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I know we've always tried to trade professionally and honestly, we were putting nearly as much effort into advertising trade as retail if not more, due to have to describe and photo all marks, scuffs etc where as retail, your happy on the condition. First 6 months of the year the profit per unit makes you wonder if its worth it, against the time in prospecting retail customers. I am not saying you should rush trade deals but it's difficult to get the balance right, I guess it's ensuring you treat others how you want to be treated, be proud of the name on the invoice

For it to work you would have to split your business into sales and workshop, with spearate tax returns and different VAT numbers. Its your choice to sell cars, if you chose to have technicians working on sales car rather the more profitable retail work then thats your choice. The expense is the persons wage, what he could or couldn't earn you has no bearing on the cost of running you business. Internal labour charges tell you how profitable each part of your business is but they are internal and are of zero interest to the taxman. The way you are thinking means we could decide a technician is worth £60 per hour, get him to do nothing for 40 hours at a cost of say £400 (£10per hour) then reduce our business's profit by that week by £2400 (40x£60 per hour). We can't just make up an expense without paying it, its called tax evasion!!

Problem with a lot of sponsorships is that they solely want your money and rarely do any of the people connected to the team become customers. The only time I would consider a sponsorship was if I was approached by a very good customer, that way its more of a goodwill payment then a payment in hope of some return.

Totally agree with you James, Photo and PR .. I helped a good friend out with local team a few years ago, got promised various photo shoots but nothing ever materialised - told him how disappointing i had been - he had the cheek to ask the next year - !! Told him I might as well have put the few hundred quid down the drain ! he's answer was can't believe you don't want to help these young kids for a few hundred quid ! Got approached again by another local team this year - I explained what i would want as a minimum and they would have to sign to agree - guess what they never came back - last I heard they're still looking ! Once caught ...!