Tougher truck market dents Enza’s sales

COMMERCIAL vehicle dealership Enza Motors has had to contend with a drop in profits following a fall in demand for new trucks and vans.

 Accounts for the Warrington-based company, which owns four Mercedes Benz dealership sites, show that in the nine months to December 2009 its sales fell to £48.8m – down by 2 per cent on an annualised basis, but its pre-tax profits for the period also dropped to £289,613 – a 45 per cent annualised drop.

Managing director Roy Reed said that the company had done well to hold its own in a market where sales of new trucks fared particularly badly – dropping by around 40 per cent. He added that Enza had also undergone a period of consolidation last year, following the closure of a showroom on Bury New Road in Manchester and its relocation to Trafford Park.

He said that the latter site, which also has its own parts and service department, was a much better location for its core customers and added that the number of “walk-in” customers the firm picked up as a result virtually doubled from 75-80 up to 150.

“We’ve traded reasonably well throughout a difficult period,” he said.

Reed added that the firm had managed to hold onto all of the sales teams at its four key sites  – Trafford Park, East Manchester, Warrington and at Stoke-on-Trent, although overall employee numbers have fallen to 253 from 33 following a reorganisation of its service teams.

Reed said that sales since its year end had remained uncertain, with fleet van and truck sales holding up much better than retail sales.

“I don’t believe we’re moving back to the level of sales we were seeing before the credit crunch – if anything they’ve eroded slightly – but the decline is now manageable. We’re not panicking,” he said.

Earlier this year, the company received a Mercedes Benz CharterWay Dealer of the Year award as a result of the amount of motor finance business it had written.