Refuse Porsche and Face The Music
The Collection, a luxury dealership in Miami that houses nine premium brands under one roof, has been locked in a legal battle with Porsche for over three years. The dispute began when Porsche demanded that the dealership build a standalone facility exclusively for the German brand, which the dealership refused to do. Unlike Porsche, none of the other luxury brands represented at The Collection, including Ferrari, Aston Martin, and McLaren, have ever requested exclusive facilities.
What followed was what the dealership described as calculated retaliation. After refusing to comply, The Collection alleges Porsche began withholding pool cars, the discretionary inventory that includes test vehicles and high-demand models. The dealership, which ranked third among all U.S. Porsche dealers in 2018, plummeted to 32nd place by mid-2022.
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How Pool Cars Help Dealerships
The lawsuit details how Porsche’s allocation system compounds the damage. Pool cars typically represent about 20 percent of inventory but play a large role in the turn-and-earn system. Under this model, dealers receive future allocations based on their previous year’s sales volume as a percentage of total national sales.
Without pool cars, The Collection’s sales declined, triggering lower allocations the following year in a cascading effect. Porsche maintains that pool car assignments are discretionary and tied to brand promotion standards. If The Collection wins this case, it could embolden other dealers nationwide who face similar pressure to make costly facility investments or risk losing inventory access.
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Porsche’s Push Toward Exclusivity
The whole case reflects a broader shift in Porsche’s brand strategy. Post-COVID, Porsche started raising prices of its cars in a move that some have called “the Ferrarification of Porsche”, as a way to inch towards the exclusivity of brands like Ferrari. While Ferrari incentivises dealers to sell at MSRP, Porsche dealers could charge an Additional Dealer Markup (ADM), forcing customers to pay far above MSRP for desirable models, with the ultimate loser being customers unwilling to pay obscene markups.
The Collection alleges that Porsche also gave more attention to dealers willing to charge high ADMs than those who weren’t. The dealership seeks $100 million in compensatory damages, which under Florida law would automatically triple to $300 million, making it one expensive affair for Porsche.
