PENDRAGON PLC - Pendragon to Open New Coventry Distribution Centre

London, July 12

The Company is pleased to announce the opening of a brand new ten-acre distribution centre in Coventry, which will be operated through its Evans Halshaw brand, the UK’s leading online automotive retailer.

The site has been designed to de-fleet vehicles returning from lease and prepare them for onward movement to the Company’s Evans Halshaw outlets across the UK.  In addition, the site also has a used car retail outlet with vehicle display for over 400 cars and extensive vehicle refurbishment workshop capacity. The distribution centre is expected to become fully operational in the final quarter of the year and handle over 25,000 vehicle de-fleets in its first full year of operation.

The facility forms part of the Company’s strategy to build a national chain of used car outlets and this development fills the Coventry area, which was one of 40 key markets where the group had no used car sales presence.  The Evans Halshaw Car Store retailer will stock a wide range of makes and models, all available with aftercare plans and backed by the Evans Halshaw Price Guarantee.

Since opening, the Coventry site has created 66 jobs for people in the local area, from entry level roles through to leadership. The launch of the new distribution centre has also created a number of new job opportunities for Vehicle Technicians, offering the opportunity to work within a brand-new workshop with state-of-the-art facilities, on a wide variety of vehicles. The team is now recruiting to fill the final few vacancies, which include Technicians and roles within Accountancy, Sales and Administration.

Trevor Finn, Chief Executive said:

“This is a huge forward step for our used car strategy and we are excited to get the Coventry distribution centre fully operational. The versatility of the site is exciting, as we can prepare thousands of cars before they are sold on in our Evans Halshaw Car Store centres.  As announced in our 27 April 2017 IMS, we have made a strong start to 2017, and the distribution centre will ensure we build on the progress already made.  Our interim results for the first half of 2017 will be released on 1 August 2017”.