NEXT week I’ll be able to tell you about a special series of Service Dealer magazines to be published during 2013 to commemorate our 25th Anniversary. Amongst the special features for the first issue will be The Dealer of Yesterday, Today - and Tomorrow.

The dealer of 1988 when we first launched had none of the technology that everyone takes for granted today. The internet didn’t go public until 1989 and then was mainly text based, and it wasn’t until the early 2000s that it started go mainstream. And mention Google, E-Bay, Twitter or Facebook to a dealer in 1988 and he’d probably think you were talking about a new model of hedgecutter.

It’s been the pace of change that has been extraordinary.

However, look at the dealer network of today and it is not a great deal changed from that of 25 years ago. It has remained relatively stable whereas other industries have undergone seismic upheavals.

The question is, what about the dealer of the future?

A small news item caught my eye this week about John Deere in the US buying a controlling interest in one of their key dealerships. Such a move happened in the ag machinery industry when Claas bought out some of their dealers in the UK in order to protect their market in certain areas of the country. Was that a smart move, or simple expediancy at the time? I guess that only those within the inner circle at Saxham could answer that.

In the grasscare sector, that could probably only happen where a major franchise such as Deere was involved, given the multi-franchise nature of most dealerships. But you are already seeing a significant move by Deere to consolidate their dealer network, much as Ransomes did some years ago.

However, it only needs more acquisitions, mergers or trading agreements to be established between a number of key manufacturers, for supplier-owned dealerships to become a much more likely proposition in the future.

Your thoughts?

Chris Biddle