1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
12
13
14
15
16
17
18
19
20
21
22
23
24
25
26
27
28
29
30
31
32
33
34
35
36
37
38
39
40
41
42
43
44
45
46
47
48
49
50
51
52
53
54
55
56
57
58
59
60
61
62
63
64
65
66
67
68
69
70
71
72
73
74
75
76
77
78
79
80
81
82
83
84
85
86
87
88
89
90
91
92
93
94
95
96
97
98
99
100
101
102
103
104
105
106
107
108
109
110
111
112
113
114
115
116
117
118
119
120
121
122
123
124
125
126
127
128
129
130
131
132
133
134
135
136
137
138
139
140
141
142
143
144 
'...So-called pirate parts'
Page 113
If you've noticed an error in this article please click here to report it so we can fix it.
• FIVE or six years ago many people felt that the role of the wholesaler in the aftermarket was in terminal decline, Partco Group director Peter J Edge told the Financial Times Motor Conference at the Royal Lancaster Hotel, London. The assumption that eliminating the middle man would decrease costs was widespread.
"But middle men will always be around as long as we perform certain functions better than anyone else. The important thing to remember is that distribution functions have to be performed by someone.
"A distributor's role is to add the value of service to the products his partner, the manufacturer, makes, whether they are paint, components, equipment, consumables or whatever."
Edge said that his company has never made the pursuit of sales its primary objective, but, rather, worships at the altar of customer service.
Another important factor, he said, during his paper on "Manufacturing, components and the aftermarket: future distribution structures," has been the growth in repairers operating on a national scale.
This, he said, is one of the factors combining to put do-it yourself into decline and place the focus of attention back in the Nineties to the garage workshop. The vehicle parc is becoming more complex and, where 10 years ago fewer than 1,000 references covered the UK exhausts market, it now needs 4,000.
Edge said he has great confi dence that the independent sec tor will adapt to the increasing complexity of the market, adding: "And as for the so called 'spurious' or 'pirate' parts, I would just like to quote Joe Lewis, chairman of Unipart Industries, who said 'There are no spurious products, just good and bad products and the only ones that will continue to exist will be those that meet the quality demands of the market place ... good money will always drive out bad ... and good parts will also drive out bad'.
"And this from an organisation that was at the forefront of the copyright issue 10 years ago, when it was part of the British Leyland Group." Edge said that there is no doubt we will see the emergence of "Genuine Parts" operations on a European scale. They would gain market share. UK national distributors had diminished from
11 to five in six years.