Chris Bryant & Andrea Felsted, Columnists

Would You Buy Your Dream Car From Amazon?

Selling autos is tough, even for a giant of e-commerce.
Christophe Calais/Corbis via Getty Images
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You don’t need a brain like Jeff Bezos to figure out why he began selling books online and not cars.

Books are a cheap and easily-shipped commodity product. By contrast, people rarely buy a car without driving it first, while vehicles are bulky and customization options abound. There's more: new cars are typically bought on credit. Manufacturers and dealers tend to have tight-knit relationships, and in the U.S. there are pesky laws protecting dealers (as Tesla has discovered).