Carmakers call for aid
Front-page lead from Motor Trader , 13 March 2009

“Carmakers also sent a clear message to the Government, insisting that a scrappage scheme along the lines of those introduced in Europe is even more essential than freeing up credit sources to dealers and their customers...

...“There is now a body of evidence that scrappage works,” Paul Philpott, MD of Kia UK, told Motor Trader. “Germany’s scheme was introduced on 1st January and now the market forecast for this year has been revised upwards by between 400,000 and 600,000.” He added that currently the Government was concentrating on trying to keep manufacturing going, without focusing on the core issue of stimulating demand...

...All the manufacturers spoken to argued that Government concerns about the cost of such a scheme were not justified as it would be virtually self-funding due to incremental VAT revenue. “Buyers of new cars don’t currently come out of cars as old as eight years, so a scrappage scheme would bring them into new car market,” said Paul Willcox, MD of Nissan GB. He added that the Government would thus benefit from the VAT revenue generated; “It needn’t cost the Exchequer a single penny.”

New tyres for NASCAR in 2010?
News story from Race Tech , March 2009

“Goodyear’s Greg Stucker told trackside media that the COT definitely stresses its tyres in a different way to its predecessor. “It’s harder on those right sides. We would like to go taller and wider to kind of open up the durability envelope of the tyre, make the tyre a little bit more forgiving and a little less sensitive to maybe guys missing the setup or maybe being more aggressive on their setups.’’

Stucker’s comments came shortly after reports that rival manufacturer Firestone had been testing stock car tyres. A Chip Ganassi Racing ARCA stock car was spotted running on the road course at Homestead Miami Speedway with the tyres, which were unbranded, as were all the supporting vehicles and personnel.

A Firestone official stated that the brand would like to develop a stock car tyre but the test was merely a technical exercise and had not been conducted on the request of NASCAR. Goodyear has a sole supplier contract with NASCAR until 2012 and Firestone has not been seen in NASCAR since 1974 – the brand is currently the sole supplier to Indycar.”

Nissan to lose fifth of network
Front-page news from Motor Trader , 13 March 2009

“In August we had around 180 sites, of which 60 per cent were doing a fantastic job, the rest were not and 20 per cent were poor on every KPI score you can think of,” Willcox said.

“We had a clear, open policy to these dealers, improve or find another franchise. We hadn’t terminated dealers for a long time, but we terminated four in December despite the downturn, on the basis of consistently poor performance.”

Such terminations were the result of a need to level performance across the network; “We have a very wide level of dispersion – we have some strong performers, and some woeful performers.”...

...Nissan will help strong performing dealers through the downturn, along with struggling outlets who have the potential to turn things around; “However partners who don’t address their operational issues will find we won’t support them if they run into problems.”