Do you expect a 4 years list for the F430 ?

A friend of mine, here from Germany, has ordered (and confirmed) his F430 in May 2004. Delivery date confirmed for: February 2006!
I wouldn`t wait such a long time

 

Whose economy?

http://uk.news.yahoo.com/040909/325/f2aej.html

However, I my bet is the waiting list will mirror the 360 at 2+ years

 

Ferrari TRIES to keep the waiting list below 2 years.

 

Is that what they say? Shame they don't follow that policy in the UK

 

Can't comment - we are still funding all the Lada's in East Germany!

 

Yep, that's what they say in Germany.

 

95% are LHD`s...... Maybe thats why

 

They have to restrict supply to keep the 20% premium for RHD!!

(never a truer word spoken in jest!)

 

no, somewhere around 2-2 1/2 years roughly.

 

I hope the Ferrari dealers have learned from the 360. Where they kept taking orders to the point the list got to be 5 years long depending on the dealer.
I have a big question. What happens to the people who are on the list for a 360 which they will not ever see. Do they just get dropped? Do they get the first F430s? How are dealers and Ferrari going to make these people happy? And how are dealers going to build a list from loyal clients you have already bought Ferraris from them already with the ones on the list already for the 360?
I feel this is a bigger problem for Ferrari and the Dealers. What are all your thoughts?

 

Ferrari doesn't try do anything like that at all. They have a fixed amount of cars they can produce and they have to split them amongst their model ranges (612/575/430) and then allocate them to each market. The difference between what they can build and what each market orders determines the waiting list. Their total annual production of regular production cars is approx 4,200. They have made inroads with dealerships into Russia and China, which means a few less cars for the other markets in the world. The only way to shorten the waiting list is to limit demand and at the incredibly small number of cars they produce anually that is not going to happen, as long as the cars are good. In the early 90's when they were producing unadulterated crap, they could hardly move 2,500 cars per year Worldwide!

 

I think the 430 lists will be much shorter after the first year or so than the 360 lists were.

Some reasons:

1. Over $200K out-the-door price for a bare-bones coupe (WAG).

2. Many other interesting cars on the market at a similar price point (eg, Gallardo, Ford GT, Aston, etc).

The 360 waiting list phenomenon might have been one of those "perfect storm" situations...

 

I think when you speculate on "the list", you have to realize that there are two lists. The coupe list will probably be a couple of years. If you are thinking about a coupe, there are some other choices out there. The other list is the spider list. If you are like me, I only want a spider. A ragtop buyer doesn't have as many choices out there. I believe the spider list will continue to be four years ++. I also speculate that some dealers will transfer the 360 buyers to the 430 list EXCEPTall the dealers have buyers that have been buying F cars from them for many years. Those preferred buyers will go to the head of the list and the rest of us will have a further wait. That's business and I have to live with it. I have been on the spider list since May 2002 and I bet I still have another 2-3 year wait. If and when I get tired of waiting, I will pay a premium for a 360 or 430. Until then I am enjoying my 355 spider.One would think that the boys in Italy would figure out a way to produce and sell more spiders and increase their bottom line. The lack of spiders only helps speculators and doesn't do anything to help the Fiat group.
PS- this is usually only in the USA

 

The waiting list should be considerably shorter, if we could all stop ordering or talking about ordering the F430 !!!

 

Well, as one of us mentioned Ferrari has gone into new markets, but has not raised the total production of Ferraris per year. I believe that the list will be high for the new F430 even if they raise the price of the coupe to CS price or even higher if Ferrari chooses to. The big problem is even under these conditions there are still many more buyers than cars being built. And it is not going to matter how much we talk about the F430 the journalist are going to rave about it in all the up and coming test and articles. This is going to increase demand all by it's self. Also the F430 is going to be better than the 360, it will handle better, be faster in acceleration, it will be more usable, which will make people like us want to buy one in exchange for our 360 or instead of buying a 360 in the first place. Ferrari needs to realize that 4200 cars a year is far too low. They could increase production to 5200 and it won't change Ferrari's appeal one bit.
As for Aston, Lambo, and the Ford GT taking some of the demand from Ferrari that is true these cars will, but Ferrari's demand is so high that it makes little difference to the prices and the supply. For all these reasons Ferrari could increase production slightly easy some of the pain of the loyal customers Ferrari has gotten over these years.