INTERVIEW
‘It’s an awful thing to say, but we’ve had a really good lockdown’ James Baggott talks to Marshall Motor Group CEO Daksh Gupta about the impacts of lockdown, and his vision for the group’s future after Covid...
One of Marshall’s dual-brand Jaguar Land Rover showrooms 12 | CarDealerMag.co.uk
H
e’s the veritable pandemic poster boy. Whether it’s at the vanguard of rallying his troops during lockdown, chatting up investors or starring in front of the TV news cameras, no one could accuse Marshall Motor Group boss Daksh Gupta of hiding behind a desk. Since the start of lockdown, the chief executive of one of the largest dealer groups in the UK has never been busier, working 14-to-15-hour days minimum. Now, with his 117 dealerships getting busy once again, he faces new challenges. While lockdown was about preservation and emergency action, he’s turning his attention to planning for the future. The coronavirus pandemic has been painful for many dealers, but it’s starting to present opportunities – and that means growth is back on the table for Gupta. He predicts that within five years there will be an emergence of car dealer ‘supergroups’ – generating revenues of more than £5bn each – and he wants to be one of them. ‘I think in the next three to five years you might see a number of groups breaking away into that £5bn-plus category,’ Gupta told us in an exclusive interview video interview, covered here in full for the first time. ‘Whereas before I thought this might happen over eight to 10 years, I now think the emergence of five or six supergroups will happen a lot faster.’ Gupta has been acquisitive since taking over the chief executive role more than a decade ago, buying and selling 159 businesses in his 12-year tenure. The latest addition to the portfolio was VW Aylesbury, bought from Jardine. But now Gupta is aiming for the stars. ‘This business absolutely has the potential to be one of those top five or six groups. I have no doubt we will be one of them. ‘But do we do that now or do we do that in the next three years, or the next five years? I don’t know, but what we won’t do is rush anything. ‘We are ready and in a great position to do it, but we will only do it when we are in a strategic position and when it makes financial sense to do it for our shareholders. ‘Has this business got the potential? 100 per cent it has, for sure.’
