Lamborghini dealer accused of selling cars to resellers, criminals

Lamborghini accused a US dealer of selling its supercars to brokers and resellers while demanding kickbacks in return.

Lamborghini has taken Illinois-based Gold Coast Exotic Imports to court over breach of contract, which requires a dealer to sell to “retail customers” or other authorised dealers.

In this case, Gold Coast Exotic Imports is accused of misrepresenting to Lamborghini that it sold cars to a former Chicago pro athlete and the CEO of a chiropractic clinic in Minnesota when, in reality, they sold cars to “brokers” and “resellers”, including one who “previously pleaded guilty in a criminal fraud case”.

Lamborghini found at least 32 transactions between the dealer and supposed non-retail customers that took place in 2023. The company has said that its dealers are barred from making direct sales to brokers and resellers because they often flip the cars at inflated prices.

In its lawsuit, Lamborghini mentions that “these practices are merely one part of a larger program of deception and that Gold Coast and its employees have engaged in other misconduct, including demanding off-the-books kickbacks from customers amounting to hundreds of thousands of dollars for Gold Coast, to agree to sell exclusive limited-edition vehicle models to those customers.”

“The dealer was paid more than $4 million in incentives since 2019, but the dealer was operating a shadow program,” the lawsuit states.

Source: Chicago Sun Times