SA Auto Week to take place in Eastern Cape during October
Despite potential headwinds, South Africa’s automotive industry remains committed to long-term growth and resilience.
- Industry News
- 2 April 2025
Staff costs are the largest overhead in many dealerships. Whilst simply comparing the costs over different periods will give you a broad idea of where the costs are, it will not give you much information on the efficiency of your non-GP generating staff.
Whilst technicians’ and salespersons’ productivity are well understood and managed, the so-called “nonproductive” staff are often employed based on industry norms or historical dealership structure.
Here are some measurements that you can use to help you understand where your dealership stands – this should be done over an extended period so that valid trends can be established.
Unit sales per sales department admin staff member – the price of vehicles has increased dramatically as has GP in most cases, but the invoicing process has not changed.
Workshop invoices per costing clerk – how has this changed over time? Are there any factors that you think could have affected this positively or negatively?
Parts delivery drivers per R100 000 wholesale parts turnover (delivered parts to offsite clients). Parts prices have increased enormously, and looking only at the salary cost of drivers as a percentage of GP will not deliver a meaningful result.
Debtors and creditors accounts per debtor and creditors clerk. An added measure could also be invoices per debtors and creditors accounts per clerk. A substantial number of different accounts with a few transactions per account will be more admin intensive than a few debtors accounts with more invoices per account.
These are only a few examples as your staffing structure is different in every dealership. If you are part of a group, it will be interesting to compare your dealership to other dealerships in your group.
Despite potential headwinds, South Africa’s automotive industry remains committed to long-term growth and resilience.
South African consumers demonstrated a strong appetite for new passenger vehicles in March, according to figures released by the Automotive Business Council (naamsa).
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You can't build a reputation on what you are going to do.
Henry Ford
Firstly, all praise to the Almighty for bestowing his favours upon us without which none of this is possible.
A few small ideas to help you add to your bottom line and enhance your balance sheet:
Dealerfloor chats to Jaun Marais (photo), Operations Executive at the Hatfield Motor Group, about their recent expansion of GWM dealerships and his plans and passion for the Chinese brand, which has become a vital part of the group’s product offering and business success.