How the deal works

BOISE -- You’ve heard it said before, this is a buyer's market.  

That usually refers to the real estate industry, but a local car dealership is getting national attention for its efforts to attract buyers.

They’re borrowing a gimmick usually used for something like shoes sales -- buy one, get one free.

But when you're talking about a car that's a pretty enticing offer.

To some it looks like an offer too good to be true, but desperate times call for desperate measures.

"We're doing that to spur sales, we've got a large inventory of vehicles we've got to move," said Mark Peterson, Peterson GM Super Center.

When fuel prices skyrocketed earlier this year, gas guzzlers like the Cadillac Escalade, the Chevy Suburban and diesel pickup trucks started collecting dust on the showroom floor.

Now Boise's Peterson Super Center is wheeling and dealing to accelerate sales.

"We decided to be aggressive and go ahead and do it and the results have been fantastic," said Peterson.

The offer is this -- buy one of the big vehicles and get a Chevy Cobalt for free, or take the equivalent, $13,500, and knock that off the price of the other vehicle.

"The idea that we were doing this somehow made it to USA Today and that's really why we got so many calls from around the country and we sold vehicles in Louisiana, Texas, as far away as Alaska. It's just been crazy, the response," said Peterson.

"Last month, for example, to this month we've seen an increase of over 150 percent in vehicle sales, largely attributed to this ad. It's just been great," said Peterson.

"These deals are so plentiful right now and they're growing every month," said Jessica Caldwell, Price Unit Analysis at Edmunds.com.

Industry analysts say, if you're in the market to buy and you have the means to do so -- there may be no time like the present.

"The bottom line is: this is an excellent time to buy a vehicle.  We haven't seen incentives like this in years.  Most of our recent memories don't go back to when it was such a great consumer market out there," said Caldwell.

This deal at Petersons originally only went through December, but it's been extended into 2009.      

Which is a good thing because they're about to get even more national attention -- the Today Show will highlight their buy-one-get-one free offer Wednesday morning.

Mark Peterson says no one's actually taken him up on the free car -- so far, everyone's taken the $13,500 discount instead.

The vehicles you have to buy to get that offer range from $45,000 to $70,000.

Read the USA Today story