It’s a fair question, as few things feel more hollow than something new with lots of sizzle, but not enough steak. Our new Car Vending Machines look like agents of change, but what do you actually gain from a few bells and whistles?

Let’s start at the end and work backwards from there.

We’re convinced the Car Vending Machine will not only contribute to a better overall car buying experience for you, but also save you MORE money than delivering cars straight to your door.  And here’s how.

For every car a dealership sells, it costs them roughly $2,000.  With $1,500 being paid to the dealership’s personnel and $500 going towards costs of running the physical dealership, those numbers add up.

Carvana was built on the idea that tools could be built to let you direct your own car buying experience, while also enabling you to reach out to us only when you WANT help. That saves about $1,200, which is a big win. We also realized it was much less expensive to deliver cars to you than it was to run a big dealership, making a comparatively modest $200 dent in the pocket book, saving you another $300. Not too shabby.

That’s where the $1,500 we tout in savings comes into play – and that’s before we start shouting about how we don’t charge doc fees…but that’s a PR approved point for another post.

Of course, $1,500 in savings was where we were before the Vending Machine – and it was a pretty good place. With customers on average enjoying tremendous savings per car purchased, and with Carvana averaging 4.9 out of 5 stars in over 1,200 consumer reviews, it has allowed us to grow and grow fast.

The “growing fast” part is where the Vending Machine makes its timely entrance. It costs us about $200 in all to deliver a car to your door. It’s also a lot of work. That option is here to stay, but we couldn’t help but wonder if we could provide another option that would come at no additional cost to you.

If you come to us, it saves us about $150 of the $200. You do that 1,000 times a month and the numbers tell quite a story. We realized we could give you a truly one-of-a-kind pick-up experience at zero extra cost, while also allowing us to perhaps lower our advertising costs, which may ultimately save you even MORE in the long run.

So we built it, spending a couple years on the engineering and architecture, the robotics and electronics and the lighting and process. It was a huge investment, but we made it with the conviction it would be better for you.

Now that we’ve got it, we couldn’t be more excited to share it with you while keeping our prices as low as they have ever been.