Leicester squares up to expectations
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Although Leicester has been hit hard recently, Sean Booth, who has opened a new Volkswagen van dealership in the city, believes the prospects are good.
Words / Images: Steve Banner With a third of its households claiming benefits — thanks to the recession and widespread job losses in manufacturing — Leicester is going through some tough times.
This has not, however, deterred Sean Booth from opening a new Volkswagen dealership in the city. As owner of Leicester Van Centre, he believes sales prospects are good, given the strength of the VW range. Certainly the only way has to be up, given that Leicester has been an open point in the manufacturer's UK van network for the past eight or so years.
While larger companies have taken a hammering, Leicester is packed with smallto medium-sized family enterprises that operate light commercials, says Booth. "We also have Walkers Crisps, so we'll be knocking on its door."
When asked how many vans he expects to sell annually, Booth says: "Potentially, we're looking at about 300 new and 250 used," he replies. -Ideally, l'd like us to achieve those figures tomorrow but, realistically, we're looking at a five-year plan. If we can reach those numbers after three years. I'll he happy.
"On the sales front, I think things are getting better and that we've timed the van centre's opening perfectly."
Contract hire
He detects increased interest in contract hire. "Bigger businesses like it — it's become a favourite among them — because it involves fixed and predictable payments," lie says. "They can include a maintenance package if they want, and they don't have to worry about disposal.
-However, a lot of self-employed people prefer hire purchase because they don't want to hand their vehicle back after three years; they may want to keep it."
Transporters should do particularly well for the dealership, Booth believes. "Crafters should do well too, but Mercedes-Benz's Sprinter is more widely recognised in that market, so we're going to have a lot of work to do," he says. -Transporters are more widely recognised than Vitos, so that gives us an advantage."
With Mertrux representing Mercedes-Benz in the city and Sandiehffe representing Ford, there is no lack of competition for sales "All the key van franchises have a presence," he says.
Infrastructure
Shared with a VW passenger car retailer Booth owns that business too, along with several outlets through his company Parkway Derby the three-acre-plus, I250,000 St Margaret's Way van centre sits on what was occupied by the previous VW commercial vehicle dealership.
"Consequently, much of the infrastructure we need is still here," says Booth. Van facilities include a 170m2 showroom, four dedicated workshop bays and equipment to carry out Class 7 MoT tests.
The site is close to the city centre, which makes it expensive to operate, Booth admits, but the presence of the car and the van franchise, plus a bodyshop, allows the necessary economies of scale to be achieved.
"The only difficulty is that access from the main road is slightly awkward," he remarks.
The dealership does not offer late-evening servicing, although Booth would consider doing so. "However, the workshop is open all day on Saturdays," he says. And his thoughts on overnight servicing? "I think we'd have to generate a lot more business before we went down that route." he replies.
Stock source
The operation's second-hand stock is derived from a mixture of sources, including demonstrators, courtesy vans, ex-contract vehicles from VW and trade-ins. "We mainly sell used VWs, but if we take in a nice retailable non-franchise vehicle as a part-exchange, we'll have a go at selling it." Booth says.
Booth and his colleagues do not lack experience with VW vans. "We also run a VW van centre in Northampton and we are authorised repairers in Kettering," he says. The Northampton site charges a lower hourly rate for servicing commercial vehicles than it does for cars. "That's because the former tend to be in the workshop for longer and generate a bit more business," he says.
"If a van comes in two years after first registration, it probably would have done between 60,000 and 70.000 miles, and the brakes and other things will need attention," he says.
If a car comes in after two years, however, then all it probably needs is a lube service," he adds. "It will be in and out in an hour." In