Highlights from Cardiola Live 2026 reveal deep insights into the UK automotive industry, focusing on the rapid rise of Chinese car brands, challenges faced by new and used car dealers, and the growing impact of AI on car buying. Industry leaders discuss market dynamics, profitability pressures, EV policies, and digital stock sourcing innovations. The episode also explores how AI is reshaping consumer search behavior and dealer marketing strategies, emphasizing the need for unique, conversational content. The event featured diverse panels from manufacturers, dealers, and tech innovators, offering a comprehensive snapshot of current trends and future directions.
Car Dealer Live 2026 took place on March 19 at the British Motor Museum. In this special podcast, James Baggott rounds up some of the highlights from Chinese challenger brands to how car dealers are using AI. To catch up on all the news from the event check out the Car Dealer Magazine website and to watch back all the sessions, grab a replay ticket at CarDealerLive.co.uk
"including those Chinese Challenger brands that we've been talking about so much on this podcast. We talked about electric cars, we talked about AI."
Chinese Challenger brands are new car companies from China trying to sell their cars in places like the UK, competing with well-known brands.
Chinese Challenger brands refer to emerging Chinese automotive manufacturers entering established markets, challenging traditional car makers with competitive electric and conventional vehicles.
"Greg Woplin, he's the head of regional development for Geely UK."
Geely is a big car company from China that owns many car brands and makes different types of cars, including electric ones.
Geely is a major Chinese automotive manufacturer that owns several global brands and produces a wide range of vehicles including electric and hybrid models.
"Steve Beattie was also there. He's the deputy country manager for BYD."
BYD is a company from China that makes electric cars and batteries, and they are growing fast in selling these cars worldwide.
BYD is a Chinese automotive and battery manufacturer specializing in electric vehicles and plug-in hybrids, known for its rapid growth in global EV markets.
"And then, of course, you've then got the new technology and with all the EVs that are coming through, you know, lots of talk about EV, plug-in hybrid."
An EV is a car that runs only on electricity instead of petrol or diesel. It uses batteries to power the motor and doesn't produce smoke or pollution when driving.
EV stands for Electric Vehicle, which is a car powered entirely by electricity stored in batteries rather than using a traditional internal combustion engine. EVs produce no tailpipe emissions and are becoming increasingly popular due to environmental concerns and advances in battery technology.
"...with all the EVs that are coming through, you know, lots of talk about EV, plug-in hybrid. And of course, we're in a really good place for that."
A plug-in hybrid is a car that uses both gas and electricity. You can charge its battery by plugging it in, and it can drive some distance using only electricity before the gas engine starts.
A plug-in hybrid is a type of vehicle that combines a gasoline or diesel engine with an electric motor and a rechargeable battery. It can be plugged in to recharge the battery and can run on electric power alone for short distances, improving fuel efficiency and reducing emissions.
"So Geely acquired Volvo in 2010, which gave us a lot of learning about the UK markets, well, European markets in general."
Volvo is a car company from Sweden famous for making safe and reliable cars. Geely bought Volvo in 2010, which helped them learn about selling cars in Europe.
Volvo is a Swedish automotive manufacturer known for safety and durability. It was acquired by Geely in 2010, which helped Geely gain insights into European automotive markets.
"BYD has been in the UK since 2013 with buses. There's about 3,000 electric buses in the UK."
Electric buses are big vehicles that run on electricity instead of gas or diesel. They are better for the environment because they don't produce smoke or pollution while driving.
Electric buses are buses powered by electric motors instead of traditional internal combustion engines. They produce zero tailpipe emissions and are increasingly used in public transportation for environmental benefits.
"And I think as Tesla led the way for the Chinese cars, sorry, for the electric cars that supported, I think with BYD moving into that way..."
Tesla is a company from the USA that makes electric cars. They were one of the first to make electric cars popular and helped other companies, including those from China, to start making electric cars too.
Tesla is an American electric vehicle manufacturer that has been a major pioneer in popularizing electric cars worldwide. Tesla's success has influenced other electric car brands, including Chinese manufacturers like BYD.
"I'm really direct. I'm really honest with my dealer network. There's two things as far as I'm concerned..."
A dealer network is a group of stores that sell and fix cars from a specific company. Having many dealers helps people buy and take care of those cars more easily.
A dealer network refers to the group of authorized dealerships that sell and service vehicles for a particular brand. Maintaining a strong dealer network is crucial for brand presence and customer support.
"One is BYD volume and the second is retail and profitability. That's the only two things in terms of what I care about."
Retail means selling cars to people who want to buy them. Profitability means how much money the dealer makes from selling those cars.
Retail refers to the sale of vehicles directly to customers, while profitability measures the financial gain from these sales. Both are key performance indicators for dealerships and brands.
"And then we've been rewarded with their volume, with their commitment, with their NPS scores and everything they've done."
NPS scores show how happy customers are and if they would tell friends about the business.
NPS stands for Net Promoter Score, a metric used to measure customer satisfaction and loyalty by asking how likely customers are to recommend a business.
"I think we cannot underestimate the power of a regional dealer."
A regional dealer is a car seller that works in one area or region and knows the local customers well.
A regional dealer is a car dealership that operates within a specific geographic area or region, often with strong local market knowledge and customer relationships.
"And also it's very important to say, so Cherry, so we as a group, Cherry group, so we joined the UK market. We spent almost more than 20 years to join the UK market."
Chery is a car company from China that makes and sells cars in other countries too. They were one of the first Chinese companies to sell cars outside China.
Chery is a Chinese automotive manufacturer known for producing passenger cars and exporting vehicles globally. It is notable for being one of the first Chinese manufacturers to export cars to overseas markets.
"if your question is, how did the quarter start? Well, new car volumes are definitely there. And everyone talks about automotive being especially resilient."
New car volumes mean how many brand-new cars are sold or bought in a certain time. It helps show if car sales are going up or down.
New car volumes refer to the total number of new vehicles sold or registered within a specific period. This metric is crucial for understanding the health and trends of the automotive market.
"And then it really starts to put pressure on your balance sheet. It affects cash. And, yeah, profitability is really difficult for lots of retailers at the minute and ours certainly."
A balance sheet is like a financial snapshot showing what a business owns and owes. Car dealers use it to see how healthy their money situation is.
A balance sheet is a financial statement that summarizes a company's assets, liabilities, and equity at a specific point in time. For car dealerships, a healthy balance sheet is crucial to manage cash flow and financial stability.
"What are you looking for from your manufacturer partners at the moment to improve that? Your profitability, what can they do for you, Richard?"
Manufacturer partners are the car companies that sell cars to dealers. Dealers work with them to get good deals and support to sell cars better.
Manufacturer partners are the car brands and companies that supply vehicles to dealerships. Strong relationships with manufacturers can help dealerships improve profitability through better pricing, incentives, and support.
"between those who are EV at Zev mandate pressured and those who aren't. You're sort of starting to see that the Chinese that are coming in and don't necessarily, they have some EV, but actually a lot of their new product now that's coming into market and selling in great volumes is plug-in hybrid, which gets them away from that massive Zev mandate pressure,"
A ZEV mandate is a rule that says car makers have to sell a certain number of cars that don't pollute, like electric cars. This affects which cars dealers can sell and how much they cost.
ZEV mandate stands for Zero Emission Vehicle mandate, a regulatory requirement that pushes automakers to sell a certain percentage of zero-emission vehicles like electric cars. It impacts manufacturers' product strategies and pricing, especially for dealers.
"since COVID, we've had a shortage of that golden sort of three to seven year old stock. And that is clearly continuing."
Three to seven year old stock means used cars that are between three and seven years old. These cars are popular because they are not too old but cheaper than brand new ones.
The term 'three to seven year old stock' refers to used vehicles that are between three and seven years old. This age range is often considered ideal for used car buyers due to a balance of depreciation, reliability, and remaining lifespan.
"We're seeing some pretty interesting trends around specific stock types like hybrids, which we've got the highest bid-gray ratio on the platform over the past six months."
Hybrids are cars that use both gas and electricity to help save fuel and pollute less.
Hybrids are vehicles that use a combination of an internal combustion engine and one or more electric motors to improve fuel efficiency and reduce emissions.
"is that 92% of dealers said in our survey that digital stock sourcing is now absolutely essential to be able to do the job right."
Digital stock sourcing means using the internet and online tools to find and buy cars for a dealership instead of going to physical places.
Digital stock sourcing refers to the process of finding and purchasing vehicles for dealership inventory through online platforms and tools, rather than traditional physical auctions or direct purchases.
"You can just connect private sellers directly with dealers, remove the middlemen, and therefore get better economics on both sides."
It means letting people who want to sell their cars talk directly to car dealers, so it's easier and cheaper for both.
This concept involves creating a platform or marketplace where individual car owners (private sellers) can sell their vehicles directly to car dealerships, bypassing traditional intermediaries. This can improve pricing and efficiency for both parties.
"there was a technology shift that just sort of tipped over, which was that the cameras on people's mobile phones reached a point where they were actually better than SLR cameras."
SLR cameras are fancy cameras that used to take really good pictures before phones got better cameras.
SLR (Single-Lens Reflex) cameras are traditional cameras that use a mirror and prism system to allow photographers to see exactly what will be captured. They were once the standard for high-quality photography before smartphone cameras improved significantly.
"to be able to take an amazing profile of their car. So that was definitely a kind of turning point."
It means taking really good pictures of a car so people can see what it looks like when they want to buy it online.
Car profile photography refers to taking high-quality photos of a vehicle to showcase its condition and features, which is essential for online car sales platforms to attract buyers and provide transparency.
"John, have you ever wondered why I, along with 14,000 other dealers, choose to partner with Auto Trader? Well actually, I didn't think so. I'll tell you anyway, with more than 84 million consumer visits every month, it connects us with more engaged car buyers and delivers more deals than anyone else in the UK."
Auto Trader is a popular website where people buy and sell cars in the UK. It helps car dealers find buyers and sell cars more easily using smart technology.
Auto Trader is a leading online automotive marketplace in the UK that connects car buyers and sellers. It offers tools and data-driven insights to help dealers optimize their sales and marketing strategies.
"And now, with the launch of buying signals, we'll have brand new insights on every deal, showing how likely a customer is to buy the car they're interested in."
Buying signals are clues that show if someone is ready to buy a car. Dealers use these clues to help sell cars faster and better.
Buying signals are data insights that indicate how likely a customer is to purchase a vehicle. These signals help dealers prioritize leads and tailor their sales approach to increase the chances of closing deals.
Term
AI
"Plus, as someone who set out to use AI and data as much as possible in my business, I've found their technology, data and tools genuinely invaluable."
AI means smart computers that can learn and help people make decisions. In car sales, AI helps dealers understand what customers want and when they might buy a car.
AI, or artificial intelligence, refers to computer systems designed to perform tasks that usually require human intelligence, such as recognizing patterns or making decisions. In automotive sales, AI can analyze data to predict customer behavior and improve sales outcomes.
"He was joined by Lena Rabiro. She's the brand director at Dacia UK."
Dacia is a car company that makes simple and affordable cars. Many people like them because they are good value for money.
Dacia is a Romanian car manufacturer known for producing affordable and practical vehicles. It is a subsidiary of Renault and has a growing presence in the UK market.
"David Cately, he joined. He's the director of automobile at Suzuki GB."
Suzuki is a car and motorcycle company from Japan. They make small cars that are popular in many countries, including the UK.
Suzuki is a Japanese automobile manufacturer known for producing compact cars, motorcycles, and all-terrain vehicles. Suzuki GB refers to the company's operations in Great Britain.
"It's more about what it means for legacy manufacturers and the actions they've had to take in order to achieve their mandate targets."
Legacy manufacturers are the old, well-known car companies that have been making cars for a long time, mostly petrol or diesel cars. They now have to change to make electric cars.
Legacy manufacturers refer to established, traditional car companies that have been producing internal combustion engine vehicles for many years. They face challenges adapting to new regulations and transitioning to electric vehicles.
"like pence per mile, you want to incentivize customers to buy EVs, but then you want to penalize them for it, potentially."
Pence per mile means paying money for every mile you drive your car. This helps the government get money from drivers, especially when cars use less gas or electricity.
Pence per mile is a cost metric used to charge drivers based on how many miles they drive, often proposed as a way to replace fuel taxes as electric vehicles use less or no gasoline. It can be used as a government policy tool to incentivize or penalize certain types of vehicle usage.
"You've then got the aspects of an electric car grant that in some ways raises the profile of EV, but can be quite again confusing for customers."
An electric car grant is money the government gives to people to help them buy electric cars. It makes electric cars cheaper and easier to get.
An electric car grant is a government incentive program designed to reduce the purchase price of electric vehicles to encourage adoption. These grants help make EVs more affordable for consumers but can sometimes cause confusion regarding eligibility and application.
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The Cardiola podcast is sponsored by Autotrader.
John, have you ever wondered why I, along with 14,000 other dealers,
choose to partner with Autotrader?
Well, actually, I didn't think so.
I'll tell you anyway, with more than 84 million consumer visits every month,
it connects us with more engaged car buyers and delivers more deals than anyone else in the UK.
And now with the launch of buying signals,
we'll have brand new insights on every deal showing how likely a customer is to buy the car they're interested in.
Plus, as someone who's set out to use AI and data as much as possible in my business,
I've found their technology, data and tools genuinely invaluable.
But when I do get stuck, which is let's face it, most of the time,
Autotrader is always on hand and committed to supporting us to get the very best from our package.
To find out how they can help you, visit trade.autotrader.co.uk.
Welcome back to the Cardiola podcast.
Well, I'm James Bagger, and today in a break from the norm, it's just me.
Well, that's partly because your usual host, John Ray, is very poorly.
He's got quite possibly the same loss of voice that I had last week, but we won't go into how he got that.
He's been very busy at Cardiola Live over the last couple of days.
He's had a very busy couple of weeks, so he's taken the day off.
So you've just got me today.
So in a break from the norm, we're going to do things slightly differently.
Yesterday, we welcomed the great and the good from the automotive industry
to the British Motor Museum at Gayden for our Cardiola Live event.
It was a fantastic day, one that I really, really enjoyed.
And in today's podcast, I'm going to bring you some of the highlights of those sessions.
Now, if you want to watch any of the sessions back in full,
you can log on to the Cardiola Live.co.uk website, bag yourself a replay ticket.
There's something like six hours of sessions for you to enjoy and fall on there.
Loads of really good stuff, we chatted to dealers,
both franchised and independents, car manufacturers,
including those Chinese Challenger brands that we've been talking about so much on this podcast.
We talked about electric cars, we talked about AI.
It was a brilliant day, and in this podcast, I'm going to bring you some of my highlights.
And I think I'm going to start with those Chinese Challenger brands.
It was a session that most people had asked me about in the lead up to the event.
And when I was particularly looking forward to myself.
On the panel, I had Farrell Soo.
He's the UK country manager for Cherry.
Greg Woplin, he's the head of regional development for Geely UK.
Steve Beattie was also there.
He's the deputy country manager for BYD.
And sadly, Victor Zhang, who was supposed to be joining us from a mode of Jake,
who couldn't make it due to personal reasons, but instead, he sent his head of sales.
Siraj Naran, Yat and Murthy, he joined us too.
So in this session, you'll hear what they had to say.
I'm interested to know why you think the British car buyer has accepted your brands so quickly.
I'm just let's start with the late, the latest included the panel for the entrance here.
Yeah, I'm going to call myself the youngest.
OK, good idea. I don't go away with that often.
And I think several factors.
I think there's some broader economic factors around this, around affordability,
value for money, which I think is driving sales for all of us.
I think there's a value proposition that customers can identify with.
And I think there is less loyalty around some of the brands that have had success.
And we've probably all worked for them over the years.
And I think that's driving success for all of us.
Steve, all by self.
Yeah, I guess I think for me, I think the British car buyer
have got a history of accepting new brands.
You know, if we go back to, you know, maybe not my time, but maybe John's over there,
maybe the 60s, when the 70s, when the Japanese would come in.
And then we obviously saw the 90s with the Koreans come in and now the Chinese.
I think there is a history and a legacy of new brands entering the UK market
and indeed being successful throughout their era.
I think that's probably number one.
I think number two is, again, the British public.
We're always looking for what's great value for money.
What can we get?
You know, certainly from a car buying experience is the best car that we can get right.
We all love our cars in the UK, and it's about trying to get the best car
that we can possibly get for our money.
And I think that we probably are in a position where we hit the market.
And then, of course, you've then got the new technology and with all the EVs
that are coming through, you know, lots of talk about EV, plug-in hybrid.
And of course, we're in a really good place for that.
But I take your point on those, the Korean and the Japanese brands.
But you guys have done it far quicker.
I mean, you look at some of the statistics.
I mean, the growth of your market share has been far faster.
Why do you think that is?
Because I work for someone called Stella, who is unbelievably aggressive.
So I think Stella started the business, was in the business two years after the chairman.
So she's been through the whole business.
You know, she started selling AA batteries at trade shows when BUID started 31 years ago.
So she's been through the whole thing.
So it's great to have almost an owner driver running BUID,
which I think helps drive that because there's so many overdrive drivers out here.
And I've been listening to many of you today.
And I think the owner driver really, really drives performance.
And for me, that's probably why the success have been so quick.
And of course, we've got some great cars and it's then just about making sure that we can,
you know, get them GB type approved and bring them across.
I mean, sorry. Yeah, go for it.
Another factor at play here, which is the product is fundamentally good.
That I think when the Koreans entered the market, when the Japanese entered the market
for the first time, they were lagging behind the industry as a whole.
I think what's changed aside from the general China speed of things
is we've entered the market with exceptional product at an exceptionally good price,
which means the acceptance is accelerated on the way up here on the on the A34.
We used to always just see the JLR transporters going in the direction of Southampton.
This time it was just a motor JQ transporters coming this way.
How have you managed to get accepted so quickly?
I mean, especially, I mean, JQ, second best selling car.
I think we call it hashtag China speed.
You know, that's what we're describing.
That's doesn't mean one speed.
We keep going. We go for volume.
We want to be successful in the market we're in.
There's a big saying in
Cherry International in the country for the country.
So we really want to be embedded in the country and be part of the culture.
I think that will take time, of course.
But for us, what's really worked is the product.
We cannot understate that enough.
The products are very strong.
They're good looking.
If I don't say so myself, we've got traditional dealer models.
So, you know, there were lots of talks about franchise
and all the various other aspects that come with it.
I think we kept it simple.
We said, let's go for a traditional dealer model.
And I think most importantly, staying agile,
listening to what the market's telling us
and evolving our go-to-market offers accordingly.
Fao, what's your take on this?
Yeah, I think many people talk about products.
So I was, I am the one who has a 10 years engineering background
in automobile many years ago.
So I really agree with that.
The product is very important.
And why we can have this, all the Chinese manufacturers
will have a very good success in the UK.
And I think it's most important thing
we're providing the cutting-edge technologies
to the UK customers.
And this is why we're different from the mentioned
to the Japanese and the Korean brands many years ago.
So we are doing something different.
And we're providing something different technologies
and different customer experience to the UK market as well.
And at the same time, I want to say is that we also carry
a lot with our partners.
So we grew up with our partners' profitability.
So this is another thing we want to pursue
the sustainable development in the UK as well.
So all of us, I think this is a key point
of all of our Chinese manufacturers, yeah.
Greg, there's a lot of dealers in the room here
who will be working out which of you,
which of your brands to back
without us becoming too, becoming too Dragon's Den.
Why should they back you?
It's the same for all of us, I think,
that there is a scale that is driving
the success of the brand in the UK.
I think what helps Geely specifically
is there's some context around the brand.
I think everyone in the room understands
the broader holding company.
So Geely acquired Volvo in 2010,
which gave us a lot of learning about the UK markets,
well, European markets in general.
But probably more importantly for our customers,
we can explain the context of who Geely are
whilst we are a new entrant brand to the UK market
as Geely itself, the actual holding company
has operated in multiple European markets
for a very long time.
And so I think that helps sales argumentation,
selling cars, there are some brands out there
who perhaps don't have the European history,
but Geely is in a lucky position.
I'm, BYD have built a big network of dealers rapidly.
Why have they backed you?
Yeah, I think we've got 132 dealers.
For anyone out there, I do have a few open points.
We've got 132 dealers that we've got live
and we've got 39 retailer partners.
I think there's a couple of reasons
in terms of we've got backed.
We were lucky that we had some pioneers.
BYD has been in the UK since 2013 with buses.
There's about 3,000 electric buses in the UK.
So we had a little bit of a heritage,
but we've got some early pioneers
that adopted BYD quite quickly.
And I think as Tesla led the way for the Chinese cars,
sorry, for the electric cars that supported,
I think with BYD moving into that way,
I think our opening of dealers has supported
the rest of the Chinese brand
in terms of people opening dealers quicker.
I think that's been one thing.
But I think for me, there's two things.
I'm really direct.
I'm really honest with my dealer network.
There's two things as far as I'm concerned,
I've got on my KPO.
One is BYD volume and the second is retail and profitability.
That's the only two things in terms of what I care about.
And I think finally, just sort of how it out,
there's a lot of independence in here.
Our dealer of the year last year for BYD was an independent.
So they were literally came to us in January.
They had an old Mercedes 1990s showroom.
Looked really pristine.
It was definitely a premium used car they sold.
They wanted a BYD franchise.
So we went through the process with them.
We awarded them the BYD franchise.
And then we've been rewarded with their volume,
with their commitment, with their NPS scores
and everything they've done.
So I think we're just really open as certainly as ours.
And I'm sure the rest of the guys here
are really open to doing different things.
I mean, on the emoter-jakey front, it's very similar,
you've taken on a lot of dealers.
And in some respects, the way that you want,
what you want them to do at the start
is not the same as some of these legacy brands.
If that was helped you, if those standards,
you're not as worried about.
I think we cannot underestimate the power
of a regional dealer.
When we first launched, people knew that dealer name
better than the new emoter-jakey.
So every week, when you look through customer surveys,
we do it as a team.
We look at 10 positive, 10 mediocre, 10 negative.
And a constant theme we see with the positives
is I've bought four cars from this dealer before
and I've bought the emoter-jakey is my fifth car with them.
You cannot buy that kind of loyalty.
That's gained from many years of great customer experience.
And this is where regional dealer hubs
have been so powerful for us.
And it's really gotten the name out for Mojakey
on our behalf, of course.
It's brilliant.
Foul, Cherry's joining the lineup here.
There's lots of Chinese brands
that we are writing about all the time.
We've got four on the panel here,
five on the panel that include Moda and Jakey.
How many brands do you think the UK can realistically support?
I will not say a detailed number
because I don't know either currently
because as I mentioned,
so we are pursuing the continuously developing
in the UK market.
So it doesn't matter how many brands in the future,
more importantly is that the business,
the profitability of our partners
and also the volume at the same time.
So if we can help and work with our partners
to develop our profitability of every partners in the future,
then it grows with everyone.
So if needed, we can develop more new brands.
It all depends on the market,
depends on the development of our business.
And also it's very important to say,
so Cherry, so we as a group, Cherry group,
so we joined the UK market.
We spent almost more than 20 years
to join the UK market.
We have started our Cherry business 29 years ago
and we started exporting cars for more than 20 years.
As well, we are the first manufacturer in China
to export the cars to the overseas market
and why we joined the UK so late
because we want to make sure we have the best preparation
for the UK market and our UK partners.
Now that was a fascinating panel
and I could see from the room
and the number of questions that came in from the audience,
how interested the industry was in these new entrants.
Are we called the panel our Chinese challengers?
And this could probably be the last time I used that phrase.
They rapidly become in the most important part
of the UK new car market.
And I think from that panel you've just heard,
you can sort of see why.
From these Chinese challenger brands,
though, we moved on to new car dealers.
Becker hosted a panel with Richard Ennis.
He's the CEO of Heading and Sam Luscombe from Luscombe Motors.
How are you finding the year so far for your businesses?
If I start with Sam, there's your closest.
Yeah, 2026 has started quite well.
It's been very busy.
We've introduced a new franchise on the 1st of March.
That's obviously taken up a lot of time.
But generally speaking, the first quarter of this year
has been, I think everyone's probably found
quite a buoyant news car market.
New car has been under margin pressure,
but volume has been there and has been good for us.
So all in all, we're going to be in a good position,
similar to last year.
Last year was very good.
This year is going to be similar,
which is always a challenge.
If you have a good year the year before, it's to try and match it.
And part of that has been to make sure that whenever you expand
and take on a new franchise, that the existing franchises
get the same amount of focus and attention that they used to do.
Richard, what about you?
Not quite the same, I would say.
Although I think we should have sat on the same couch
because that would have been quite cozy, wouldn't it?
Or I'll squeeze up.
No, I think, what would I say about that?
I mean, you know, Sam does a particularly good job
and he's a really successful young guy doing great
and it's really, really good to see.
But I just think there are lots of franchise retailers out there
who don't have that story.
And so what I would say, if your question is,
how did the quarter start?
Well, new car volumes are definitely there.
And everyone talks about automotive being especially resilient.
And I get that, but there's so much of a story underneath that volume.
So, you know, it's great that we can always produce something,
you know, circa two million new car market.
But, you know, and our volumes are pretty good in both the brands
that we represent, but profitability is really not.
And I think that's become an increasingly problematic
for lots of retailers because, you know,
I think that's been our challenge since 2024, then 25.
It will be again this year.
And it probably won't change until probably, you know, 28, 29 or 30.
And that's a really long stretch.
And then it really starts to put pressure on your balance sheet.
It affects cash.
And, yeah, profitability is really difficult
for lots of retailers at the minute and ours certainly.
So, yeah.
Well, I'm going to try and split this into two questions
because I think, understandably, your businesses are very different.
What are you looking for from your manufacturer partners
at the moment to improve that?
Your profitability, what can they do for you, Richard?
Me. So, yeah, that's a good question.
Probably lots.
I think that targeting is always really difficult.
And I think, you know, I think listening to Ian Plumer,
I think a while ago, I think he was saying in a presentation
that he made in 2019, there were 40 brands compete.
And I know it's like over 70.
And, you know, your target only ever goes up.
That puts a huge amount of pressure on teams and businesses.
But largely, if you're fighting that hard for market share,
then you always end up discounting your way there.
So, that makes it really difficult.
And so, if you'll send me, well, what could a manufacturing partner do?
Maybe help more on targeting
because we've seen before with sensible targets
or with supplier restrictions, you know, we can become more profitable.
And you always really want one more customer than car, if you can.
But the minute you've got more cars than customers,
it becomes really tricky.
And I'm talking about some really heavy losses.
Although, I would say that automotive has always been like that.
And we were chatting earlier in the foyer.
And we were saying, but, you know, for me, the biggest game-changer
is fundamentally the cost-based now of automotive retailing
has changed so much in the last five years.
And, you know, as a start, it's just interesting to me to think that in 2016,
I remember paying a car park attendant, really important job
in a busy after-sales environment,
16,780 quid on minimum wage for a 42 and a half hour week.
And he's now knocking on the door of like 28 and a half grand.
And when you consider, when you start to look at the GP levers,
it's like, geez, like, have we pulled any lever in the last 10 years
that's given us an extra 70% gross profit and it hasn't.
And so, you know, going back to what I was trying to say
with manufacturers' targets, new car profitability particularly,
is that it hurts you so much more now
because the cost base is just so big and so set.
And it's really, really hard now to achieve profitability,
unless you're some.
Yeah. Well, I was going to say, your business is smaller and more nimble.
You've added a new car brand.
How is that going to impact your profitability?
Why have you chosen them? Why are they a good fit?
I think in the first instance, it's about picking the right one.
We've had opportunities to expand over the previous few years
that you look at and weren't quite right for that business plan.
Can it return what it needs to return from the get-go?
We've decided that time is now.
You don't get opportunities all the time.
But again, it's a case of looking at it.
Can the business, is the staff, is our management structure in place
and able to take on the growth from 75 to 100 people?
I think it is. It is now.
But ultimately, it's a case of other costs than a spiral.
And cost control is one of the really important things
about maintaining a profitable dealership in 2026.
It always has been, but especially the things that Richard mentioned there.
The costs are getting out of control and margin isn't going with it.
In fact, margin is under pressure more and more than ever.
And you're sort of starting to see a bit of a disparity
between those who are EV at Zev mandate pressured and those who aren't.
You're sort of starting to see that the Chinese that are coming in
and don't necessarily, they have some EV,
but actually a lot of their new product now
that's coming into market and selling in great volumes is plug-in hybrid,
which gets them away from that massive Zev mandate pressure,
which means that they cancel operate with reasonable margin opportunities for dealers.
And you contrast that with those who are under massive Zev pressure
and having to massive discount EVs to force the issue.
And that's where you see the big, the big discrepancy really.
That was an interesting chat too, wasn't it?
And one of a few car dealer panels we hosted during the day.
Later on, I enjoyed catching up though with Tom Leith.
He's the co-founder and CEO of Motorway.
And we talked about how he built that business.
But he started by explaining some research the firm has carried out all about dealers.
Yeah, I mean, I guess this research reflects a lot of what's been talked about before.
We've had, as we all know, since COVID,
we've had a shortage of that golden sort of three to seven year old stock.
And that is clearly continuing.
I think what's interesting is it doesn't seem to be getting any better or changing.
So the fact that this year actually people are finding it harder than last is interesting.
We're seeing some pretty interesting trends around specific stock types like hybrids,
which we've got the highest bid-gray ratio on the platform over the past six months.
So we're certainly seeing changes within it, but those constraints are obviously still there.
And I guess it just underlines the requirement to be smarter about stock sourcing,
to use as many tools available and to really use the data.
And there's more tools available to do that than ever before.
And obviously that's what Motorway is here for.
We've got over 2,000 cars a day, all privately owned cars,
and this exclusive window onto these doorsteps that Motorway offers
just gives this extra headroom for dealers to find the right stock in that kind of constrained environment.
What else did your research find?
Yeah, I mean, I think the biggest thing that was interesting other than the fact that this year is
the most interesting thing that it's not getting easier,
because you kind of expect that stock to start flowing through,
is that 92% of dealers said in our survey that digital stock sourcing is now absolutely essential
to be able to do the job right.
And I suppose that's not a surprise, but I don't think it's all in one bucket,
because some digital sourcing is really just another way to buy stock from the same place in a different way.
Whereas what we are doing is something very different, which is this exclusive private stock,
which premotorway didn't really exist.
And so there are a lot of dealers that I think are now spreading that stock sourcing across these different areas,
and that's something we'd love to support people with.
Motorway has really changed the way that dealers like me buy cars.
It's radically shaking up the market.
Tell me about where did the idea come from?
Yeah, it's 10 years since we started motorway as of this year, which is kind of wild to me.
And I'm not from the car industry originally, so I started motorway with my co-founders.
We'd done multiple businesses together.
And when we approached this one, we were very ambitious and wanted to do something that we felt could change an industry.
And we'd always been fascinated with the car market and had really spotted this challenge on both sides of the marketplace,
where you have consumers who find it difficult to sell their car easily for a good price.
And at the same time, as we dug into it, really understanding from dealers that stock sourcing is the biggest problem.
And our fairly naive view is that this would be a fairly straightforward thing.
You can just connect private sellers directly with dealers, remove the middlemen,
and therefore get better economics on both sides.
If I knew then what I know now, I don't think we would ever have started it,
because the reality of that model is much more complex.
And as we've scaled, we've seen that we've had to build a lot more into that to make it work.
There was another trigger for it, actually, which is that in around the mid-2010s when we started,
there was a technology shift that just sort of tipped over, which was that the cameras on people's mobile phones
reached a point where they were actually better than SLR cameras.
And it was only at that point that it happened.
Motorway wouldn't have been possible prior to that moment.
And then when that did happen, that's when it made it possible for private sellers, anyone,
to be able to take an amazing profile of their car.
So that was definitely a kind of turning point.
So yeah, 10 years on now, we're now a business of 400 people.
We have over 7,000 dealers on the platform.
And the platform's just got a lot more, it's got a lot more powerful than what it does.
Clearly, we list over 2,500 cars a day from customers around the country.
We run our daily auctions for dealers, but we've also added in all these additional services like transport
and obviously payments, which has been a big lift for the platform.
The thing I would say I'm most proud of since that is that
some of the very earliest dealers that believed in the model,
people like George at Hilton Garage or Alex at Carbase,
I think we have a bunch of our early partners here,
they're still on the platform, they're some of our biggest buyers,
and we've built our business alongside theirs,
and I would say that's the thing I'm most proud of.
What's been the biggest challenge?
You've mentioned there were a few along the way,
you wouldn't have started if you'd known, which ones were the...
I could probably take the whole interview with challenges,
but the biggest thing we saw when we started to hit real volume was that
buying a car from a consumer can involve a lot of admin and can take a lot of time,
and that was really constraining the amount of cars that people could buy on the platform.
And so that's why we've had to build all of these additional things,
and the hardest thing that we've had to build is payments,
and we built that because that was the biggest pain point for our largest buyers,
having to buy cars, transfer funds to every single seller was really painful.
And so that's something we've invested a lot in over the last couple of years,
and now most of our dealers are now buying all of their cars through motorway pay.
We've processed over £10 billion worth of transactions through that,
and then we've added in things like stock funding integration
so people can draw directly from their stock funding provider in order to buy the cars.
And that's been a huge unlock, so there's a massive challenge to build
lots of FCA accreditation and all of those challenges to go through,
but now we're finding that dealers are able to buy way more cars
with a lot less admin and a lot more security,
so that's one that we're, again, really pleased that we've got scaled out
and there's still lots more to come on that.
I'm going to summarize a few of the questions here.
There are some frustrations when it comes to dealers buying on the platform
with the way that consumers list them.
I mean, it's obviously a challenge for you and it's a challenge for the dealers
because the car that turns up is not what they were expecting.
How do you go about solving that?
Is it on your agenda and is it something that will get better?
That's a great question and absolutely.
I mean, it's really the core of the business.
I think one of the biggest challenges in used cars generally
and one of the reasons why it took longer to shift on line than others
is this problem of trust
and the problem that these are used cars so everyone's individual.
And so the job that we need to do is to make sure that when
sellers are profiling their vehicle,
we're getting the absolute most accurate picture of that car that we can,
including all of the damage and condition of the vehicle.
And just for the avoidance of any doubt,
this is not a platform where sellers take photos of the car.
They instantly get posted on a platform and dealers then bid on them.
There's already a lot in there to try and get this as detailed as possible.
So we insist on 16 very specific photos of every car.
We insist on all damage being logged.
And then we have a whole manual review where we have over 200 people
in our customer support team who go through every profile, speak to every customer,
make sure they're a ready seller.
They spot additional damage.
They add it to the profile.
So that's always been critical to the product.
But we do need to go further to your point.
And we hear the concerns that when a dealer arrives at a seller's house
and the car isn't as described, that's a massive problem.
And it causes renegotiations on the doorstep,
which have to happen in those cases.
And no one wants to do that, right?
The ideal situation is the car is exactly as described and the purchase goes ahead.
The big unlock is AI in that.
And so we've been spending a huge amount of time and resource
in integrating AI into our profiling.
And that's been really successful.
The first bit that we've done is we feed back to sellers when the photos aren't good enough.
And we have well over a million photos uploaded through our apps every month.
And these are all structured data that our team tag.
And that gives us almost better training data than anybody else.
And so the next phase of this is to use this new technology
to be able to actually detect damage on these photos.
Pick up when people have missed something and ask them to go and take a close up of that scratch.
And so we've integrated a fair bit of that already.
And actually this year I think will be some of the biggest leaps that we've ever made in that regard.
So short answer, absolutely it's on our radar.
It's probably the biggest thing that we focus on because it's the biggest pain point that dealers raise to us.
And that is ultimately what drives everything that we do.
John, have you ever wondered why I, along with 14,000 other dealers, choose to partner with Auto Trader?
Well actually, I didn't think so.
I'll tell you anyway, with more than 84 million consumer visits every month,
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And now, with the launch of buying signals, we'll have brand new insights on every deal,
showing how likely a customer is to buy the car they're interested in.
Plus, as someone who set out to use AI and data as much as possible in my business,
I've found their technology, data and tools genuinely invaluable.
But when I do get stuck, which is let's face it most of the time,
Auto Trader is always on hand and committed to supporting us to get the very best from our package.
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Now, back to the podcast.
Batch hosted a session with a selection of more established car manufacturer MDs.
He was joined by Lena Rabiro.
She's the brand director at Dacia UK.
David Cately, he joined.
He's the director of automobile at Suzuki GB.
And Lorraine Bishdon is the MD for both Subaru and X-Peng.
It was a really interesting panel, this one, too.
And they had a lot to say about help and support for the UK car industry.
Right, Lorraine, I'm going to jump straight in with you, actually.
I mean, you're the MD of a pure EV car brand, X-Peng,
rapidly trying to grab some market share.
I mean, how do you think the government's EV policies are at the moment?
Do you think they're a bit counter-intuitive?
For example, pay-by-mile, et cetera, et cetera.
Yeah, so whilst I'm responsible for X-Peng working at International Motors,
we have a combination of both legacy and new brands.
So I have got a perspective where I can see it from both sides.
I think we would all agree in terms of the Zeb mandate that it presents its challenges.
From X-Peng's perspective, because in the UK we're an electric brand,
it doesn't impact us directly.
It's more about what it means for legacy manufacturers
and the actions they've had to take in order to achieve their mandate targets.
That's resulted in some distressful behaviour.
The EV car grant has taken a little bit of heat out
because some of those legacy manufacturers have benefited from it.
I think the pens per mile thing is interesting.
I think the timing wasn't great.
I think on a personal level, I think it presents challenges for rural drivers.
They don't have access to really good public transport infrastructure.
But I think, as we know, governments often have to socialise these changes in policies.
From our point of view, I think as long as they get the balance right
between still incentivising people to go into EV,
they've done that very well with company car drivers,
so helping to encourage the private retail customer to do that.
I think if they balance the policy, then it will work.
And for manufacturers like ourselves who've got one of the best in class efficiency
in terms of our battery technologies, then that will work for us.
David, you are responsible for one of those legacy brands.
Of course, the last year you launched your first pure EV.
I mean, I'm sure you've got some ideas on how the government is handling the EV transition.
I've got some very good ideas on how the government could handle the EV transition.
But in preparation, first of all, thank you for having me.
It's great to see everybody here.
And I think prepping for this particular session took a little bit of a step back.
If we look at where we are, we've got a market that's roughly two million units.
Probably a little bit more, a little bit less, depends on what happens.
I mean, a lot of people have mentioned it already.
We've moved from 40 brands six years ago to going to be 70 brands this year.
We've got the legislation you've mentioned.
We've got consumer behaviour aspects, the way they're changing.
We've got then the introduction of some conflicting situations for the government,
like pence per mile, you want to incentivize customers to buy EVs,
but then you want to penalize them for it, potentially.
You've then got the aspects of an electric car grant that in some ways raises the profile of EV,
but can be quite again confusing for customers.
You put that together with the geopolitical rhetoric going on in terms of war, FCA and other aspects.
And I think if we pause there for a second, there's a lot going on.
There's a huge amount of challenge in the industry, not just for manufacturers, but for people in the audience.
So I've got huge empathy for everybody in the industry at the moment.
However, it can also be seen as an opportunity rather than a challenge.
So I think we're in a position where we've got the three C's at the moment, which is competition.
We've also got confusion and confliction.
Competition, because there are so many brands now, however, that competition raises the profile of the industry
and gives us all opportunities.
We've then got confusion.
I mean, with the amount of messaging that's out there for customers, the amount of new products,
it's so confusing for customers.
And then for manufacturers, there's a bit of a confliction and for dealers,
because we want to be strategic, we want to plan long term,
and everybody, every manufacturer has their long term product plan and their strategic focus.
But then you've got the short term tactics of trying to hit mandate targets and achieve those aspects.
So you think about those three C's at the moment, that makes it incredibly challenging across the industry.
However, for us as a manufacturer, yes, we've launched an EV into a crowded segment of 30 brands.
The choice is massive, but it's about three words.
Simplicity, consistency, and agility.
So we need to be simple, which we have a reputation of being very simple.
Doesn't know if that's good or not, but we have a reputation of being simple, working with our dealer network.
We're consistent on what we agree, and we're very agile.
So from that perspective, as long as we can overcome those three C's with simplicity, consistency, and agility, we will achieve.
Nina, you're responsible for a brand that is very much focused on value for money.
You've got one of the cheapest EVs in the market.
Clearly, Datu is doing its side of the bargain here.
Could the government be doing more to help you?
I would say we can always do more to help.
But in terms of the ZD mandate, we actually monitor and control at group level.
So we are actually in a very strong position overachieving the market with the Renault R5 that was really brilliant and helping.
That is also doing the job.
We have one car, but even with one car, last year we landed at 17% of our EV, our sales were EV.
Can we do more? Of course we can do more.
The conversations that the SMNT is having with the government is reassuring for everyone.
It's good to see that they are open to review the targets because the ZD mandate was set a few years back in a totally different context.
So it's good that they are talking.
So any revision on those targets will be very welcome from all manufacturers, I suppose, including us.
At least to have the certainty what is going to happen and continue our journey to achieve 2030.
From car manufacturers to independent dealers, and Becca was joined by an interesting bunch with a lot to say.
Guests included Umesh Samani, he's the chairman of the Independent Motor Dealers Association, as well as running his own business,
his own news car business, specialist cars and stoke.
Stephen Douglas, he's the founder of really easy car credit and one of the men behind Dealer Way and the dealer pod.
And George Mannin, he's the director of Hilton Garage.
He was a chat about AI and, unsurprisingly, that pricked up my ears the most.
Following the point this morning about a third of customer engagement happening out of hours, how are you actually managing this on the ground?
Are you relying on AI chatbots or are you having to change your sales team's working hours?
So, we use auto-convert because we do a lot of finance.
It's mainly for the finance, but we also use it as a CRM kit.
We've built a lot of automations in the background, which auto-convert allows you to do.
And when a lead comes in after hours, auto-convert handles that application from start to finish.
And we're playing around now with different AI tools to sort of take that to the next level.
So, literally, I can't remember who it was.
I think Danny, when he was on before, he was explaining, you know, he comes in on the morning and everything's sort of like lined up for him because he uses the chatbots and what have you.
It's similar for us, but I think we're going to move it on further with some of the AI tech.
I've been heavily getting into AI.
I know it's like the most word that goes around, but it's true, though, isn't it?
AI is here to stay.
You know, it's not going to go away.
Every competitor in this room who's sitting next to you, if they're not using it, the person sitting next to him will be.
So, you've got to be on board with AI.
And just a little tidbit.
I play around with most of it.
And Claude is far in a way.
He's my best mate.
It's the AI tool that's out there at the moment.
I mean, I've got it to interview me, literally to interview me, ask me all about myself, all about me business.
And it's spent about an hour and a half interviewing us back and forth, back and forth.
And it literally built a file system on me, my business.
Me likes, me dislikes, what sort of cars I buy, all the rest of it.
And then now when I talk to it, it knows all the context.
And I've currently got to build in tools for me business to help run the business.
And I'm excited by that as well.
I mean, we've just moved to Delacate as a DMS system.
And that's made things a lot easier for us because they've got really open reporting access.
So we can pull anything we want, run them through AI and get any answer we want.
We don't need to put like a ticket in and request a new report that's going to get pushed two months down the line.
It's all there. And also the CRM is pretty cool as well.
But just like these boys, we're using AI almost every part of the business.
I would say it's like making a choice between digging a hole with a spade or with a digger.
You can look as clever as you want, dig with a spade, but we're going to do it a lot quicker with a digger.
I think I need to meet Claude, I think.
I'm still very old fashioned, very small, independent.
So obviously I don't have lots and lots of inquiries going through middle of the night.
But the odd one, I'll just handle it myself.
So no issues. I don't get loads and loads overnight.
So it's strange actually because all over the years I've never had many after our inquiries.
I think people tend to understand I close at six o'clock, I've got the odd email.
And I've sort of dealt with it.
I think a lot of people, Umesh has got people coming to him to sell their cars.
They're not coming to him in the evening, you're living the dream.
Absolutely, always living the dream.
So looking at current issues, one of the questions we've got here, recent fuel price spikes is obviously going up quite a lot.
Have you noticed a sudden shift in what consumers are looking for?
And are you seeing any petrol buyers suddenly wanting EVs? I don't know if you guys sell many EVs.
Is that something you?
Me personally, no, I've avoided it as long as I possibly can.
The retail price model that I'm working to, I haven't really entered that space yet.
I'm sort of like 15 grand maximum would be my retail price.
So it's coming for us, so I'm going to have to look on it.
But no, I haven't really noticed an answer to your question around fuel prices, a change of what people,
certainly our customers, that they're sticking to the trend for us to really...
I don't think we've seen the full impact of the fuel thing yet.
I think it's still very... I think people are talking about it.
I don't think it's had an impact as yet.
The question about EVs, I've not had any EVs at the moment.
I'm not anti-EV.
Interesting ability on what John was saying as well.
I think it's about education with, you know, educated customers.
And I get quite a few customers asking me about EVs.
They're always being sort of anti-EV.
And by the time I've finished with them, I've explained it could be the right car.
And it's amazing how they start opening and listening to it.
So it's just a personal thing. I've not had any.
I've been offered a few, but they've been the wrong model or makes that I've not been comfortable with.
But I would happily buy an EV.
I think there's a great market there.
And I think there's a massive, massive opportunity, especially for the independents,
to dive into it if they haven't done it yet.
What about you, George?
We probably got over the PTSD of the EVs about four years ago.
I mean, what I think about it makes me a lot of panic attack.
They're about five to 10% of our stock now.
But we try not to really think of them as this different car.
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