From Opel trade-ins to unfamiliar brands

When Stellantis announced its plans to switch to agency agreements, Hekkert Autogroep realized that its sales team would get to work with new and unfamiliar brands. This prompted the search for a solid trade-in system. “Our sales reps used to know the exact value of any Opel car, but now we deal in many different brands. This is impossible without the right software,” says Wino van den Bosch, Commercial Director at Hekkert Autogroep.

 

Unique pilot in automotive sector

Van den Bosch did not hurry the decision to switch to software from JP.cars. After all, their previous system worked well enough. But the company is always eager to improve and the commercial director liked the idea of a paid pilot program. 

“Our standards are high. I have worked with many programs and usually, they promise the world. But they often disappoint in practice. Generally, you receive a program demo with data from a fictitious company, and everything works great. But once you implement the program yourself, things turn sour. That is why I liked the idea for paying for a pilot program, with JP.cars customizing the software with our data. While this is quite uncommon in the automotive sector, it allowed us to experience how the JP.cars software works in practice. We have been using the software for a few months and it works well for us,” according to Wino van den Bosch.  

 

Uniform valuations for the entire team

The commercial director says the software’s valuations are one of its biggest benefits. With multiple sales people spread out over various locations, it is vital to work with uniform and correct trade-in values. 

Van den Bosch: “When you ask six people to valuate a vehicle with the average software system, this results in six different prices. JP.cars does that much better. When you and I valuate a car using the same variables, we get the same price.”

 

Marketability well displayed

Besides the uniform valuations, Van Den Bosch is very positive about the ETR: JP.cars’ marketability index. Van den Bosch: “The software displays a vehicle’s marketability in a clear way. Another metric, the APR, shows the reliability of that assessment. This is a great feature, because you can adapt your pricing accordingly. Of course, any car will sell if you make it cheap enough. But the software lets you set a price based on marketability and that is a great plus.” 

 

Hekkert Autogroep growing hand in hand with JP.cars

Commercial director Van Den Bosch wants to see Hekkert Autogroep grow hand in hand with JP.cars, as evidenced by his contributions to the improvement of the software. 

“When I have ideas for enhancing the software, I forward them. For example, we needed a feature that would allow us to save a valuation, so that I could monitor the sales price set for a car by our manager used cars. I explained this to JP.cars and they immediately implemented this functionality.”