Although the industry indices for the manufacturer and independent workshops reached their lowest level at the end of last year, they were still at a high level. However, at 122 (manufacturer) and 132 (independent) points, they were still at a high level. Almost 60 percent of authorized dealers of car manufacturers and a good two-thirds of owners of brand-independent automotive businesses rated their economic situation as "good". Only eight and five percent of entrepreneurs respectively stated that their current business situation was "poor". This is the result of the industry index survey conducted by the trade journal "kfz-betrieb".

Increase in new car orders

At the end of the year, brand dealers benefited from good new car business and an increase in incoming orders of around four percent in December compared to the same month last year. In 2011 as a whole, a good 3.17 million new cars were registered in Germany, an increase of nine percent. "Despite the ongoing discussions about the debt crisis, the German passenger car market remained more stable than many had expected," said Matthias Wissmann, President of the German Association of the Automotive Industry (VDA), commenting on new car sales.



According to "kfz-betrieb", however, there were regional differences: While a quarter of new car dealers in western Germany reported higher sales compared to the previous year, this figure was as high as around 42 percent in eastern Germany.



In addition, the majority of those surveyed were optimistic about their sales development: one in two brand dealers expect sales of new cars to remain the same and 15 percent expect them to be higher than last year by the end of this month.

"kfz-betrieb" is the most widely read trade magazine in the automotive industry and has been informing the automotive trade and service sector for 100 years. "kfz-betrieb" is the official organ of the German Motor Trade (ZDK), the professional lobby for around 38,000 car dealerships and workshops. Daily news from the entire automotive industry is available at www.kfz-betrieb.de and in the daily newsletter. The parent company Vogel Business Media is one of the leading German providers of specialist information with around 100 trade journals and 60 web portals as well as numerous international activities. Its headquarters are in Würzburg. The company celebrated its 120th anniversary in 2011.