Porsche Romania General Director Brent Valmar: some car dealers sell well below market price

Marţi, 10 februarie 2009, 14:39 English | Business

Cars will never be as cheap as they are now and when the crisis ends, prices will bounce back to a reasonable price that can offer sufficient profit returns to cover costs and further development needs, Porsche Romania General Director and vice-president of Romania's car dealers association APIA, Brent Valmar declared. He said that currently, some car dealers have cut prices well below the market average, which is not sustainable. Valmar declared that Porsche Romania deals with the crisis much better than other companies do.

Valmar declared that in January, new car sales dropped by 63% and he estimates that the same trend would be valid for February. The market is affected by the massive imports of second hand cars, by the national currency depreciation and the new credit criteria.

Valmar said that the crisis does not have selective effects: importers of used cars are also hit by the market conditions as people do not have purchasing power any more. When it comes to Porsche, Valmar declared that a series of activities have been restructured and a new IT system  was introduced at the level of the importer in order to cut the need of personnel.

Valmar added that the company avoided hiring new personnel for several months now and that they also cut eight positions in the hierarchical chain.