2:57 pm, February 8, 2023
Sytner and CarShop’s parent company Penske Automotive saw its profits reach record levels in 2022, despite a slight dip in performance from the UK wings of the company.
Documents uploaded to the US outfit’s website reveal that Penske enjoyed a bumper year in the 12 months to December 31, 2022, with record levels of turnover and profit achieved.
Penske’s total revenue rose by nine per cent to a whopping $27.8bn (£23bn) last year. That resulted in a 16 per cent hike in pre-tax profits, which ballooned to an impressive $1.9bn (£1.6bn).
The accounts showed that the UK accounted for 30.4 per cent of the group’s income, compared to 31.2 per cent in 2021.
On this side of the Atlantic, Penske runs around 140 Sytner dealerships as well as more than 20 CarShop sites.
The CarShop brand, which is used in the UK and US markets, sold 71,242 used cars in 2022 – a 12 per cent rise on 2021. The outfit also enjoyed a 16 per cent hike in revenue, generating $1.72bn (£1.43m).
Like all firms, the group suffered from global supply chain issues, which caused its revenue from new car sales to drop by three per cent worldwide.
However, that hit was absorbed by rising sales of used cars, finance, insurance, servicing and parts.
A breakdown of the figures showed that BMW was the group’s most successful brand in 2022, making up more than a quarter (27 per cent) of all sales-related revenue.
Overall, premium brands – including Bentley, Audi and Mercedes – accounted for 71 per cent of sales revenue.
Commenting on the company’s performance, chairman and CEO Roger Penske said: ‘Our international diversified transportation services company produced record results in 2022.
‘We retailed more than 447,000 new and used vehicles through our retail automotive operations and over 20,000 new and used commercial trucks through our commercial truck dealerships, while our investment in Penske Transportation Solutions continues to benefit from the growth in its vehicle fleet.’
The latest release was also the first sighting of the firm’s Q4 results, covering the final three months of 2022.
Over the course of that period, Penske saw its revenue increase by 11 per cent to $7bn (£5.8bn), of which 28 per cent came from the UK market.
CarShop sold five per cent fewer used cars over Q4 – down from 14,815 to 14,028.
Penske added: ‘I am also pleased to report a strong fourth quarter driven by demand for new vehicles in both our automotive and commercial truck dealerships, coupled with continued service and parts revenue growth and expense control.
‘On a same-store basis, fourth quarter retail automotive new unit sales increased 11 per cent and commercial truck new units increased 36 per cent, while service and parts revenue increased six per cent for retail automotive and 16 per cent for commercial trucks.’
A full financial statement and annual report are due to be published by the company soon.
Car Dealer Live – the future of the car dealer – exclusive conference features talks from leading car dealers, Google and Auto Trader among much more. Find out the full event details and book tickets.
