Bluewater Trailers

The morning of November 16 I phoned Bluewater Trailers to purchase an enclosed trailer that I had found in an ad the previous night. The ad was for a car hauler 8.5x18 and was very specific for the trailer build and included the stock number and VIN number of the trailer with a listed price of $14082 (I have screenshots of the entire ad). I spoke to a sales associate and gave them the VIN and stock numbers to ensure the trailer was in stock, which they confirmed, so I confirmed that I wished to purchase it and placed a $1600 deposit on it with my credit card. The associate said they would complete the bill of sale which would include the taxes, tire recycling fee ($4 per tire) and the plate/registration costs since I wished them to complete the licensing and email me the completed invoice, at which point I could arrange to pay the remaining balance.

About 15 min later I received a phone call back from the sales associate stating that they could not sell me the trailer for the advertised price as there was a mistake and the actual price of the trailer was $17996.72. I was obviously unhappy about this since in my mind we had already reached an agreement when they took my deposit, which they were now going back on. The sales associate said that they could get a manager to call me back in a little while since they were currently in a meeting, which I agreed to. Approximately 30-45 min later the sales associate phoned me back again, stating that a manager would not be able to speak to me, but that they offered to discount the trailer by $750.

I'm not sure if this was intentionally misleading advertising by the company or if it was a legitimate mistake. Many trailer companies advertise a type of trailer with a low price and then state within the ad that they start at that low price depending on the options of the build. This particular ad was not the case as it was for a very specific trailer with the VIN and complete build info.