Author: Robin Roberts

The move towards electric cars is going to be a shock for many car dealers, according to a new survey. While they are generally satisfied with the manufacturers’ plans to introduce battery electric vehicles and hybrids, they are far less happy about their dealership costs and how they are going to make money out of them in the longer term. Already coping with new restrictions surrounding working with coronavirus-19 and dealing with customers, the dealerships are embracing many more on-line solutions to contact, selling, buying and servicing vehicles. Dealers who embrace active contact like telephoning and emailing or texting customers…

The UK plant builds cars for the UK and Europe and the Japanese car maker is preparing a new global production plan which will see a 20% reduction in capacity and that is expected to see it concentrate on the Far East and USA. There was a report this week that it is about to announce the closure of its pickup and ev plant in Barcelona which employs over 3,000 people. Nissan said it plans to make a statement about global production plans on 28 May and its impact on the 6,000 people employed there as well as hundreds more…

New models are coming to join an ever growing market place and their numbers are expected to swell very quickly once the coronavirus lockdown ends and some semblance of normality returns to showrooms. So it was interesting to study the results of a valuation survey compiled by Vanrama which looked at the current crop of cars and how they hold onto prices over different durations, typically what buyers have been working on for several years. There are some fascinating, even eye-opening as well as eye-watering, figures to swallow, even for well established brands. The depreciation of electric cars over 5,000…

A van has become Britain’s best selling vehicle during the coronavirus lockdown according to the latest figures from the Society of Motor Manufacturers and Traders. While the Mercedes Sprinter delivered for dealers the chaotic charts saw the pure electric Tesla Model 3 top the passenger car list, but even that couldn’t match the Sprinter. Overall, the previous low for car sales was immediately after WW2 and in February 1946 the market saw 4,044 new cars registered. It is not recorded when a van previously topped the UK sales charts. The news comes as SMMT releases its latest new car market…

In a period of continually rising prices, one business is delivering potentially big savings and changing the way thousands of owners get their cars serviced. It’s also giving an unexpected boost to hard pressed independent garages. We are all accustomed to doorstep deliveries and collections and Fixter is what is nowadays termed a disruptor in the motor repair business. Co-founder and chief executive officer Limvirak Chea’s Fixter company essentially links independent garages with those who need work on their cars and offers guaranteed servicing and repairs between doorstep collection and return by an agent at times to suit the customer.…

A South Wales software development expert has joined forces with a furloughed pilot to get a potentially lifesaving project off the ground. Richard Blackwell of Tiger Bay productions has been working with temporarily grounded Flybe pilot Josef Mauris to 3D manufacture visor face-shields and using a friends’ network of about 40 people to make, assemble and distribute they have about 2,500 in stock. Using crowd-funding to buy the raw materials for the 3D printers they plan to ramp up production from the original 500 a week using 15 printers to thousands a week as more printers join the production. Richard,…

You have to admire Jaguar, which has gone through tough times yet always produces some head-turning desirable cars.  The latest Jaguar XE saloon is a good case in point and offers a very broad range of eye-catching four-door saloons in rear and all-wheel-drive as it pitches against predominantly German rivals as well as Swedish saloons. The range explained: There are approximately 50 models in the four-door range spread over eight trim levels with rear or all wheel drive, petrol or diesel engines, six-speed manual or eight-speed automatic transmission  from £31,500 to £45,835, but the flagship 600hp 5.0V8 is a staggering…

Auto Vivendi, one of the UK’s leading providers of supercar-related lifestyle experiences run by two Welshmen, has taken delivery of six Aston Martins at the company’s sports car home and global headquarters, Gaydon.   The six Aston Martins comprise Vantage, DB11 Volante, DBS Superleggera and three DBS Superleggera Volantes, and account for 25 per cent of Auto Vivendi’s collection of cars amassed by its Welsh directors Richard Thomas of Maesteg and Craig Williams, from Usk.  Offering a breadth of characterful supercars to cater for every occasion, this latest acquisition spans each model currently offered by Aston Martin, this is the first…

When a car-maker gives a model a name it risks being memorable, forgettable, laughable, unpronounceable or ultimately it means little, but in the case of the Skoda Superb, it actually means a lot. It’s the 125th anniversary of Skoda in 2020 and for 85 years it has been making models with the name Superb. There’s probably a strange truth in the fact that many people will have actually ridden in a Skoda Superb but, for a variety of reasons, they may not have appreciated that particular taxi ride. To me it seems the Superb has become the taxi of choice…

Every manufacturer loves to cram features into their model to make as much money as possible, but the Suzuki Jimny has something few ever include, a free smile. The standard-spec smile is something so many modern cars lack but the simple Suzuki has it in spades. And thensome. The original Suzuki Jimny dates from 1970 and the Light Jeep 10 which was remarkable for its abilities against much more powerful 4×4 rivals, but it was the SJ series which really won the hearts of Europeans and UK buyers in the 1980s and for the best part of three decades afterwards.…