work in unsafe conditions, and crack down on independent unions.
Here at the UAW, we are fighting to end the free trade disaster. Free trade pits workers against each other across borders and is fueled by corporate greed. That’s why we will always support strategic tariffs, including the 232 tariffs on auto and heavy truck. Tariffs work, but only if they are deployed intentionally to protect workers and grow our manufacturing communities.
It’s time to permanently end offshoring and the race to the bottom. We need well-designed tariffs, and a comprehensive rewrite of the USMCA and other bad trade deals.
While both sides are lobbing new tariffs across the border (and renaming lakes for some reason), automakers are weirdly silent. According to Politico, there’s a lot of back-channel work and hope that this will all end:
If the North American neighbors don’t resolve their differences by Jan. 1, President Donald Trump has pledged to hit the truck, its Canadian parts, and others like it with a 50 percent tariff when crossing the border, a result that would be “cataclysmic,” for the industry, according to one industry official who said companies would be forced to raise prices.
But as they wait for tempers to cool in Ottawa and Washington, carmakers are taking a soft touch approach to lobbying the Trump administration to abandon its trade war.
“We’re kind of regrouping,” said another auto industry official. “We just need to let both sides go back to their corners for a bit, and then figure out how to come back together.”
I suspect the outcome of the midterms will impact the timing of trade talks, for good or ill.
BYD Profits Rise On Exports
China stands to gain the most from the United States dropping the ball on global trade, specifically after walking away from the Trans Pacific Partnership. The biggest winner might be BYD.
BYD Co.’s profit rose for the first time in five quarters as surging exports and demand for some of its pricier models helped the world’s largest electric-vehicle maker overcome a downturn in China.
Second-quarter net income climbed 30% from a year earlier to 8.2 billion yuan ($1.2 billion), according to figures derived from first-half earnings reported on Friday. That compares with the 8 billion yuan average of estimates compiled by Bloomberg. Revenue slipped about 3% to 194.6 billion yuan.
There are still a lot of risks for BYD, and the home market is weak, but the US continues to shed influence globally, opening the door to Chinese automakers.
Ohhhhh Shooting Brakes
I’m a sucker for a car that’s not a wagon turned into a wagon or a shooting brake, and Broad Arrow will be auctioning off two of them this summer.
First, at the Zoute Concours Auction in Belgium is this 2026 Daytona Shooting Brake Hommage by Niels van Roij Design:
Strictly a one-off, it is based on a 2009 Ferrari 599 GTB Fiorano and while the impressive V12 beneath the long bonnet is largely untouched, almost every element of the car has been altered to create something truly unique. This includes the 3D printed carbon fibre within the elegantly sculpted nose, the beautifully hand-formed bodywork that extends to the curvaceous rear with its deep window, and the diffuser that surrounds the bespoke double-barrel shotgun exhaust tips. The electrically operated butterfly doors that curve around the handcrafted shooting brake luggage compartment feature strong and flexible Plexiglas and intricate, hand-milled hinges, each a work of art in themselves.
And then at the Zurich auction is this 1987 Aston Martin Lagonda Series 3 Shooting Brake by Roos Engineering Ltd:
The Aston Martin Lagonda was revolutionary for its imposing wedge-shape design, luxurious interior and futuristic technology. This Series 3 is one of only 76 produced by the British marque and the only one to have officially been approved by the factory for conversion as a shooting brake. Acquired in 1996, it was entrusted to Roos Engineering Ltd in Switzerland, who undertook the dramatic transformation, including using factory-supplied parts.
Completed in 2000, the conversion involved a significant overhaul of the mechanical components, but it is the shooting brake style that truly captures the imagination. The windows and luggage compartment bodywork were all custom-made, as were the carpets and other trim elements. The interior was redesigned in Connolly leather and Alcantara and the rear bumper features revised parking and signal lights to ensure they can be seen when the tailgate is open.
One of the rarest iterations of the Aston Martin Lagonda, this Shooting Brake conversion captures the attention with its unique styling and precise Swiss craftsmanship.
Is that really a shooting brake? Also, does someone want to loan me 350,000 Swiss francs?
What I’m Listening To While Writing TMD
Man, they really do come in threes. I’m going to finish off this week with one of my favorite songs from Norway’s King Harald V. Just kidding (though RIP King Harald), here’s Remi Wolf with her new song “Bottle.”
The Big Question
What’s the greatest distance from your home to a new or used car you purchased?
Top photo: Carvana, DepositPhotos.com
Carvana (along with CarMax) already has an extensive logistics network for moving cars around the country, and leveraging that into new-car transportation is a no-brainer.
Besides, most car dealers will tell you that service is far more profitable than sales. So Joe Schmucko’s Chrysler-Jeep in East Nowhere, PA. gets to make money on servicing the cars from AZ without having to bother to sell them.
I would buy a new car from anywhere in the country, but I’ve been burned a couple times on traveling for used cars, so I’d be more leery of that.
TBQ:
My last 3 car purchases were all far away (for me)
Volvo – 150 miles in a different state
BMW – 133 miles
Mitsu – 83 miles in a different state
Prior to that? I think the furthest would be 20 miles, tops. Online tools have changed things.
Furthest I driven to get one was from Chicagoland and drove down to St Louis to get my FJ cruiser. But for older vehicles to be shipped I got a K5 Jimmy shipped from Washington State to Chicagoland and also when had the 73 Javelin that was shipped from Florida so not as far as the K5.
We pulled the RDR-based sales reporting for one small-market Pennsylvania CDJR store, the same data the factory uses, covering every new vehicle reported sold to a buyer within 50 miles. Here is what July 2026 looked like: 693 new CDJR vehicles sold into that radius, split across 99 selling dealers.
Please tell me this is a typo. How the hell would 99 different dealers be working an area of that size? You want to know why your dealers aren’t making any money, there’s your answer right there.
The furthest away I’ve bought a car was Staunton, IL, about 900 miles away, turned out to be a real piece of garbage, so probably never again. Although, that dealer went out of business not long after
Back in 2003 my parents went to a dealership located about an hour from their house to purchase a Wrangler that was sourced from another dealership in Indiana.
20 something years ago, about 900 miles for an 86 Vanagon in SC, sight unseen. Flew down and drove it home, with a few mishaps… Still have it, tho
Well, my primary residence was still in San Francisco at the time I purchased my Mercedes-Benz in Beverly Hills while subletting an apartment in Hollywood for a few months….
…so 380 miles.
Does that count?