9:32 am, March 23, 2025
Chinese car brands have become a popular choice for consumers, and car dealers have said they needed to join in or miss out.
Franchise car dealer brand director Aaron Carter explained at Car Dealer Live that taking on a Chinese car brand at DM Keith was vital for the business’ future.
Carter said: ‘For us, it was join or get left behind. We see the landscape changing and if we stay with the same portfolio that we’ve had for many, many years, we might see some of those legacy brands dying.’
The DM Keith boss joined JATO Dynamics Paul Hilton and Bo Yu on stage to discuss the impact of Chinese car makes on the UK market.
JATO conducted exclusive research into the impact of Chinese car brands into the UK market, finding that Vauxhall and Ford were impacted by their growth.
The UK has been the largest growth area for Chinese cars, and JATO’s research looks at how this will continue to shape the industry.
Bo Yu, JATO’s country general manager for Greater China, said: ‘So far we’ve seen the significant market share rise in the small and compact segments. This is mainly driven by the success of MG brand over the last two to three years, but we’ve also seen the progress in the middle sized segment as well.’
When questioned by host James Batchelor about negative opinions of Chinese cars, Yu added: ‘I think you can’t, let’s say, change the world in one day.
‘One of the topics that we discuss, not only with the industry, with people in China and UK as well, is the fact that you need to build your brand image and win the trust from whatever the consumer or the future partner in UK market is not easy.
‘There are lots of things to be done and done in the proper way to really build this positive image.’
JATO head of retail Paul Hilton added that despite the focus on price, that wasn’t the only driver for Chinese car growth in the UK explaining that their EV technology was among plus points for buyers.
DM Keith’s Carter added that they’ve found they had to increase services to meet expectations of BYD owners.
He said: ‘We’ve been on this journey with BYD for two years now, so it started off slower.
‘We’ve found actually we’re getting compared by customers to Mercedes and Porsche, and they’re coming into us and saying, the experience I expect from an aftersales perspective is the equivalent of what I’ve been delivered in the past.
‘So we’ve made errors of judgment in the early days, and certainly, probably maybe in the last six months, we’ve changed our mindset in terms of preparing our aftersales function to support the consumer as well.
‘It’s not just about the sale of the car,’ he said, ‘but customers then expect the service from an after sales perspective, so you’ve got to gear up early rather than later.’
You can download the full research from JATO by clicking here.
