Dorschel Mini of Rochester

mntcooper · Member

Dorschel Mini of Rochester

Pamlico · Motorer

Somewhat surprising that it's not in conjunction with BMW of Rochester. Apparently West Herr, who own BMW of Rochester, investigated placing a MINI dealership on Henrietta Rd, but the price of the land was quite steep and by the time all the other costs were factored the total cost was prohibitive.

Not the best news for Towne as they have had the market to themselves since the MINI was released.

gvcmel · Motorist

I can say that the franchise when released by MINI in the spring for the Rochester area was hotly contested amongst several dealers. I know a couple of businesses that were disappointed when the results were announced.

I have not heard what won Dorschel the franchise in the end.

PepperMINI · Motorer

Hopefully, this will motivate Towne to get there act together and provide superb customer service. I bought my VW from Dorschel, and I can't say a lot of great things about them, either.

gvcmel · Motorist

Yes, we have a New Beetle and I can't say the Dorschel experience has been all it is advertised as. Most services have required a return because of sloppy workmanship.

Lets hope this fanchise being separate does not inherit the big box mentality.

PepperMINI · Motorer

I found Dorschel to be a bunch of liars and completely inefficient. I scheduled a 7:30 a.m. oil change appointment and told them that I had a meeting at 9:00 a.m. (about five minutes away from the dealership), and they assured me that since I was the first one in, they would be done by 8:30 at the latest. At 8:15 I asked them how it was coming, and they told me that the car was being washed. Since it was a yucky snowy day, I told them not to bother and to give me my car back, and they said that they were washing it right then and were almost done. Another half hour goes by and I went back up there and reminded them that I needed to go to a meeting, and they said that they were pulling it out. Long story short, I ended up missing my meeting (for an oil change), and when I went out to get my car at 9:30 a.m., it was clear that not a drop of water had touched it. This sort of service happened more than once, so I changed to Vincent to service the VW (plus it was closer to my house than Dorschel, anyway). Maybe since they'll have less MINIs to deal with, they can be better at service.

wienerdog · Member

Not to pile on But when we moved to Rochester we had SAAB's The service we recieved at Dorshel's and thier sales tecniques were enough to never purchase another SAAB I suspect we have been a bit spoiled by Towne.

yellowmininy · Obsessed (Taking the long-cut)

Well, the last new car before I bought Minis at Towne was a Toyota from Dorschel. Sales was OK, my first service appointment was aggravating enough that I went to Hoselton for all my service visits after that.

I've just realized I'm going to have to do a lot of driving soon in the new Mini to run through the warranty period, to avoid the chance of having Mini Roadside Assistance tow it to Dorschel instead of Towne! (Still have AAA, fortunately!)

cereal · Motorist

yellowmininy wrote:
Well, the last new car before I bought Minis at Towne was a Toyota from Dorschel. Sales was OK, my first service appointment was aggravating enough that I went to Hoselton for all my service visits after that.

I've just realized I'm going to have to do a lot of driving soon in the new Mini to run through the warranty period, to avoid the chance of having Mini Roadside Assistance tow it to Dorschel instead of Towne! (Still have AAA, fortunately!)

Sounds like there need to be a few winter runs eh???

Jack07734 · Motorer

New MINI?

yellowmininy wrote:
Well, the last new car before I bought Minis at Towne was a Toyota from Dorschel. Sales was OK, my first service appointment was aggravating enough that I went to Hoselton for all my service visits after that.

I've just realized I'm going to have to do a lot of driving soon in the new Mini to run through the warranty period, to avoid the chance of having Mini Roadside Assistance tow it to Dorschel instead of Towne! (Still have AAA, fortunately!)

yellowmininy · Obsessed (Taking the long-cut)

2011 True Blue Cooper Countryman, picked up 9/13/11. Pamlico has my yellow Mini, so it's still in the neighborhood!

Pamlico · Motorer

Right - I bought Cathleen's original Mini, so it still lives. ~ 108K miles and thanks to Cathleen's diligence & excellent maintenance it still runs quite well.

Nice to be back in the Mini fold. I had 2 of these previously. The first was a 2002 MCS that was I think the second in Rochester. Replaced that with 2005 John Cooper Works MCS which was great, but ultimately I replaced that with a 2008 BMW 135i which I had until a couple of months ago.

Eleven months after placing a deposit, I took delivery of a 2011 BMW 1M in September. This is a very limited production car - final number not in yet, but the total number of cars delivered to the US looks to be somewhere on the order of 750. BMW of Rochester only was allocated 1 car and luckily I got the deposit in early enough to get it. Given all that, I wanted a daily driver / winter car and Cathleen bought her new car at just the right time. I was really happy to be able to buy her old one. It's perfect for what I was looking for - gets me back & forth to work as well as around town. Interesting to note that after being available for a number of years, the Mini still gets looks from other drivers.

gvcmel · Motorist

ooohhhh - 1M. so jealous.

Pamlico · Motorer

It's an interesting car. Very fast, handles great and has about the best brakes I've ever used.

cereal · Motorist

Sounds like you need to take this to a track to really get the full experience!

Pamlico · Motorer

That's the plan come the spring.

I was trying to get it to 1300 miles for the first service before putting it up for the winter but I only made it to ~ 1000. Once I get it fully broken in I'm hoping to have enough time to get it onto the track at WG.

gvcmel · Motorist

the BMW Car Club track dates for WGI are:

May 4-6

August 22-23

September 21-23

The Autocross schedule is not complete yet but:

May 12th - Letchworth state park

June 17th - WGI with PCA

September 15th - Letchworth state park.

Pamlico · Motorer

Right, thank you. I'm a member of the BMWCCA (but haven't participated in any events - always too busy). I hadn't checked the GVC site for dates yet. Almost certainly won't make early May as the car doesn't get back on the road until 1 May and after that I need to get a few hundred miles on it so it can have it's first service.

Jack07734 · Motorer

yellowmininy wrote:
2011 True Blue Cooper Countryman, picked up 9/13/11. Pamlico has my yellow Mini, so it's still in the neighborhood!

Congrats on the new ride.

smile Happy Motoring,

Jack

Jack07734 · Motorer

yellowmininy wrote:
2011 True Blue Cooper Countryman, picked up 9/13/11. Pamlico has my yellow Mini, so it's still in the neighborhood!

Before you know it you'll be like these guys. biggrin

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YSV7sii9d-U&feature=youtu.be

smile Happy Motoring,

Jack

cabel1961 · Member

Hello fellow owners!

I am looking for any comments about MINI of Rochester. I did not purchase my MINI there and I am having a tough time with them honoring a warranty repair done by an outside mechanic. Anyone else have issues or positive experiences? Is Towne any better?

Thanks,

-c

jrbond007 · Motorer

My Daughter had service done there. They seemed ok. I'm in the Buffalo area, so Towne is the place I go. They have been really good. Of course we have bought 3 MINI's from them as well.