Guest Blog

Despite the absence of any blogs for the last three weeks, I’ve not actually been away.  The days have shoby getting the ICDP Omni-Channel Cookbook finally completed after some months on the ‘to do’ list (more details here), some interesting client meetings, a classic car rally with my son and several days of hard labour under a baking sun (yes ...

In our regular feature Professor Henry Blair, Senior Counsel at Motor Industry Legal Services (MILS), answers your questions. In this month’s edition he looks at the impact of the Digital Markets, Competition and Consumers Act (DMCCA) on the motor sector   Q: What is the Digital Markets, Competition and Consumers Act, and how important will it be? A: Sarah Cardell, ...

I had some time off last week in order to complete various bits of work around our house.  I won’t bore you here with all the challenges faced but I was reminded of discussion I had many years ago with Sir John Egan, the former Chief Executive of Jaguar Cars, who then went on to the same position at the ...

Last month dealer management systems (DMS) group CDK Global was hit in the US by a cyber-attack which results in it closing down its cloud based software for US dealers. Here Andy Thompson, Offensive Cybersecurity Research Evangelist at CyberArk offers dealer CEOs practical advice to ensure they keep safe and prevent themselves from falling victim to cyber crime in the ...

We’re all familiar with the concept of the connected car, mainly from the point of view of how it affects aftersales with the ability to provide over-the-air updates and to capture data from the car such as fault codes, wear levels and other information that would improve planning of aftersales needs. This in itself is not straightforward as the independent ...

The transition to net zero continues to grow, with over 1 million electric vehicles (EVs) on UK roads by the end of May. The latest SMMT figures show that while the pace of growth may be slowing, the number of BEVs registered year to date is nearly 10% up on 2023. The proliferation of BEVs will require automotive retailers to ...

I generally try to vary the subject of my blogs each time both because it reflects the different discussions and experiences that I have in the course of every week but also to address the varying interests of readers from across the different parts of our industry. This week however I will make an exception by returning again to the ...

We are often told that the customer experience in dealerships has been transformed in recent years through more diverse recruitment practises and improved training, reinforced by ongoing customer satisfaction surveys and mystery shopping.  You would therefore expect to find this reflected in feedback from buyers.  We are also all too aware of the weak demand from retail customers for battery ...

The acquisition of ATG by Keyloop brings together two of the largest technology companies that support a large number of franchised and independent dealers across the UK. The question for the industry is whether the coming together of these two companies will benefit retailers. The news made headlines a few weeks ago, and the deal is set to transform the ...

The Tesla share price has dropped by 45% since the end of December on the back of a series of negative news stories and announcements.  In most listed companies this would be a source of huge concern, but despite the fall, the market capitalisation of the company remains over seven times greater than that of Toyota, and Elon Musk continues ...