I've had Aston Martins for over 35 years - three Lagonda's, and 2007, 2009, 2015GT, and 2011 V8 Vantages- present car, as well as three V12S Vantages. The 2007 Vantage was bought new, and all but my 2011 Vantage were under factory or extended Aston Martin warranties. The Lagonda's were actually pretty reliable, powertrain wise with zero issues, and if something failed electronically, well, that was the end of using that feature. My 2007 V8 Vantage was bought and ordered new from Lake Forest in Chicago - 400 miles from home. Lake Forest had a hand full of Astons on the showroom - new and almost new. In those days you spec'd your car and waited 6 months. Lake Forest as well as ALL Aston Dealers thus had relatively low overhead. Any warranty work meant that they would pick up the car and deliver it - typically a one day turn around - pretty amazing. The catch is to maintain a factory warranty meant the annual inspections in which it was my cost for shipping the 800 mile round trip on top of the $1800 to do the fluid changes. On the second year I owned the car it needed a new door seal. Lake Forest screwed up the new seal and it flapped outside the door. Instead of shipping the car back to Chicago, they told me that Morries Mazda could fix the door seal, and that's when I knew Morries was going to be the Aston Martin dealership.

The next several years, I think went really well with the Aston dealership both in service and sales. My local group Midwest Aston Martin Owners has had about 50 members, some leaving, other joining, and seeing an Aston Martin in nice weather in Minneapolis is not too rare.

All was well, until Andy Palmer took over Aston Martin and destroyed the elegance of the designs, made an Aston Martin a repackaged Mercedes with previous generation electronics, and the worst move - forcing Morries (And all other dealerships) to purchase 30 cars in advance as if they were a Nissan dealership - with absurdly short floor plans. (Andy Palmer was past CEO of Nissan). Worse yet, instead of just fixing the warranty issues, it was like United Health took over warranties, and would do everything they could to 'prove' the issue irritating customers. Morries can't survive losing (millions I'm told) every year. To get the Aston dealership, Morries had to make a massive investment including an $18,000 coffee maker. I once asked to have a cup of $18,000 coffee (I think I was the only cup ever made from that machine) - tasted like my Kureg.

Tomorrow will be the last day of Morries being a 'New' Aston Martin Dealership offering warranty work. That said, Steve, their excellent mechanic, as well as all that important service equipment and technology stays to service the many existing Aston owners - most I think the generation prior to Andy Palmer era.

I can't blame Morries to drop Aston (and Maserati). They are forced to take cars that Aston shoves down their throat, with options to bring prices into overly priced ranges. If they had a base (no option) Vantage, DBX, and DB12, with a showroom to preorder - just a low cost boutique building, like the new Lambo dealer being built, there is a possibility of profitability. In the 15 year's that $18K coffee machine sat in the wall, it did not influence a single sale. If the $240K Vantage sitting on the Showroom floor was a base $191K - the standard features as well as the electronics and performance makes it a bargain compared to my (optioned) $150K 2007 V8 Vantage I first purchased in 2006 ($234K in 2025$). I might be able to convince my wife not to divorce me with a $191K Vantage - but not a quarter million$ vantage with the same electronics and performance. I don't need $50K in carbon fiber crap.

Now it's up to all of us local Minneapolis Aston Martin owners to have Morries service our cars so they at least stick around for us.

I'm guessing Morries is not the only dealer abandoning the ship.

If Aston is to survive, we need to have a tiny showroom, no inventory, and great service with as in the past - no questions asked warranty repairs, just fix it, quickly.

Ferrari includes 7 years of services on a new car - Aston Martin are you listening? Not 7 years at nearly $2K a year.

Do you know of other Aston dealers dropping the brand?

 

I question how long our local dealership (Boston) will remain under the current ownership. They bought the AM and Lotus franchises from the previous owner about 4 years ago. There is no dedicated dealership/service site. The "dealership" is in a rented building that does not look like an Aston dealership with no service. Servicing the cars is ~3 miles away in a dilapidated facility that is unbecoming of either marque. All of the experienced technicians have moved on and dealership charges beyond absurd prices. The owner of the dealerships is an experienced real estate investor who doesn't want to spend a dime on making the franchises what they deserve. Patrons of the marque are fleeing towards independent shops to work on their cars.

The previous owners of the franchises had a nice showroom, glorious service bays, and a real love of the marques. It was fun to bring cars there, felt like they cared, and prices were decent.

Sad state for one of America's oldest & mature Aston and Lotus franchises. I feel for the sales staff that have to make a living under such conditions.

 

As much as we have debated the looks of the new vantage, AP was also responsible for Valkyrie, DBX, DB11, DBS. Give him some credit already.

LS also "forced" dealerships to buy up the inventory, not just AP. The fact AML is on its 4th CEO since LS took over says a lot. It's not the CEO who can't run the co. It's him.

I like AP having engaged with him on multiple occasions in person or through emails. He's a bloke I can hang with after work just geeking about cars. Not LS though. Good luck dealing with him.

 

As far as AM dealers dropping the franchise I am sure there is an answer but AM doesn’t have one.The dealership owners just can’t keep going as they are under the rules AM makes them follow. The St. Louis dealer quotes service prices that are just nonsense. Oil change at $1500 and a brake fluid change is $500. Bamford Rose does not work on the MB engined cars because of the cost for the diagnostic software. A local shop does all that work for $200 in labor. I just supply the parts. I have maybe $275 in parts if that. There is a point people will not buy a car that has service cost in the thousands for minor maintenance. The service department keeps these dealers open. Stroll will off load the company to full Middle East ownership sooner or later.
My cousin went to buy a Ferrari. The dealership wanted to do all these checks even though he was paying cash. He was lucky he did not have to grease the salesman to sell him a car. He told me he heard stories of having to give the salesman $10K for the privilege of buying a car at retail. I bet AM wishes they had that problem.

 

As a newcomer to the Aston marque after picking up my V12S last fall I visited the Boston dealership to get some service codes removed. Your description above is spot on, one can only hope a new owner takes the reins.

 

To be fair everyone in the performance car market is in the do-do right now with the exception of Ferrari who are defying gravity.
I consult https://ssoreport.com who appears to be able to read a balance sheet rather than just regurgitating the key headline figures sent out in the companies press release highlighting the spin they want on the numbers.
Bottom line, AM is losing $1M per day right now and the only metal they are moving at a profit is the limited edition hyper cars.
Still, could be worse, this could be the Maserati forum. Mind you, the Tesla ‘dealership’ a few miles away has run out of space to store all the vehicles waiting to be paid for by customers. There are 4 cyber trucks there. The dealership did not even bother to clean the snow off them when it snowed a month ago.

 

I miss Andy Palmer's time as CEO. I wish he was still there. He made the marque fun and did do a lot of good. Thinking consumers would get the Vulcan trickle down styling instead of a DB10 was a mistake. Not importing Cygnet to the states was another. The rest was fine.

Who am I to 2nd guess Lawrence Stroll? AML stock can only go down another $1.30. He's got the right people in place for their motorsport efforts but not convinced on the passenger car side. I'd like to see Cosworth collaboration on bread & butter cars. I like to see a new run of spare parts for previous models like headlights, taillights etc... More effort from AM to ensure customer cars remain on the roads for decades to come. No need to soak the loyal customer base on prices. Less cost on spare parts is more money that could be spent on a new Aston Martin.

How about a new Cygnet and have it come to the States? Beats keeps buying emissions credits from Tesla.

 

I see Jaguar dealers shuttering. They no longer even build cars, so strange. Unfortunate that AM never found a home with a large auto maker with deep pockets, but even the large auto makers are not doing well these days. Governments trying to shove EV's down everyone s throat is back firing and almost bring the entire auto industry to it's knees.

 

It seemed like the long-term plan was for Mercedes to buy AML in order for them to have a luxury marque under the umbrella like BMW and VW have.

As soon as AML was in a solid enough position to pass their M&A study. Maybe Mercedes' hope is to wait until stock is below $1 and buy as much as they can? I'd suspect Saudi's PIF would have strong interest when the stock is around $1 or less.

I'd love to see Honda buy out AML. Imagine V12's with Honda's hand in the design and manufacture!

 

They did, though. Ford owned them from 1991 to 2007 (they got sold when Ford was refocusing on their core brands and dumped everything considered extraneous, like Jaguar, Volvo, Land Rover, and Mazda).

I wouldn't be surprised if AM ends up owned by Geely (or some other Chinese OEM) in the near future, since they seem to love acquiring storied European brands.

 

Not happening, Honda has its own problems. That's why they are trying to merge with Nissan and Mazda.

 

Cynet???. Easily the most horrific thing to ever be foisted on Aston Martin! An automotive atrocity. It's a Toyota iQ, which is great as a Toyota iQ. But to put an Aston badge and grille on a tiny Japanese economy car, along with fancy leather, was unforgivable (and I'm generally a big fan of the Astons (the real ones) that Ulrich Bez was responsible for). No, it wasn't done for corporate fuel economy figures. It takes more to make an Aston Martin than just a grille and badge stuck on a car. And no, I don't want Mercedes to buy Aston Martin. Mercedes engines are great, but an Aston Martin needs an Aston Martin engine, IMO. Yes, I know about platform sharing across VAG, BMW-engined Rolls-Royces, etc. Bentley Contis are great cars (for example), but are Phaetons or Panameras underneath. Not for me, but to each his own. If M-B buys Aston, not only will we have Benz engines, we'll also have "Aston Martins" with shared Mercedes platforms. That would NOT be an Aston Martin. I know it's exceedingly difficult to be a small manufacturer in today's world, but IMO an Aston that's a Benz underneath wouldn't be an Aston Martin, and that would comprehensively defeat the purpose.

 

I know that they were under Ford. Ford invested billions then let Alan Mulally give them away for pennies. I hate to see either Mercedes or any Chinese company acquire them.

 

Wow, that's really sad to hear.

Back in 2015 I was on a hunt for a 6speed DBS. They're nearly impossible to find today but back then it was very difficult as well. I'm in Wisconsin, about 60 miles north of Chicago so Lake Forest Sports cars was my place typically but I was searching all across the country for the right DBS.

Finally one popped up in a search and it was in Minnesota at Morries. I called on it immediately but was still too late and they already had it sold. A sales guy drove the car home after work shorty after it was traded to the dealership and his next door neighbor fell in love and had to have it.

I was pretty bummed and asked for first crack at it should the sale fall apart. About 24hrs later I got a call and it was available again. I dropped everything and got on a plane to Minneapolis to see this car and do the deal.

The car was awesome (only 13,000miles) and so was everyone at Morries. As I said, it was a 6speed car and I didn't like the clutch feel very much.. The tech agreed so they even through a new clutch in it for me. Because of that unexpected delay, I flew home and about a week later, Morries hauled the car to me in an enclosed trailer free of charge (350 miles each way!).

Such a great bunch of people and a wonderful dealership experience.

 

Back then they had the best sales group - Russano, Dan and Scott were incredible, you likely dealt with them, you can still if you buy from Minneapolis Ferrari which is where they are today.