Car dealership Group 1 Automotive to cut around 300 jobs in the UK

The company said it plans to reduce the size of its workforce by approximately 10%.

The business made record profit and revenue in the UK last year (Niall Carson/PA) (PA Archive)

Car dealership Group 1 Automotive, which owns more than 70 car dealerships in the UK, is planning to cut hundreds of jobs across the country.

The business said on Wednesday that it plans to reduce its UK headcount by around 10% in the first quarter of this year.

That would have an impact on around 300 people, the company confirmed to the PA news agency.

According to fillings at Companies House, Group 1’s main UK subsidiary employed 3,409 people in 2022, the last year data is available for.

Chief executive of the US-based parent company Daryl Kenningham said: “We experienced challenges in our UK operations during the current quarter with used vehicles and recognise we have some work ahead of us to bring our costs back in-line with recent trends.

“We are focused on reducing costs in the UK in the first quarter of 2024, with an expectation of reducing our UK headcount by approximately 10%.”

Of the company’s employees, 1,663 worked in its production arm in 2022, a further 1,253 in distribution and 493 in management and administration.

Group 1’s UK dealerships are focused around the south-east of England. The company first entered the UK market in 2007 by buying BMW and MINI dealerships.

The redundancies will come despite UK revenue rising 9.5% to 3.1 billion dollars (£2.4 billion) across 2023 and gross profit hitting a record high of 410.1 million dollars (£323.3 million).