10:00 am, December 29, 2025
Constellation Retail Group – the parent company behind Marshall Motor Group and used car dealer Cinch – clocked up a loss of £23.7m last year.
In freshly released accounts for the holding company, ending March 2025, the firm said revenues stood at £3.74bn, up nearly 2% on the year before.
However, the firm swung to an operating loss of £23.7m from a profit of £75.7m the year before.
On an adjusted EBITDA level, the group said it made a profit of £43.5m, but even this was nearly half the £81.6m it made the year before.
Marshall Motor Group makes up the bulk of the group’s trading activity, although the accounts do not break out a standalone revenue figure, with Cinch only included for the final months of the year.
Profit for Marshall Motor Holdings Ltd halved, though, down from £22.2m in 2024 to £11.2m in 2025.
Cinch numbers are only included in the holding company’s accounts from November 2024 onwards after a complicated restructuring of the dealer assets owned by Constellation Automotive Holdings.
The firm is a TDR Capital-backed group which also owns the auction house BCA and car buying business We Buy Any Car.
Separate accounts for Cinch Cars revealed it made another £100m loss for the year.
Marshall Motor Group accounts no longer give the full picture of the dealer group’s performance as these are now wrapped up in this holding business.
In those parent company accounts, the firm says Marshall profits fell due to a ‘lower number of franchises’ and blamed ‘difficult market conditions’.
It also blamed the ‘impacts of the ZEV Mandate’ on its lower margins.
Constellation Retail Group last year cashed in a £36.1m profit on the sale of its shares in the listed dealer group Lookers, which was taken private by Global Auto Holdings.
While that share deal resulted in a healthy profit, the group’s holding in Vertu has fallen £5.6m during the year, which has been booked as a loss. The group owns some 10.1% of Vertu’s shares.
Constellation Retail Group says its balance sheet ‘remains robust’ with net assets of £390.4m. This includes £65.1m for Cinch, which was moved within the group during the year.
The accounts reveal Marshall new car sales to retail customers were up 6.8% on the previous year to 39,191 cars while fleet sales dropped 18.5% to 15,643. In total it sold 54,834 new cars.
However, the firm said the ‘discounting’ of electric vehicles had ‘impacted’ its ability to ‘meet and achieve bonus targets’.
Used car sales – which is likely to include some Cinch-sold cars – was up 6.3% to 72,849 cars. Aftersales revenue, meanwhile, was pretty much static at £307.9m for the year.
Constellation Retail Group is run by Gary Savage, the former Mercedes Benz UK boss.
