May 17, 2012
Car Buying Guide
Hearty congratulations to Mazda and in particular the MX-5 on reaching its 100,000th new car sale in the UK twenty years after the first model arrived in British car showrooms, a fantastic milestone for a great little classic. The MX-5 was first unveiled at the Chicago Motor Show in 1989 and arrived in the UK in March 1990. It sold 2,246 units … [Read more...]
Standing at the auction yesterday I couldn’t help noticing how the hall seemed completely bereft of atmosphere. The usual suspects were all in attendance of course, milling about chomping on bacon rolls as usual, but the distinct lack of quality cars being entered meant I stayed only a short while. The tell tale signs were obvious; on the rare … [Read more...]
Selling cars is a very skilled business despite what many people might think. To be able to match an appropriate car with a suitable owner and get the price bit right takes training and experience with a liberal dose of personality and communication skills. During leaner times and occasions like we now find ourselves in, where supply has become … [Read more...]
When you are in the business of selling cars, never, ever sell to friends and family it nearly always ends in tears. For some reason when serving a family member or friend they always expect that it be the cheapest, lowest mileage and cleanest example previously owned by a little old local lady who only went to the shops and back, and of course … [Read more...]
During an economic downturn or periods of economic uncertainty it is more important than ever to ensure that any car you buy or service you pay for is legitimate. We in the trade always look a little more closely at part exchanges and all the supporting paperwork. For example when someone says their car has a “full service history” is that … [Read more...]
As the trickle of part exchanges arrive at action the distinct lack of cars has begun to re-heat demand. Most of the major auction houses have had many more buyers for far fewer cars and as a result some cars have been making, what we call in the trade, 'Brewster’s'. This was kind of predicted and may very well be only be temporary in nature … [Read more...]
Over the years the car trade has unfortunately been blighted by bad practices and fraudulent actions, one of the worst being clocked cars, which leads to nothing but misery for drivers and distrust and contempt cast upon all car sellers. A car is "clocked" if someone interferes with the odometer (the mileage reading) and while it’s not … [Read more...]
The Rover brand which is likely to be resurrected again by late September still has some unfinished business with some of the previous models. A pal at auction recently watched an 05 registered Rover 75 MG ZT 2.0 diesel saloon, which according to the guides should be worth somewhere around the £4,000 mark, achieve a staggering £7,000! … [Read more...]
It appears so as less than 10 percent of the UK's top 200 car dealers are represented on social networking sites and most of those probably only use it because they think they should or that there marketing departments think they should. As a Google employee recently commented social media is like teen sex, everyone wants to do it but no one … [Read more...]
With fuel prices spiralling out of control once more, car drivers are being hit where it hurts more than most. What with VAT set to rise and new car prices having already creeping upwards It makes the job of finding a car which will not cost the national debt to maintain that much harder. It seems it is either price hikes or cuts but no increase in … [Read more...]
Why do customers choose certain cars over others? Well that is certainly the $64,000 question and if we knew the definitive answer we could probably sell the formula for a lot of money. In the car trade there is one thing we can be sure of and that is if we have a car with what we call a unique selling point we can be fairly confident that the car … [Read more...]
I was having a pint with an old colleague who 'made his money and got out' and we were chewing the fat about the good old days where you could actually have a laugh whilst doing your job. He was commenting on the fact that today’s “modern salesperson” might not even go for a drink after work and discuss the days play if you like, and where, … [Read more...]
|The summer moves along at a pace and on my recent camping holiday (Roman Abramovich’s yacht was booked up unfortunately) I couldn’t help noticing how many “sensible” cars I saw parked next to the tents. It appears that with many of us deciding, for economic reasons, to holiday in the UK we are also snapping up MPV’s and estates … [Read more...]
Franchised car dealers are under pressure like never before from independent repairers offering ultra-competitive deals on car servicing. We have already started to see large fleet and rental companies opt for using Kwik-Fit for their annual servicing on their cars, much to the frustration of dealers who feel that they should be getting that work. … [Read more...]
We are always pointing out here at MTI how difficult it is going to be for dealers to find quality retailable used car stock in future due to the shrinking car parc. There will be less of the previously owned cars which dealers have traditionally vied for. In other words 1-3 year old cars with fewer than 40k miles which are still in warranty … [Read more...]
There is much talk at present about how the retail car sales business can improve the service it delivers to its customers. As a result a greater emphasis than perhaps ever before is being put on training and coaching staff to be better equipped to offer an enhanced experience whilst at the same time draw satisfaction from the process. The buzz … [Read more...]
As we go into August the world of car sales has been yo-yoing, with some industry insiders saying business is brisk with plenty of buyer demand while others saying its tough out there and getting tougher. Certainly cars which really have unique selling points are still making a premium whereas run of the mill volume type examples are selling … [Read more...]
The ongoing debate about whether buyers will eventually search for, locate and buy a car online without necessarily seeing and testing continues to divide the trade. Of course the companies which are gearing up for this will say that they make the process so user friendly that car buyers can feel totally confident that they are getting what they … [Read more...]
People in the motor trade love to make predictions and, of course they are not always. That said, I predict many more predictions by voices within the trade before the year is out. The latest batch come from car dealers, especially those in the franchised sector, who are predicting tough times ahead for the used car sector in the coming months. … [Read more...]
It appears that the motor trade is somewhat slower than other business sectors to take advantage of social media, thinking that perhaps it is something for the “youth” and not really seeing the benefits to their business. They are, it seems also frightened of the potential for bad publicity should they let the genie escape from the bottle. … [Read more...]
Marketing used cars has reached an exciting new stage, as the internet paves the way for more advanced classified ads; we are now seeing the images come to life in the form of a fully fledged car review on video accompanying the main advert. If you go any of Inchcape’s Volkswagen homepages and click on used cars (example here) they have … [Read more...]
The school summer holidays are officially here and traditionally it can be a mixed bag for the trade. If the sun is shining customers head off to the sun in the UK, if not they head off abroad. We are great in the car business at talking the job down at any instance and the weather is perfect for this; too hot and we are all having barbecues, too … [Read more...]
Innovation and technological development are always at the forefront of a constantly evolving car industry. As a business we are always looking at ways of improving the products and the way in which we market them in order to engage with customers in an ever changing world. Since the internet has started to take such a lead role in virtually … [Read more...]
The auctions, like the proverbial rubber ball, always come bouncing back. After weeks of the oversupply of high mileage basic and distinctly uninspiring ex-fleet cars clogging up the sales, the word on the street is that buyers are getting their debit cards out and conversions are on the way back up. It appears that after the shock of the … [Read more...]
As the new car parc has steadily shrunk over the last couple of years, the knock on effect and simple mathematics means there are likely to be fewer 2-3 year old cars around. It was a prevailing condition following the recession of the early 90’s and it is a situation that is likely to be repeated over the next few years. For example the 2.1 … [Read more...]
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