Tutors Decode High-Tech Dashboards on New Cars
Paula Latshaw is eager to get behind the wheel of her new Lexus CT 200h hybrid at Sewell Lexus in Dallas. But first, she needs some training.
Her new car isn’t the most technologically advanced car Lexus sells, but the navigation system, the voice-controlled hands-free phone system and the multiple radio options are challenging enough.
Auto dealers are using tech tutors, sometimes hiring them from the Apple genius bar, to help train car buyers on how to use a car’s infotainment system and other technology. Joe White on Lunch Break looks at how the tutorials are going. Photo: Lexus.
“I’m not used to GPS at all,” Ms. Latshaw says. A former BMW owner, she confesses she “worked on daylight-saving time all year last year” because she couldn’t figure out how to reset the German car’s clock.
Customers like Ms. Latshaw are why Sewell has Alex Oger, the dealership’s first “technology specialist.” Mr. Oger, a is on the leading edge of new efforts by auto makers and dealers to close the skills gap that prevents many customers from appreciating the sophisticated digital systems on board many new cars.