Read the May edition of AMe

Southampton-based Snows Group is a family and privately owned company that has been in business for nearly 50 years and has strong representation in the south of England.

It represents the BMW, Kia, Lexus, Mini, Seat, Toyota and Volvo brands from 15 outlets across Hampshire, Wiltshire, Dorset and the Isle of Wight employing over 350 staff. Used cars are sold through the brand Too Good To Auction (tg2a.co.uk) offering part-exchange vehicles that it would previously have disposed of through auctions.

In 2011 it employed a sales executive from Poland to meet the needs of her compatriots in the Southampton area.

Agnieszka Zytkiewicz was employed at Snows Toyota to target the local Polish community of 20,000.

Turnover in 2010 was £104 million (2009: £98m).

Cambria Automobiles plc, formerly known as Cambria Automobiles Holdings Limited, was the fastest growing private company by revenue in the 2009 Sunday Times Top Track 250 increasing sales from £26.3m in 2007 to £187.9m in 2008.

It has made eight corporate acquisitions since incorporation in March 2006 including its biggest acquisition, purchasing the whole share capital to Summit Motors Investments (UK) Limited now renamed Cambria Automobiles South East Limited.

This deal added five Ford dealerships under the Invicta Motors and Dees Ford brands, four Jaguar dealerships under the Grange brand, three Volvo dealerships under the Doves brand and three Aston Martin dealerships also under the Grange brand.

The latest purchase came in September when it added the Vauxhall franchise in buying a loss-making Southampton dealership from Hartwell. Cambria intends to grow its Vauxhall representation.

Cambria now has 27 locations across the UK holding 39 new car franchises, representing Aston Martin, Jaguar, Volvo, Ford, Fiat, Mazda, Honda, Renault, Citroen, Seat, Lotus, Nissan, Vauxhall and Triumph with a geographical spread from the North West of England, the Midlands, the South East and across as far as Kent in the East and as far as Exeter in the South West.

Cambria normally stocks in excess of 2,000 used cars.

The company culture, introduced under chief executive Mark Lavery, is known as the ‘four pillars’ underpinning all operational and strategic decisions: associate delight (the terms staff and employees are not used in the business), guest delight (treating customers as if they were in staffs’ homes), brand delight and stakeholder delight.

Recent activity includes in October 2009, the acquisition of four motor vehicle dealership sites from the Autohaus Limited administrators, adding the Triumph and Mazda brands to the group; in December 2009 – buying a dealership from the administrator of Lythgoe Limited, with both Fiat and Mazda brands; February 2010

Acquiring D&F Trading Limited from Drake and Fletcher Limited which included two Honda and two Mazda dealerships.

in its April 2012 interim statement Cambria Automobiles revealed it had experienced a more than 50% fall in profits year-on-year, a performance judged as “relatively resilient” by chief executive Mark Lavery.

Revenue for the six months to February 29, 2012 was down £17.3m from £184.2 million and profit before tax at £1.1m compared to £2.6m in the same period last year, attributed to weaker new car sales and profitability.

Gross profit fell by 5.8% to £22.7m from £24.1m, but the overall gross profit margin for the period increased to 13.6% compared to 13.1% in the previous period.

Profit before tax decreased to £1.1m compared with £2.6m in the prior year.

2010 proved a record year for this proudly family, firmly Yorkshire based group.

It recorded the highest turnover in its 65 year history: £615 million from £498m the previous year. Profit before tax also increased to £12.3m.

It now believes 2011 will be another record year with sales to the end of August already more than 1,000 cars higher than over the same period in 2010.

The group, one of the largest privately owned independent motor groups in the UK, employs 1,350 staff at its 48 dealerships throughout Yorkshire, Derbyshire, Lincolnshire and the North East. JCT600 represents 22 franchises.

It also has a car supermarket brand PriceRight with its first solus site opening at Rawdon, near Bradford, at the end of 2010 with a stock of around 120 cars.

PriceRight has also been integrated into used car operations at a handful of low market share outlets, helping to establish these as all-makes used car specialists.

Current chief executive John Tordoff is grandson of Edward Tordoff who founded the business in 1946 and son of Jack Tordoff who ran the company for more than 44 years until he became chairman in 2002.

JCT600 takes its name from Jack Tordoff's Mercedes-Benz 600 personalised number plate.

2010 proved a record year for this proudly family, firmly Yorkshire based group.

It recorded the highest turnover in its 65 year history: £615 million from £498m the previous year. Profit before tax also increased to £12.3m.

It now believes 2011 will be another record year with sales to the end of August already more than 1,000 cars higher than over the same period in 2010.

The group, one of the largest privately owned independent motor groups in the UK, employs 1,350 staff at its 48 dealerships throughout Yorkshire, Derbyshire, Lincolnshire and the North East. JCT600 represents 22 franchises.

It also has a car supermarket brand PriceRight with its first solus site opening at Rawdon, near Bradford, at the end of 2010 with a stock of around 120 cars.

PriceRight has also been integrated into used car operations at a handful of low market share outlets, helping to establish these as all-makes used car specialists.

Current chief executive John Tordoff is grandson of Edward Tordoff who founded the business in 1946 and son of Jack Tordoff who ran the company for more than 44 years until he became chairman in 2002.

JCT600 takes its name from Jack Tordoff's Mercedes-Benz 600 personalised number plate.