McLaren opens first of 35 dealers worldwide for sold-out MP4-12C

[Haltech]

Filed under: Car Buying, Performance, UK, MISC

McLaren London at One Hyde Park - Click above for high-res images

Know what you're looking at right now? An empty showroom. (Or rather, a preview rendering thereof.) McLaren London will open its doors at One Hyde Park as the first of 35 new dealers opening in 19 countries around the world. Thing is, they may not actually have any cars to sell.

Reports quoting McLaren's regional director for Asia, the Middle East and Africa (that's a big chunk of the world right there) suggest that the new MP4-12C, which we sampled in February, is already sold out for the next three years. Those numbers, however, may be based on the initial production rate: McLaren is gearing up to build 1,000 units of the MP4 each year, but capacity could reach up to 4,000 cars rolling off the new assembly line at Woking to meet demand. Now, McLaren isn't likely to build 4,000 units of the MP4 anytime soon, but could reach that capacity with other models on the way, and in the meantime could give them some room the maneuver should demand sufficiently outstrip supply.

However many units McLaren builds, they'll be sold through those 35 dealers. Following the first location in London, additional UK dealers are scheduled to open in Manchester and Birmingham, followed by European locations in Belgium, France, Germany, Italy, Spain and Switzerland. All the dealers are set to be open by year's end. Among them will be ten in North America: Chicago, Dallas, Los Angeles, New York, Miami, Newport Beach (Orange County, California), Philadelphia, San Francisco, Tampa and Toronto.

If the order books are indeed full, then all those dealerships could end up serving the needs of its existing customers - at least for the first couple of years - rather than luring in new ones. Follow the jump for the press release.Continue reading McLaren opens first of 35 dealers worldwide for sold-out MP4-12C

McLaren opens first of 35 dealers worldwide for sold-out MP4-12C originally appeared on Autoblog on Tue, 21 Jun 2011 18:39:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.



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