CarMax Will Lie to You: Or How Disruption Is Not Just Changing the Top…

CarMax Will Lie to You: Or How Disruption Is Not Just Changing the Top of Your Funnel.

We bought a car from CarMax with the promise of the new car being delivered to our front door four days later. Eight days later, I was bouncing my 20-month-old son on my shoulders in the parking lot of a CarMax store while we were on hour three of buying said car.

I want to be mad a CarMax. I was for a while. Honestly, I knew something like this was going to happen. Every step of my communication with them started out with them trying to be Carvana-y. By the end of the step, we were back to traditional ways. Phone calls and test drives.

Companies like to think they can copy disruption with no problem. But, when years of DNA form around, “come in and give this thing a test drive.” You can’t easily break that polynucleotide chain.

I see it with startups too. They aren’t trying to break the chain, but they’re trying to fake it until they make it. They spend time building what seems to be a smart, robot-driven sales funnel, but the final call-to-action is still a meeting with a salesperson. That stinks as a sales experience too. If you don’t have the tech goods yet to escape some traditional sales process, then don’t fake it. Be honest. It might just work out for you.