AM Awards 2021 winner: Best Dealership, Steven Eagell Toyota Milton Keynes

Constant evolution and improvement of the Milton Keynes Toyota retail formula were recognised by judges as Steven Eagell’s flagship site was named Best Dealership at the AM Awards 2021.

Read on to discover more about the car retailer's entry:

The Milton Keynes flagship of Steven Eagell’s network of 22 Toyota centres demonstrated how focussing on customer satisfaction can be the catalyst to improvements in all areas of a business.

With a group focus on CSI, the Milton Keynes dealership’s position as the original Toyota dealership history meant Steven Eagell’s had to achieve great things. And so it did.

In three years to 2020 service CSI has gone from 61.6% to 80.9%; sales from 85.8% to 95.7%, with overall scores improving from 73.7% to 88.3%.

In the same period profit-before-tax increased 188%.

And with return on sales last year at nearly 4% and new and used car margins in the top 5% of the Toyota GB network, Milton Keynes is the most profitable dealership in the group.

“As our largest Toyota dealership, we were keen to deliver a network-leading performance in 2020,” group marketing manager David Godley says.

This was done through communication. In monthly performance reviews, CSI scores are analysed in detail, with customer verbatims studied to identify under-performance and solutions were implemented.

An example was poor customer parking, so a parking attendant was employed.

Sales and aftersales teams are empowered to address issues at site level. They use tools such as ‘voice of the customer’, that collates customers’ feedback and segments into business areas, enabling focussed improvements, without the need for director involvement.

For used cars, each salesperson is tasked with producing a minimum of two videos per day. The result was responses to videos increasing from less than 50 per month to more than 500.

A ‘sales progressor’ was also recruited to ensure all vehicles are prepped, photographed and displayed on the Steven Eagell and third-party websites within 72 hours of coming on site. The result has been a 43% improvement in used car margins.

Success enables investment so the business is looking to increase sales and renewal teams’ numbers, continued investment in training and, of course, continue customer – and employee – satisfaction.