It's that time of year where several suppling manufacturers choose to announce and present members of their network with their dealer awards.

Service Dealer had our ceremony back in November (which you can relive here), but these opening weeks of the year are often when we hear of individual companies bestowing gongs on their dealer partners. In our news today, we have stories of Baroness, Polaris, Merlo and Avant Tecno all doing just that.

And I must say, as editor of the journal dedicated to the dealer network, I am always delighted to be able to run pieces such as these. I do think it's important for suppliers to recognise and celebrate the hard work that dealerships put in for their brands throughout the year. We don't all need our tummies tickled constantly, but to have top-quality, dedicated work acknowledged once in a while, is necessary.

As such, I think a doff of the cap is due to Lister Wilder who not only picked up three awards from Baroness, but are also mentioned as best newcomer by Avant. Nice one guys!

Similar to our Dealer Of The Year Awards, aside from the fun night out in a posh frock, winning a prize such as this can be genuinely beneficial to a small business in a number of ways. As we've discussed previously, recognition can be a valuable opportunity to enhance credibility, build stronger supplier relationships, and stand out in a competitive market. Wins and nominations can also of course serve as a powerful marketing tool, motivate staff, and drive continuous improvement.

It feels important that dealers are well aware of what is required of them to be in the mix for industry awards such as those we feature today. If you haven’t yet pursued winning one, consider engaging with your suppliers to make sure you fully understand their criteria and can position your dealership for recognition. Equally, when the information is released later this year for our Service Dealer awards, do make sure you read all the guidance to get your dealership and your colleagues in the running this time around.

As we've said before, you know how hard you work year-round, so why not shout about it?

Busy workshops

Talking of hard work, an area of many dealerships that should win all the trophies will be your workshops. As we tend to at this time of the year, we are hearing anecdotally that many dealerships' service departments are absolutely rammed right now.

So today, we'd like to find out from as many of our dealer readers as possible if this a description that you recognise for your business? We're running a short survey on winter servicing that we'd really appreciate your input on, to find out if this is indeed the case nationwide.

We tend to run a questionnaire along these lines at this time of year, each season. Twelve months ago when we asked you how things were in your workshop, 'busy' was the key word we heard. However, for many who responded this was tinged with frustration at not being able to staff their service departments as comprehensively as they would like. Recruiting, and indeed retaining, quality personnel was clearly having an impact.

Some typical responses we received from dealers in 2024 included:

• "Staffing as ever remains a challenge with the industry needing to encourage more youngsters to enter the industry."
• "Staffing is dire. Finding anyone, not just experienced staff, is proving to be our main drawback."
• "We are extremely busy with 12 week lead times, ongoing delays in obtaining some parts, and ongoing issues recruiting more staff."

Do comments such as these still ring true for your dealership at the start of 2025? Have matters improved? Hopefully they haven't become any worse?! Or are we pretty much as we were?

Please do let us know today. All your answers and comments are in the strictest confidence. We'll reveal the findings and a selection of your opinions which we'd love for you to share, in the next issue of Service Dealer magazine.

Thanks in advance for your help.

TAKE THE SURVEY.