9:19 am, September 11, 2025
Berrow Motors boss Joe Betty has admitted ‘I couldn’t be the leader I wanted to be’ as he opened up on his shock decision to close the used car dealership.
Car Dealer reported last month that the popular dealer was shutting up shop when it came to used car sales, after battling rising costs.
Betty was best-known for documenting his experiences in the motor trade via his Shifting Metal YouTube channel, which currently has almost 130,000 followers.
He has now appeared on the most recent episode of the Car Dealer Podcast, to explain his decision and outline what comes next for the business.
While the public facing dealership has now ceased operations, the firm is continuing to trade cars and Betty will be continuing to make content.
However, he says that he has been ‘spread too thin’ for too long now and is looking forward to running a ‘leaner machine’.
Explaining his decision to hosts James Baggott and Jon Reay, he said: ‘Balancing everything up and weighing everything up, I’ve decided that actually, I do think that the motor industry and used car sales are just getting harder and harder.
‘I think that crucially, everything is just so expensive. Even over the last six years I’ve been doing it has got so ridiculously expensive that I’ve just been squeezed and squeezed.
‘When I weighed it up, I just thought that making content and some of the other businesses that I’ve set up to service the motor trade, that’s probably where my time deserves to go.
‘I spread myself too thin and so that’s why I, while we’re not closing Barrow Motors as a business, I have closed down the physical site where we were.
‘We are just going to run a leaner machine, not selling to the public. I think I’ve had my fill of that, to be quite honest. We’ll do some trading of cars.
‘The way I explained it to someone the other day was rather than having a car dealership and documenting what’s going on, we’re going to be having a YouTube channel that kind of has a car dealership on the back of it, in a sense.
‘Everything will have videos at the forefront of the mind.’
‘It will be 10 times better for everyone’
During his appearance on the show, Betty was quizzed on how his staff took the news of the closure.
He paid tribute to his staff’s understanding and said that he did not think the news would have come as a shock.
The 37-year-old added that his workers have all now found alternative employment and will be ’10 times better’ working in new environments.
He added: ‘I genuinely think everyone will be better for it and in a better place enjoying their job and their life a little bit more.
‘I take full responsibility because I spread myself so thin and wasn’t there to really be the leader that I wanted to be.
‘I kind of hoped that I could say “these are the rules, this is how you do everything and off you go,” but it just is unrealistic.
‘It doesn’t really work that way and I think under someone else’s leadership, where they really are 100% on something, it will be 10 times better for everyone.’
The Car Dealer Podcast, sponsored by Carwow, sees an industry guest join our hosts to discuss the motor trade’s biggest headlines of every week.
A full list of the stories discussed can be found here.
You can listen to all episodes of the Car Dealer Podcast on Spotify, or wherever you get your podcasts.
