Smoke and mirrors in the UK car market

It seems as if the motor trade in the UK is going from strength to strength. Sales are buoyant, the order banks are filling up, there are many new models coming to market and f&i income is at an all-time high.

Scratch beneath the surface however and many dealers will tell you that it’s not all it seems. Although the headlines will say that the market is forecasted to be up 8.4% year on year, the truth is many of these cars have been registered to achieve unrealistic targets at massive discounts and sit unsold on dealer forecourts costing money.

There is no doubt that customers are benefiting from these fire sales but franchised dealers increasingly have to balance keeping their manufacturer partners happy and remaining on plan. The problem apparently is that the rest of Europe is in decline and therefore car makers are loading the shortfall into the UK market.

The positive aspect for buyers of course is that not only are there some fantastic deals on offer but there is also a lot of choice as these practices are not confined to individual car makers, there is still hot competition for market share and with up and coming manufacturers having a real go at cracking the lucrative UK market the consumer is likely to continue being the winner right through the summer at the very least.