Dealers suffer salesman shortage Many truck dealers are finding it
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increasingly difficult to recruit and retain salesmen. Pinched margins are limiting their ability to pay decent commissions, and that could prompt sales staff to pursue careers in other industries.
managing profitability isn't there."
Mudie says the only answer is to wring more profit out of truck sales. That's going to involve training sales people to sell finance more effectively. "The margin you make out of selling a truck may be paltry, but there are better earnings to be had out of contract hire." It also means encouraging them to sell more extras; everything from communications equipment to mechanical handling gear. Richard Thompson, managing director of Hull Renault VI distributor Thompsons, shares Mudie's concern. So does David Baker, general manager of Sheffield Mercedes-Benz dealer Northside Trucks.
"The industry has to reward successful people, and you can't do that if you can't generate the revenue," he says. "And the better the quality of the sales people you employ, the less aftersales grief you're going to get." "It's not an industry that is attracting young sales talent," says Hugh Robertson Smith, managing director of Kettering, Northants-based Volvo distributor John R Billows.