Carblah enters the arena with the first Car Retailers Review Index
Co-founded by automotive legend Steve Fowler, Carblah aims to provide essential information to customers by providing access to reviews of all the major car retailers.
Carblah is a data-driven platform with advanced AI-powered analysis of consumer reviews that has accumulated all that data to produce the first Carblah Index. Carblah say this is “a groundbreaking national report measuring customer experience across the UK’s automotive retailers”.
With nearly a quarter of a million customer reviews posted on the Carblah website over the last twelve months, the Index has amassed a wealth of information that has led to a comprehensive snapshot that ultimately provides a customer satisfaction score for the UK automotive retail sector.
The Carblah Retailer Index ranks the UK’s major automotive retail groups. Carblah says “Retailers are grouped with the top four scores high enough for Diamond status and the following 25 being awarded Gold status. Other retailers either sit in the Silver or Bronze categories, depending on their overall scores”.
The top 29 retailers winning Diamond or Gold status are listed below:
Howards Group – Diamond
JCT600 – Diamond
Holdcroft Group – Diamond
Vantage Motor Group – Diamond
Toomey – Gold
Cars2 – Gold
Eden – Gold
RRG – Gold
Ray Chapman Motors – Gold
Drive Motor Retail – Gold
Renault Retail Group – Gold
Richmond Motor Group – Gold
Yeomans – Gold
Arbury – Gold
W R Davies – Gold
Snows – Gold
Arnold Clark – Gold
Vertu Motors – Gold
Caffyns – Gold
FRF Toyota – Gold
Waylands Automotive – Gold
SG Petch – Gold
Fish Brothers – Gold
Mon Motors – Gold
Riverside – Gold
D M Keith – Gold
John Grose Group – Gold
Peoples – Gold
Heritage – Gold
Interesting data that comes from the Carblah Index shows the largest retailers don’t necessarily translate to the best, with only three of the UK’s 25 biggest retailer groups ranked as Diamond or Gold in the Carblah Index for customer satisfaction.
Carblah actually reports that 18 of them sit in the bottom half of the table, while the ten lowest ranked retailers include nine of the UK’s biggest groups.
Customers complain most about communication with 16 per cent describing unanswered phone calls, callbacks missed, and non-existent parts updates.
Trust was ranked second worst with 15 per cent of consumers feeling misled, pressured, or staff were dishonest.
Michael Yeates, Managing Director and co‑founder of Carblah, said, “The Carblah Index is designed to bring clarity, fairness, and transparency to one of the UK’s most important consumer industries.
“With nearly a quarter of a million customer reviews informing the rankings, the Index provides a national benchmark that cannot be gamed or unduly influenced. Our aim is to inform consumers of the best performing retailers for customer experience, and support those businesses that want to see an improvement in their satisfaction scores”
Steve Fowler, Carblah co‑founder, added, “Customer service is one of the biggest battlegrounds in the automotive industry, yet for years the industry has lacked a single, trusted benchmark for consumer satisfaction.
“Carblah is all about real reviews by real people, and the Carblah Index is based on what buyers and owners are really saying about their experiences, not just star ratings.”
The Carblah Retailer Index will be published twice yearly in May and October. The Carblah Car Index, launching in July, will analyse satisfaction of makes and models across the UK market.
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About the Author
Graeme Cobb is a lifelong car enthusiast with a passion for writing about cars, EVs, industry updates and more.
You can find Graeme on 𝕏 at @graeme_cobb or YouTube @REV-EV.