10:30 am, December 28, 2012
BROADBRIDGE Heath Motor Company has been placed in administration as ‘the recession claims another victim’.
The Peugeot dealership is set to close its doors on Monday with 33 members of staff losing their jobs.
An administrator told the West Sussex County Times that the garage was another ‘victim of the recession’ and that the reason behind the closure was ‘purely financial’.
He added that customer orders were to be fulfilled by other local dealers as the dealership wound down and the site’s 100-car stock would be sold off before being sent to auction.
The local paper reports that the Broadbridge Heath Motor Co. closure is the second dealership failure in the area in just five months. Earlier this year Stevens Vauxhall was closed after management failed to find a buyer. The Vauxhall site had been selling cars from Horsham since 1963.
The news of another dealership entering administration smacks in the face of official figures from the SMMT which show new car sales have been RISING this year.
In 2012 new car sales have climbed steadily every month compared to 2011, however many dealerships are still struggling. Industry whispers suggest the statistics do not correlate with what’s actually happening on the ground.
What do you think? Are industry figures misleading? Is it really far tougher out there than reports suggest? Let us know by commenting below or tweeting the editor @CarDealerEd.
