29.03.2017 The UK’s Best Car Dealers Named in an All-New Auto Express Driver Power Programme

  • Britain’s biggest car satisfaction survey partners with Statista to find the top car dealers in the country
  • Auto Express Driver Power Best Car Dealer Survey launches new database of top 1,000 dealers for 2017

 

London, 29 March 2017: Every year for the past 15 years, Driver Power has revealed the best and worst models and the best and worst dealer networks in the UK, as voted for by car owners across the country. From Alfa Romeo to Volvo, we’ve identified the most enjoyable models to own and the most trustworthy dealer franchises in the country.

Driver Power is the largest car satisfaction survey undertaken in the UK, giving the very best knowledge and insight into the market place. Now, for the first time, Driver Power has teamed up with Statista, which operates one of the largest statistics portals in the world, to find the top 1,000 best car dealers in the UK and Republic of Ireland.

 

Best Car Dealers 2017

Brian Walters, Research and Insight Director at Driver Power, said: “Consumers want to know more than just the best new and used cars to own, they want to know the best dealers in their area to buy and service them. With over 16,000 new and used car dealers in the UK and Republic of Ireland, identifying the top dealers was no small task! We’re delighted to have worked with Statista to collate the Best Car Dealers 2017 list for the first time – we hope the database search function will prove invaluable to car-buyers.” 

 

The Best Car Dealers 2017 programme used two distinct online surveys: a survey of new-car buyers and a second “peer-to-peer” survey of car dealers and industry experts such as garages, repair shops and auto parts suppliers. Consumers were asked to rate the dealers with which they have experience on factors such as the demeanor of salespeople, the ability to negotiate a good price, the quality of the after-sales service, and the likelihood to recommend to a friend or family member. 

 

The unique peer-to-peer survey identified which car dealers (other than themselves) these experts would most recommend to their family and friends. A dealer’s scores from both surveys were then combined to create an overall score on which the top dealers were identified. This robust research approach yielded an extensive database of tens of thousands of data points from which Statista has identified the Best Car Dealers 2017.

 

(Download this chart here: https://www.statista.com/chart/8721/best-car-dealers-uk-ireland-2017/)

(Download this chart here: https://www.statista.com/chart/8721/best-car-dealers-uk-ireland-2017/)

 

 

Commenting on the new programme, Steve Fowler, Editor-in-Chief of Auto Express, said: "Finding a good, trustworthy dealer can be a big problem for car owners. So this survey provides them with a clear idea of local garages that will provide a high level of service at a decent price."

 

Thomas Clark, from Statista, explains the intention behind this ambitious market research project: “This ranking serves as a beacon for consumers who want to quickly find out where they can expect the best advice and service while looking for a car.”

“The new ranking also pays tribute to the fact that getting the best deal for your personal or professional transportation has become a lot more complex in recent years: once upon a time it was about a single-act purchase. Now dealers also provide financing and insurance services. This drastic change in demand and the complexity of the market with the addition of hybrids, e-cars and car-sharing, dealers are expected to help consumers in every step of the car purchase process. Forward-looking car dealers understand these trends – and act service their clients accordingly.”

 

To find the best car dealer near you, click here to search the Auto Express Driver Power Best Car Dealers database: https://www.statista.com/page/bestcardealers

Coverage on this new ranking can be found here: http://autoexpress.co.uk/bestcardealers

For more information about Driver Power contact Brian Walters on brian_walters@dennis.co.uk or on 020 7907 6743.

 

About Driver Power

Driver Power was launched as a reader survey in Auto Express magazine and over the last 15 years has grown into the largest in-depth car satisfaction survey undertaken in the UK. It taps into Dennis Automotive’s vast audience of car owners to give the very best knowledge and insight into the market place. Since its launch in 2001, the Driver Power survey has been completed by more than half a million people across the UK.

 

About Dennis Automotive

The Automotive Division includes Auto Express, Carbuyer, Classicandperformancecar.com, Driver Power, evo, Land Rover Monthly, Octane and Vantage. Automotive is the largest division at Dennis Publishing and houses a rich mix of digital, print and affiliate brands. From general motoring enthusiasts to classic and performance car fanatics; we’ve got it covered. 150,000 copies of Dennis Automotive’s magazines are purchased every month and Dennis Automotive titles have 70,849 subscribers. In October 2016 alone, its websites were visited by more than 7m global unique users, 4.6m of which were in the UK.

 

About Statista

Statista.com is a leading data and business intelligence portal. Statista provides its customers with considerable efficiency and cost benefits with regard to locating business-relevant information, primarily in the form of statistics, on a single highly-relevant platform. The portal offers a vast pool of data in German, English, French, and Spanish, which is collected in accordance with customer needs and expanded on a daily basis. The platform today already gives access to some one million statistics from over 18,000 sources covering more than 600 industries and offers – in three equal parts – data from Statista’s own collections, data from partners, and data from publicly available sources. Based on this data Statista constantly develops new, innovative data-based products such as, for instance, national rankings (e.g. “Best Employer”, “Best Law Firm”, etc.). Furthermore, Statista designs up-to-date infographics to the specifications of its customers. For more information about Statista please visit www.statista.com.