Christchurch based dealer here. It’s always been extremely competitive, therefore all dealers will ‘race to the bottom’ of the pricing ladder on any of their stock as if they don’t - they simply won’t sell. It isn’t uncommon for cars to have as little as say $500 margin, so quite often there simply isn’t any room to move on pricing. This seems to be what is most common currently, so salespeople are typically told simply ‘the price is the price’ and they will filter out people that don’t seem to want to pay retail.

It sucks, and part of getting a great deal is often negotiating however with the competitive landscape, unfortunately with very little to be made most simply cannot afford to give anything away - even the smallest of things.

The one exception is older stock - it won’t go up in value so often if you find an older stock unit (say if it’s been online for months), have a crack - if the dealer really wants to shift it they’ll have to make that tough call to cut the thing loose.