A car dealership is a business that sells new vehicles. A car dealership can sell vehicles of a single brand or else be multi-brand.
Car dealerships can also carry out complementary activities, such as selling used vehicles, spare parts, providing after-sales service, offering financing solutions, or even maintaining vehicles.
Contrary to popular belief, car dealerships are not franchises and therefore do not operate as a network.
Become a car dealer
In order to become a car dealer, it is essential to have various skills.
First of all, it is then preferable to have already exercised a job in the automobile , in order to better know the particularities of the sector.
Skills in sales and customer relationship management are just as essential to manage all exchanges with suppliers and customers.
Obtaining a BTS in Negotiation and Customer Relations is therefore recommended and can be supplemented by management training.
Steps prior to opening a car dealership
As with any type of business, opening a car dealership involves carrying out a certain number of preliminary steps.
The first step, before opening a car dealership, is therefore to carry out a market study. In particular, this makes it possible to take stock of the current situation in the automobile market and to study future trends in terms of vehicle purchases.
Before embarking on a creation project, study the regulations applicable to dealers beforehand, so as not to take any risks.
You must then choose the concept of your car dealership, whether you sell one or more brands.
It is also essential to define the legal status of your concession, namely SARL, SAS, SA, etc.
Thus, after having defined your project as a whole, you can then look for financing solutions, as well as the location of your future dealership.
To inform about the opening of your car dealership, deploy an appropriate marketing strategy on all types of channels (radio, display, web, press, etc.).
Finally, end with the employee recruitment phase. In order to be able to count on a multidisciplinary team, plan the recruitment of car salespeople , mechanics, technical advisers, receivers, as well as a workshop foreman.
If ever all these steps to open a car dealership seem insurmountable to you, you still have the possibility of taking over an existing dealership.
