It’s the kind of thing that can take a rotten day and make it bearable. Maybe even sweet. It’s that, “Big mistake. Big. Huge. I have to go shopping now” get-even feeling Julia Roberts made famous.
For TikToker Gigi (@freckles_g) that feeling got really real when she walked into a car dealership and drove off in her dream sportscar. She says it was super satisfying to tell “a car salesman to [expletive] off.”
Bonus? Nearly 292,000 people viewed the TikTok that explained how she got finally got her cherished Nissan 370Z.
What Happened When She Tried to Buy a Nissan 370Z?
Gigi is a self-proclaimed car lover, and was especially back in college when she set her sights on a sparkly Monterey Blue Nissan. It was a rare find, so when one popped up an hour and a half away, she grabbed her car-crazy friend and off to the dealership they went.
“We walk into this Toyota dealership, it’s the middle of the day on a Tuesday, it’s completely empty,” she says. She mimics the first salesman’s approach: hands on hips, a smug expression and a voice that sounds “Kermit the frog adjacent.”
“Hello. You here to buy a car?” he purportedly said to her male friend.
“No,” the friend replied, “my friend is here to buy a car,” and gestured to her.
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The salesman flashed her a double-thumbs-up, saying “great, cool” and walked away, Gigi says. Two more salesmen then did the same thing. “[They] assumed I was just [expletive] around,” she comments.
This was despite the pre-approved loan letter she says was in her hand.
“I was ready to buy this car without even test driving it because I wanted that color so bad,” Gigi recounts.
After 30 minutes, she was finally able to find a manager who set her up with a newbie salesperson. He’s younger than her, Gigi says, and has been on the job for about six months. Some may assume the manager assigned the novice salesman to her based on the assumption that she wasn’t a serious buyer.
Still, she knew something the manager didn’t.
“This is a ‘yes’ sale. You don’t even have to negotiate with me. I will pay almost anything for this car,” Gigi says.
It all turned around after that.
“Honestly, I think this is the best car-buying experience I will ever have in my life. This kid was effing awesome,” Gigi recalls. “Our entire conversation was maybe 15 to 20 minutes.” She further learned that he got into selling cars because his mom has cancer.
Meanwhile, upon realizing she was a serious buyer, the other salesmen started to circle, trying to poach her.
“No, this kid is nice and you ignored me for 20 minutes,” she remembers thinking. The sale went smoothly, and Gigi and her friend ended up befriending the young salesman over pizza.
Do Car Salesmen Mansplain?
The comments section of this video is wild, from stories of salesmen explaining loan interest to a someone with a doctorate in math, to a random side debate about whether or not the Salvation Army is nonprofit.
The overwhelming sentiment is one of weary recognition: some car salesmen really are out here explaining the obvious.
One said, “I was ignored at two Porsche dealerships when I tried to buy my Boxster. [...] I basically had to beg them to just unlock one of the floor model Boxsters for me. After that experience, I ended up buying a 3-year-old Boxster with under 2,000 from Carmax, where I had an incredible experience.”
Another said she’s had a salesman try to explain taxes to her, “It’s like when you buy a Starbucks & it’s a bit more expensive.”
Others agreed that giving the sale to the newbie or down-to-earth salesperson is the move. “Sticking to the newbies helps them while telling the lot they are the worst for profiling,” opined @twofacedkarma.
The One That Got Away
The car Gigi bought, the Nissan 370Z, has a dedicated following.
“The Nissan 370Z is not some jumped-up, front-wheel drive hatchback with a turbocharged inline-four. It’s a rear-wheel drive coupe with a big naturally aspirated V6,” Matt Robinson for Car Throttle wrote of the 2018 model. “It’s a coupe which—nearly 10 years after its debut—still looks great.”
Robinson described driving it as feeling wonderfully natural and compliant, but also “unapologetically butch” while chopping through gears. Pricewise, a recent Autotrader search revealed a range of about $10,000 for a 15-year-old model, $50,000 for a 2025.
In a follow-up video, Gigi shows a photo of the 370Z and explains she sold it a year later because it didn’t compare to the driving experience of her previous BMW Z3. “I’m a tiny quick sportscar girl, not a big fast sportscar girl," she says.
However, these are just driving memories, since currently she shares a sticker-covered Nissan Versa with her brother.
In her original TikTok, Gigi says, “I’m still super into cars, but my priority has changed as far as my budget.”
Motor1 reached out to Gigi via TikTok messenger. We’ll update this article if she responds.
