Scott EmpringhamAI Marketing Strategist | Helping CEOs Scale with AI

THE DEALERS HATED THIS IDEA 🔥 #automotiveindustry #generalmotors #automotivemarketing

12 Jun 2026 · 1 min

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1:01

In this monologue, the speaker recounts the launch of GM’s First Blush program – a fixed‑price, high‑transparency pricing model that threatened traditional dealer commissions. At a dealer council meeting, the council initially opposed the idea, fearing loss of commission and pricing control. The speaker, accompanied by two young team members on a flight to Dallas, demonstrated how the model could work. After a decisive call from Mark, the program was rolled out, leading to a dramatic sales surge – from 300,000 cars in one month to 600,000 the next. Dealers quickly embraced the model, and the approach spread beyond automotive to other retail sectors such as furniture and swimming‑pool sales, becoming a massive phenomenon. The narrative highlights the tension between innovation and entrenched dealer interests, the rapid scaling of a fixed‑price strategy, and the broader cross‑industry adoption that followed.

Chapters

Like, if GM did 300,000 cars a month, the next month we did 600,000. The next month! I remember we were flying to Dallas for a dealer meeting, and I said, okay, get your kids that are working on this on the plane with me. And two young kids get on the plane on the GM G5. They're scared to death. They come on, I go, show me how this is going to work. I said, this could work. The dealer council was like, they didn't want anything to do with it, with First Blush, because it's fixed price, fixes their commission, gives a lot of pricing transparency. Go back to— I kind of like pricing transparency. Yeah. So they're fighting, fighting, fighting at the dealer council meeting, and finally they go, hey Mark, we're kind of stalemated on this, you make the call. So we're going— like, if GM did 300,000 cars a month, the next month we did 600,000. The next month. Yeah. And, and the dealers did great. Everybody copied us. And then they were running— like, furniture stores were running it, you know, swimming pools. And yeah, it was crazy. It became a huge phenomenon.