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Dear me, some of you like to make life hard for yourselves. The supermarkets have done the spadework for us & just about EVERYONE expects to be instructed on what to do when shopping. If your business is generated remotely surely every single one of us is capable of qualifying most customers - sorting the wheat from the chaff. Yes, a few will slip through the net but at the point you realise they’re tyre kickers you simply show them the door & tell them to return when they are buyers. If you’ve got an open pitch & your business is mainly generated by walk-ons then surely a half-hour trip to a supermarket will give you a bloody good idea how to operate. This isn’t rocket science, a couple of signs printed, a bit of bunting (remember that?) or chain and even some rubber gloves to placate those who want them. All this bollocks about showing some tyrekicker a car then having to leave it 3 days for the next tyrekicker you’ve let in is just that, bollocks. If you’re that bothered can’t you lads stretch to a £2 bottle of spray bleach & some kitchen roll?

Agree totally, the majority of potential customers aren't stupid and have been conditioned to the new normal by the supermarkets. I will certainly be opening on the 1st June, I have a pitch with an office which is clearly signed no entry. I will socially distance myself outside with customers and explain that we cant discuss things in the office. I expect the majority of customers to understand and I can work around this. As far as I see it, we were all covered by "car showrooms" during the lockdown, regardless of whether we had a showroom or a just pitch, I am not now going to spend time looking for a loophole or technicality that prevents me from opening. Be sure that if there is an extension to the SEISS (which I doubt there will be), owners of car showrooms will not be included and they will certainly not extend it to us, or make exceptions for those with just a pitch. Everyone is welcome to their opinion, if you can afford to stay closed, do so, but having lost nearly a quarter of the year I believe its time to get this sector going again.

......I don’t imagine in his book he’ll be slagging off & naming the difficult punters, telling us about any brown envelope deals or of any mechanical bodging that I’m sure hasn’t gone on in the past. The trouble is, with many of the best tales many of us wouldn’t dare put anything in writing. I guess the tales may be similar, just the sums of money different.

Richard Branston? King of Pickle

yes i know the company , my father traded with tom in the late 70s - 80s,the traders around the midlands in those days would all congregate at the old measham auction, i would get dragged up there as a teenager loved it, you could roll up in a lumpy trade car and drive straight in and park up next to the main hall in those days, much trading was done in the car park, tom was a good buyer of range rover, merc 's especially TE wagons, and anything rolls royce, for lumpy cars it would be measham tuesday's and northampton on a thursday, some trader at northampton would do a collection with his hat - sign a £20 quid note and they would have a draw for the pot, proper arthur daily stuff... iv'e bought a few swappers off them in recent years through autotrademail when it was in its prime 2004-2010, his sales manager was a nice fella, tom will probably say different but thats understandable as he left and set up a similar company up the road with one of toms customers, they are - kaaimans international, nottingham. rory - not sure about SOR, its not toms style and that industry is currently in chaos due too a few high players going under owing multi millions to customers, , one of the reasons why tom jnr went his own way, the high end clients expect brokerage sor and zero exposure, going back to the tom senior interview - the record price for a car that he touched on, that was sold through tom jnr, the car being the ex 1937 mercedes w125 gp car - ex bernie ecclestone who is one of juniors customers, the same place that juniors recent gp cars came from, ex lauda ferrari, and the ex james h.unt mac m23

I've spent a fair few £100k's on hookers and fast cars over the years. The rest, I just wasted.

Hookers mate you pay a minimum of an hour generally which I find a bit unfair as I only need about 4 minutes on a good day and that includes getting dressed after

100% agree. From our point of view though, we will be happy if we are the only place open, so if you think you shouldn't reopen, best not to I reckon.

My book arrived hopefully will get a start on it tonight

Yes and no, from the purchasers point of view, would they click n collect a used car, my opinion is no, and, i believe the view of many other "used" car dealers think similar, a new car yes, but a used car is a whole different ball game, as for other people not closing, they are putting every one at risk, and they are taking proper law abiding traders food from there table.

The posh showroom people lobbied the government quite a lot. Did the open car sites assume they'd say car dealers can open, rather than car showrooms can open? Anyway...its not 1st June yet.....expect a change or update.....because I agree, its bonkers and doesn't make sense from a risk point of view. I don't think they'll be letting customers into an 8'x20' metal office though!

Its pretty simple - posh dealers with indoor showrooms can open from June 1st. The plebs with a shipping container as an office, have to wait until June 15th. You didn't expect it to be clear, or simple, or fair, from the government after recent events did you???