NIRVC -- The news is out---Here is their plan

[Old Bubblehead]

You decide. I took my Entegra to the factory for AIR and warranty repairs. Picked rig up on Friday and drove across Ohio. In the 300 plus miles I drove the brand-new inverter (installed by the factory) malfunctioned. In a truck stop, at midnight, in 20-degree weather I tried to troubleshoot with Entegra afterhours technical support. No joy. I emailed Joyce and Brett. Both reached out, but Entegra didn't have the urgency I was hoping for in their response. Brett arranged for their (NIRVC) best electrical technical rep to help out. When it was obvious a shop intervention was needed, Brett and the Rep (Justin) arranged for me to get the coach into the Atlanta shop and keep my personal schedule intact (had to go back to work).
If you can find any other business this large where the CEO will personally step in to help a customer, do business with them. I, nor they, claim perfection. They are working to be the best they can be and support their customers and the industry in a way not available prior to their presence in the market.
You can save pennies chasing the lowest price and lose dollars/ availability trying to keep it running with a poor dealer.
If I was looking for a new to me coach, I would focus on NIRVC.

Best of luck.

 

[lostinfla]

I can't speak to the NIRVC piece but my $.02 is anyone that has a coach that they're happy with, shaken down, kinks worked out, keep it! Prices of today's coaches and quality tanking post pandemic, you may regret letting go of what you have so think really hard about it.

^^This^^.

 

[Tnedator]

You decide. I took my Entegra to the factory for AIR and warranty repairs. Picked rig up on Friday and drove across Ohio. In the 300 plus miles I drove the brand-new inverter (installed by the factory) malfunctioned. In a truck stop, at midnight, in 20-degree weather I tried to troubleshoot with Entegra afterhours technical support. No joy. I emailed Joyce and Brett. Both reached out, but Entegra didn't have the urgency I was hoping for in their response. Brett arranged for their (NIRVC) best electrical technical rep to help out. When it was obvious a shop intervention was needed, Brett and the Rep (Justin) arranged for me to get the coach into the Atlanta shop and keep my personal schedule intact (had to go back to work).
If you can find any other business this large where the CEO will personally step in to help a customer, do business with them. I, nor they, claim perfection. They are working to be the best they can be and support their customers and the industry in a way not available prior to their presence in the market.
You can save pennies chasing the lowest price and lose dollars/ availability trying to keep it running with a poor dealer.
If I was looking for a new to me coach, I would focus on NIRVC.

Best of luck.

Yea, I posted on another forum a year or two ago and Brett reached out via PM, and offered to have a phone call (which we eventually did). In the handful of PMs and the phone call, I was very impressed with my interaction with him.

In a couple weeks, I'm going to the Nashville NIRVC, which will be my first time going to one of their facilities. I'm getting Retrobands installed, but also having them take care of a few lingering issues, including FWS not adjusted right after a trip to Nappanee in fall of '21.

In fairness to Newmar, the parts guy that quoted a living room reconfiguration apparently didn't appreciate how much work it would be, so they struggled to both reconfigure my living room (recreated getting the corner fireplace, so had them rip it out and switch to a recliner layout, which included moving TV to door side), so there were multiple things that weren't completed very well.

Others, were really dumb mistakes on Newmar's part, such as I had my paint worn off from slide toppers rubbing on slides (a recall or service bulletin was issued for this), and so it was taken to the paint shop for this, and they fixed the living room slide, but not the FWS. I didn't catch that until I got home.

 

[Neal]

Since we're sitting around the virtual campfire I'll share my opinion, you may not like it, but it's food for thought. I've had several conversations with Brett Davis, super friendly and he will go to great lengths to ensure his customers (and prospective customers) are taken care of. But is this right? Should customers be going straight to the top and bypassing the GM's and expecting priority service for whatever reason? Brett is the CEO of two huge businesses; Global Financial and NIRVC. NIRVC is expanding rapidly both in dealerships and indoor storage facilities. As you can imagine he's extremely busy growing and running his businesses and has people that should be taking care of the customers. Many of us know his cell phone number, email address, etc. and have used it. And he will take those calls, but in my opinion if anyone has to do that something is broken somewhere along the line.

If customer X has a problem and has to go to Brett and Brett gets them in somewhere then someone else is being bumped, someone that likely went through proper channels, scheduling, service, and is now delayed because someone got put in front of them. I sure wouldn't be happy and I actually went to NIRVC Lewisville for an interior/exterior detail and my appointment was not honored, I had to wait for whatever reason and at some point a day later I had to escalate which was unfortunate. That detail manager was terminated not long after that situation but the point is people make appointments and schedule services. RV service is painful, there aren't enough techs, we all know this.

So let's take this to Newmar as an example, how many have gone direct to the CEO of Newmar to get something handled? I'd bet very few if any. Newmar's service system works well. You deal mainly with your tech and 99% of the time it's a great experience. If the tech doesn't handle things you move up to the group leader, and most likely will never have to go above that because the services are handled well at the lower levels. Each NIRVC facility has a part owner (I believe) and GM that should be handling the matters. Going to the CEO should NEVER have to happen.

I know of several fellow Newmar owners that had some major warranty work done that would have never happened if it wasn't for Brett's involvement. That is unfortunate that it has to work that way, but it did. @Jim is battling getting his Newmar fixed properly at a NIRVC location, is the only answer for him to go to Brett to get the matter handled properly? I can think of a few others that have decided not to go direct Brett and bite the bullet and go through the proper channels and schedule service and hope for the best because going to Brett is the wrong answer.

So yes, it's great to have that life line to call, text, email when things don't work how you think they should or in dire need but I don't believe it's the right process. The people you hired should be doing the job and chain of command, as we know it so well in the military, should be the way to handle matters.

 

[Old Bubblehead]

Neal, all great points. I don't disagree with anything you say. Being retired military, I also have a strong sense of using the chain of command. I hate it when I am bypassed in my role, and can understand how Brett's subordinates feel when he parachutes in. I suspect they are used to it and provide feedback when needed.
I know Brett and his senior teams meet regularly for team improvement opportunities. He would be the first to tell you that the execution of his vision has yet to reach his expectations.
I don't advocate that everyone starts at the top and uses the nuclear option first.
I my case, I was in a pinch; had time constraints; was not getting the factory support I wanted; and I had Brett's number.
In looking at my coach ownership experiences with Newmar and Entegra, the thing I would talk to a prospective buyer would be about the realistic expectations for support.
Factory lead time for service appointments is 5 and 6 months out. Dealers are being forced by volume and capacity to bias the coaches they sell, driving wait times out for dealer appointments.
I do many repairs on my coach to prevent using factory or dealer service. Otherwise, I would never get to use the dang thing. Where warranty, proprietary systems, or specialized training is required forces my hand.
Sometimes there is no good answer, so you choose the best available option and try to minimize the pain.

 

[purring along]

Neal your right. Lower management should be able to handle most if not all problems. In our case it has escalated to the top with no good outcome for us.

 

[wildebill308]

Intersting read.
Neal, I n your post You said “Should customers be going straight to the top and bypassing the GM's and expecting priority service for whatever reason?”. Yet what did you do? Did you talk to the service manager, the GM?
I think we are lucky that Brett is that involved. Perhaps if the CEOs of some of the other RV manufacturers and dealers were as involved things would be much better.
Something I haven’t seen talked about especially by those who claim to have a hard time finding out information on their coach when it is at NIRVC. Did you know if you go to the website and create an account you can view on line the statis of any work orders? You can also see the location of your coach. Is it outside or in the shop.
Who is going to the Customer appreciation rally?
Bill

 

[purring along]

Intersting read.
Neal, I n your post You said “Should customers be going straight to the top and bypassing the GM's and expecting priority service for whatever reason?”. Yet what did you do? Did you talk to the service manager, the GM?
I think we are lucky that Brett is that involved. Perhaps if the CEOs of some of the other RV manufacturers and dealers were as involved things would be much better.
Something I haven’t seen talked about especially by those who claim to have a hard time finding out information on their coach when it is at NIRVC. Did you know if you go to the website and create an account you can view on line the statis of any workweek orders? You can also see the location of your coach. Is it outside or in the shop.
Who is going to the Customer appreciation rally?
Bill

We sure aren't going to the rally.I was told we were not allowed back to any nirv locations. You don't create the problem, but this is how your treated.

 

[Tnedator]

Neil,

Good points. In my case, and I didn't have a problem, but instead had some questions about retrobands and stuff, and posted about such and he reached out to me. When it came to installing, but we never pulled this off, he got me on a call with the guys that heads up those two product line initiatives (the other was the fire protection) at NIRV, and we talked about coordinating a time, in Lewisville, when their mobile van that they use for retroband installs at shows, was in Lewisville, and that way I could get the installs done without scheduling through service.

In the end, our schedules didn't line up, and then neck issues got worse (had cervical fusion early January of this year) and I pretty much stopped driving my RV. Hence the reason I've finally got an appointment in Nashville, which I organized with a normal service writer at NIRV.

It would not be good if Brett is bumping people to get someone else in for routine service. The flip side is that we've read many examples over the years of RV shops, or Cummins, fitting someone in who was on a trip and had something happen. In many of the cases we hear, it's Brett helping out people like that, whether fitting them in or providing remote support.

My experience with them is still verbal at this point, and like many, my first introduction to NIRVC was Angie Videos, but if my experience in a couple weeks is anything like others have described, I think it's likely I will continue using them for service, and seriously consider them for my next purchase, whenever that might be (actually, seriously considering a class B, little brother to my Ventana, for times I'm traveling to a hotel).

 

[Ken C]

Since we're sitting around the virtual campfire I'll share my opinion, you may not like it, but it's food for thought. I've had several conversations with Brett Davis, super friendly and he will go to great lengths to ensure his customers (and prospective customers) are taken care of. But is this right? Should customers be going straight to the top and bypassing the GM's and expecting priority service for whatever reason? Brett is the CEO of two huge businesses; Global Financial and NIRVC. NIRVC is expanding rapidly both in dealerships and indoor storage facilities. As you can imagine he's extremely busy growing and running his businesses and has people that should be taking care of the customers. Many of us know his cell phone number, email address, etc. and have used it. And he will take those calls, but in my opinion if anyone has to do that something is broken somewhere along the line.

If customer X has a problem and has to go to Brett and Brett gets them in somewhere then someone else is being bumped, someone that likely went through proper channels, scheduling, service, and is now delayed because someone got put in front of them. I sure wouldn't be happy and I actually went to NIRVC Lewisville for an interior/exterior detail and my appointment was not honored, I had to wait for whatever reason and at some point a day later I had to escalate which was unfortunate. That detail manager was terminated not long after that situation but the point is people make appointments and schedule services. RV service is painful, there aren't enough techs, we all know this.

So let's take this to Newmar as an example, how many have gone direct to the CEO of Newmar to get something handled? I'd bet very few if any. Newmar's service system works well. You deal mainly with your tech and 99% of the time it's a great experience. If the tech doesn't handle things you move up to the group leader, and most likely will never have to go above that because the services are handled well at the lower levels. Each NIRVC facility has a part owner (I believe) and GM that should be handling the matters. Going to the CEO should NEVER have to happen.

I know of several fellow Newmar owners that had some major warranty work done that would have never happened if it wasn't for Brett's involvement. That is unfortunate that it has to work that way, but it did. @Jim is battling getting his Newmar fixed properly at a NIRVC location, is the only answer for him to go to Brett to get the matter handled properly? I can think of a few others that have decided not to go direct Brett and bite the bullet and go through the proper channels and schedule service and hope for the best because going to Brett is the wrong answer.

So yes, it's great to have that life line to call, text, email when things don't work how you think they should or in dire need but I don't believe it's the right process. The people you hired should be doing the job and chain of command, as we know it so well in the military, should be the way to handle matters.

Neal,
You make some great and reasonable points that I agree with. However circumstances sometimes get in the way and having the ability to contact Brett as a last option also is something not available from most dealers. Unfortunately some don't make the effort and go directly to this option. I give Brett credit for his effort to keep customers happy regardless.