The former management team of online trade-to-trade service Autotrade-mail are set to launch a new online car trading platform called www.cartotrade.com, at the end of May.
Kevin Watson, Laura Cannon and Gee Pugsley managed Autotrade-mail in Chichester, West Sussex until owners Auto Trader made the decision to consolidate and move its sales and service operations to offices in Manchester.
Collectively, the three have more than 25 years’ experience in online remarketing and 30 years’ working with dealers.
Watson, one of the founders of Cartotrade.com, said: “The decision to re-group and develop our own proposition was a very exciting one. The combination of our experience and the encouragement from our friends within the industry asking us to ‘do it again’, only re-enforced that it’s the right thing to do.”
Cartotrade.com’s aim is to create a "friendly, independent", service that helps dealers buy and sell trade stock quickly and easily whilst maximising trade profit.
Cartotrade.com will run an ‘invite only policy’ with a strict vetting process which will generate a ‘club feel’ whilst maintaining the integrity of the website and security for its members.
Cannon said: “Being independent allows us to have purely dealer focused objectives, which means it won’t be about having the most dealers to satisfy revenue targets, it’s the quality of the dealers that’s important.
"Likewise, we won’t artificially enhance our stock volumes by using feeds from other remarketing sources. A car on the cartotrade.com website will be available to purchase, and the seller will know about it when a buyer contacts them.”
Cartotrade.com will also issue a manifesto, issuing pledges to its future members which includes that cartotrade.com will never be sold.
Pugsley said: “Whilst our website will provide a back to basics approach, we are very excited to be able to introduce some unique new initiatives.
"We have always been innovators in this field, so it will be wonderful to come to market with some completely new features, all there for the dealer’s benefit.
"Our manifesto will cement our commitment to serving the industry with the dealers’ interests at heart – all will be revealed very soon.”
The cartotrade.com team will be calling hundreds of dealers over the next couple of months, but those interested can pre-register their interest to have a free trial at www.cartotrade.com.
Jeremy has been a journalist for 30 years, 20 of which have been in business-to-business automotive. He was a writer and news editor on AM-sister brand Fleet News for three years before setting up the AM website. For the last five years he has been Bauer B2B’s head of digital helping to manage the digital assets of AM, together with Fleet News, Commercial Fleet, Rail and Smart Transport.
Aiden Timothy - 25/03/2015 11:15
More and more of these trade sites are setting up. Autotrade-mail was unique at the start as it gave a new alternative. Now we have loads of these sites and now another one starting. This is the 3rd site starting i have heard of in the past week. Is this again just another way of trying to extract another £40-£50 a month from struggling dealers. Not everyone is going to have a log in to all these sites, and everyone is going to keep saying they have the best site. We interview our dealers! We vet our dealers! same story different design website. I can only think that the sale of Autotrade-mail has just resulted in the same people trying to make even more money from the dealer by doing the same thing again. We will never sell, we don't need to satisfy revenue targets...almost laughable...Isn't that because you did sell, and now want your pension topped up by the same people again !!