We believe in promoting our clients, not ourselves so we’ve extracted a few snippets of success in this section, so you see what we can do for you.

We’re helping many international clients deliver high performance throughout their networks. Please see some of our customers’ success stories, supported by our team.

Client:  BMW - Portugal

Introducing a programme to help dealers to increase showroom traffic and sell more used cars.

Location: Portugal - May 2011

The Brief: There can’t be many countries in Europe harder hit by the banking crisis than Portugal.  The car market has borne the brunt of economic belt tightening and the short term outlook for premium sector used car sales is not good.  Our brief from BMW was to come up with a marketing idea to help dealers generate customer interest and sell more used cars.

The Method:

We identified the UK’s leading showroom event agency- Rhino Design and their famously successful VIP Event formula as the best solution for Portuguese dealers.

Two dealers in the Lisbon area were identified to pilot the programme:  Baviera, Portugal’s largest BMW dealer and the smaller Dealer AMG Car.  Working closely with Rhino, AMS consultants briefed the dealers and managed the set-up and implementation process to ensure success.

The VIP Events ran for 4 days at each dealer between May 5th  and May 8^th.

The results: 

The VIP Events were a fabulous success for both Dealers.  They proved beyond doubt that Portuguese used car buyers respond to a good offer and an exciting showroom based event just like British customers – by placing orders.  Both dealers did at least one month’s worth of business in just one weekend!

Gonçalves, president of the AMGonçalves group said  "This initiative has a fantastic success and about 30 to 40% of the people that visit the event will buy a vehicle".

This image shows the showroom at Baviera:  Normally exclusively for new cars but during the VIP Event animated with the eye-catching Celebrity merchandising and packed with used BMWs all on special offer.


Client:  General Motors International Operations - India

Used Car Training for Emerging Markets

Location: New Delhi & Mumbai

Background: The new car market in India grew by 31% in 2010 and is expected to grow by a further 40% in 2011.  General Motors plans to triple its sales in India to 300,000 units over the next 2 years and with this comes the need for dealers to handle used cars.
In general, many dealers in India are not yet in the business of used car retailing.  As the market continues to grow, customers will be expecting dealers to take their existing car in part exchange and for a competitive price; a price that will help minimise the overall cost of ownership and make switching to another new car even easier.

The Brief: General Motors International was looking for a training organisation with the skills required to steer their dealers into the business of used car retailing.  Key to this would be gaining dealer commitment by helping them develop a business plan to support their investments and sharing best practices used successfully in other markets.

The Method:
AMS ran workshops in New Delhi and Mumbai with approximately 50 dealers in total. 

Workshops were split into 4 key sessions:

1.    Why it’s important to invest in used cars and what is the profit potential
2.    A turn-around case study from Europe and the 10 keys steps to establishing a successful used car operation
3.    How to measure success, a look at the most important key performance indicators and what they mean for the business  
4.    Building your own dealer business case and agreeing to go back and implement the plan
Dealers were split into teams, they chose a dealer name and decided upon a spokes person who would summarise and present the consolidated learning.

The Business Plan:
In session 4, dealers were presented with a business case template for completion.  The business plan was developed by AMS specifically for this assignment with the needs of dealers in emerging markets central to its developments.  Dealer feedback was excellent; the business plan successfully gave an insight into what managers must consider in order to build their own highly successful used car operation and how to make a start.

The business case covered the most important decisions as follows:

1.    How much space can I afford to allocate to used car stocks?
2.    How much money do I need and what should I expect from my investment return?
3.    What adjustments will I need to make to my staffing levels?
4.    How many extra hours will I need to sell in my workshop?    
5.    .....................You’ll need to phone AMS if you want to know more!

The follow up: To get started, each dealer was given access to the resource center on the AMS web site. From our web site dealers could download all the training materials and a range of best practice ideas such as managing overage stock and common process documents, for example, appraisal forms and preparation schedules.

To date, these materials have been downloaded by more than two-thirds of those who attended the workshop.

And finally, the results:





Darren Atkin from AMS (centre bottom) with Managers from General Motors and Business Owners / Dealer Operators from the Chevrolet network in Mumbai

Client:  Major European volume vehicle manufacturer

Location: Germany

Objective: To provide our client with warranty expertise to assist them in the development and implementation of an innovative new vehicle warranty strategy.

The Brief: The client team responsible for implementing the strategy was faced with significant challenges:  The team wanted an effective warranty system but at the lowest possible cost.  They needed a better understanding warranty agency pricing with respect to the claims fund, administration charges, underwriter profit and taxes.
At the same time our client had to ensure that their innovations were totally compatible with insurance regulations especially regarding insurance tax and VAT.

Method:
1. AMS began with an in depth review of the strengths and weaknesses of our client’s proposed warranty solution; the operating processes, forecast costs, claims risks and customer benefits.  We reviewed the proposed premiums and compared the warranty agency’s forecasts with our client’s own data.

2.  We Analysed the other cost and service elements of the warranty agency’s proposal and made recommendations accordingly.

3. We considered the regulatory framework and suggested options which were more tax efficient and better suited to promoting service loyalty than the traditional routes.

Key AMS contributions

• AMS reviewed our client’s assumptions regarding the likely costs and risks associated with long term warranties and identified areas where more accurate forecasts were available.
• We identified ways to improve the warranty product design in order to make cost savings and showed how the warranty agency’s prices could be reduced.
• We designed a business format which could cut costs by operating outside normal insurance regulations.
• We identified additional warranty suppliers with the experience and operational capacity to provide a good service in order to be invited to submit a competitive quote.

Results: Our client was able to confidently redesign important elements of their strategy.  They were able to develop a better warranty for their dealers and customers and achieved annual cost savings worth Euro millions.

Client:  International training company

Location:  Germany

Objective:  AMS was briefed to write a training manual for a skills based one day used car workshop focusing on used car appraisals & valuation:  Target audience - franchised dealer sales executives.

Results:  Our client reported that the work by AMS was very successful and there were only minor changes required to the course material and that this was a reflection of the high standard of materials that were developed by AMS.  The client added “We are looking forward to developing another course with AMS in the near future. Thanks again, I have really enjoyed working with you on this project.”

Client:  Premium brand motor manufacturer

Location:  Europe

Objective: AMS was briefed to provide a team to manage the implementation of the brand’s used car strategy and create a remarketing department.  This is an ongoing project.

Results:  Our client reported  “In conclusion you and the team performed an outstanding job during 2009; over 120% above target.  Congratulations for that.  We count on you for another challenging new year.”

Client : Premium / niche brand motor manufacturer

Location:  Sweden

Objective: AMS was briefed to provide consultancy support for 6 months for selected franchised dealers to improve their used car business.

Results:




Client : Leading European Warranty Company

Location: Belgium

Objective: Increase used car warranty sales to non-franchised used car dealers

Results: After implementing an in-house strategy with disappointing results the task was outsourced to AMS.  Sales increased as soon as our team was deployed.  In 12 months we increased monthly sales six-fold.  The thriving, outsourced operation is now ready to be handed back to our client as a fully operational sales success.