£32m car salesman revs up through his Stoneacre Motor Group

A motor mechanic who rose to become one of the richest car salesmen in the UK made another £32 million last year through his Stoneacre Motor Group.

Richard Teatum, 66, set up the firm in 1994 and built it into one of the UK’s biggest motor dealers.

He is the sole owner of the company, which posted profits of £32 million in the year to April 30, according to filings on Companies House. 

This is significantly less than the £43 million it made the previous year when the firm benefited from an unusual scenario, when a rise in second-hand car prices meant the value of the vehicles on its books increased rather than fell as is usually the case.

At that time there were semiconductor shortages and high demand for used cars following the pandemic.

Growth: Richard Teatum set up Stoneacre Motor Group in 1994 and built it into one of the UK’s biggest motor dealers

Teatum said trading was roughly the same in both years. Turnover last year rose from £1.31 billion to £1.36 billion.

The drop in profit in 2023 was partly attributable to higher costs. Profits are expected to fall to £24 million in the year ending in April 2024, Teatum told The Mail on Sunday. Stoneacre, based in South Yorkshire, has 63 sites in England and Wales. It sold more than 24,500 new cars and 31,500 used vehicles last year.

An increasingly important part of the business is its repair and servicing arm. Turnover at its accident repair centres increased by 34 per cent and net profit was up by 40 per cent.

Teatum took a salary of about £1.2 million last year and he reinvests profits back into the company.

The publicity-shy multi-millionaire made headlines in 2022 when he bought a stake in fashion retailer Joules shortly before it collapsed.

‘I track a lot of companies and I thought it was an opportunity,’ he said. ‘It was a little bit of a gamble. ‘I thought it would do well, but it didn’t.’

Teatum was previously a significant shareholder in used car dealer Vertu Motors, which is listed on the stock market.

Geoffrey Warren, the owner of Cargiant, which claims to be the world’s largest dealership, is known as Britain’s wealthiest car salesman with a fortune of £2.6 billion, according to the Sunday Times Rich List.

Stoneacre’s figures come as industry chiefs warned that the car market has shrunk permanently due to a mixture of home working, the shift to net zero and the reduced availability of lower-priced models.

The Society of Motor Manufacturers and Traders last week said that demand was still lower than before Covid, and economic and social changes meant families were less likely to want to own multiple cars.

SMMT boss Mike Hawes said he never expected sales to return to pre-pandemic levels.

This post first appeared on Dailymail.co.uk