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I have been shopping for a new car for my sweet bride. This is not one of my favourite activities. Auto dealerships are not a place where I would likely be found, were it not for the necessity of purchasing an automobile.
Something has happened to the self-applied nomenclature for auto dealerships. They were dealerships for many decades. Now the salesmen (who are called things like "associates" or "customer service representatives") refer to the establishment by which they are employed as a "store."
To me, a store is a place which sells groceries or liquor or clothing or hardware, hence the grocery store, the liquor store, the clothing store and the hardware store. But the auto store?
What do you suppose it is about the sense of the word "store" which makes it seem misapplied to a place which sells cars?
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Carpal Tunnel
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to me, you don't go to the liquor dealership to check out next year's beer brands, or to the hardware dealership to price the latest ice-scraper, or to the grocery dealership to kick the pretzels. neither do you go to the car store to pick up a pickup.
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Carpal Tunnel
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Me and tsuwm, we are of one Accord.
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Carpal Tunnel
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Carpal Tunnel
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of one Accord
Cheapskates! Couldn't you a ford one each?
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Carpal Tunnel
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well they couldn't very well call it an auto shop now could they?
store i think is an american ism. the brits go to the shops on the high street..american buy stuff in stores.
in the americas, a company --oh say like the north west trading company might have a small warehouse of 'stores' --and a trader might come in and trade in his skins, (which were stored in the building till the spring, when the waterways thawed) for some of the flour (50lb bags) or beans stored there. My father in law remembered his mother buying salt and pickles, and other 'stores' when he was a child.. (pre WWI) she would go down to the city (ie, leave the bronx and go to manhattan) by boat. (he thought me clever for buying 25lb of flour at time (i made all my own bread)
i suspect, in towns and villages in great brittan, most folks didn't buy flour by the 50lb bag.. they would by a weeks worth or two week worth.. 1--they had no room to have pantries, and if they did, why would the fill them with bags (which would be a problem in settled areas, where there was a resident rodent population) of flour. A large household would no doubt have a barrel for flour.. but how many households would that be?
getting back to automobile stores..
does the dealership have a store of cars? (dealer stock?)--
many dealership today do..
would you prefer:
auto vender--a machine vender instead of a vending machine?
auto provisioner?
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Something has happened to the self-applied nomenclature for auto dealerships
Well, I think you are all right. They are not a "store", but they want you to think of them as a "store".
They don't want you to think of them as a place where you go to check out the latest models, or to kick the tires.
They want you to think of them as a "Convenience Store" where you go to pick up your snacks without concerning yourself about the price, or your waist line [or climate change].
It's just the next evolution of sales execution.
The whole idea is to get us past the idea that shopping for a car is anything more than shopping for Doritos.
If they're smart, they'll throw in a Doritos with your Durango. :)
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Carpal Tunnel
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the brits go to the shops on the high street..american buy stuff in stores
That’s close but not identical to my experience, Nu Yoik ;) I recognise the word store as quintessentially American when describing a mom ‘n’ pop small retail outfit, but in the UK it tends to only get used to refer to a larger outfit, as in ‘department store’.
I gather the etymology comes (via French) from a Latin word instaurare meaning ‘renew’.
In neither case is it natural to me, either, Father Steve, to go to a car store (sounds more like one of those dumps where imports are kept on an airfield pending distribution!)
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Carpal Tunnel
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If they're smart, they'll throw in a Doritos with your Durango.
Since we are shopping for a Honda CR-V, maybe they would rather throw in Hostess Ho Hos.
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If you're buying an SUV, they should give you a Krispy Kreme. [You won't feel so guilty about the mileage.]
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Carpal Tunnel
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w'all, it's jes' that downhome Bushit about being normal folks... don' want to shop at no dealership all hoity-toity lahk... I buy my car at the store...
formerly known as etaoin...
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