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A fifth of New Zealand's 2000-plus used-car dealers have closed down in the past six months as the recession bites.
Industry groups say the closures, and cutbacks at surviving dealerships, have wiped out at least 10,000 of the 50,000 jobs in the used-car business.
The latest casualty is Newmarket Nissan, whose Broadway site has been a car dealership for more than 50 years.
Nissan has given the Auckland City franchise, from April 1, to the Giltrap Group's nearby Schofield showroom, leaving Newmarket Nissan's sales and repair workforce apparently jobless.
Other names to have passed into history in the past few weeks include Storey Motors in Panmure, Tower Motor Group in Manukau, Car Maxx in Hamilton and Williams and Adams in Wellington.
Motor Trade Association chief executive Stephen Matthews said there were now only four used-car dealers in downtown Wellington, down from 20 to 25 a few months ago.
"We don't have an exact figure on how many businesses have folded, but I would say 20 to 30 per cent have gone in the last six months," he said.
David Vinsen of the Independent Motor Vehicle Dealers Association said at least 10,000 jobs had gone because of multiple hits from the recession, the withdrawal of General Motors' finance companies GE Money and GMAC, new emissions standards which effectively ban imports of Japanese cars made before 2002, and the plunging kiwi-yen exchange rate.
"I've been in the trade since 1978, and in the past [slowdowns] have been recessionary slowdowns," he said.
"This time what I believe we are seeing are structural changes as a result of the emissions rule, access to credit, consumer attitudes and confidence, the way deals are structured, the sorts of people who finance cars and the sorts of people they are sold to.
"It will leave the industry positioned for the harder times and well positioned to come out of it when we do."
He said the gap left by GE Money and GMAC had been only partly filled by established finance companies such as Marac and UDC.
"The quality finance companies are now looking for only quality dealers to finance sales to quality customers," he said. "So the second- and third-tier finance companies who previously financed the marginal dealers for the marginal deals have gone."
Nissan NZ managing director John Manley said the decision to close Newmarket Nissan was forced by plans to replace the Newmarket Viaduct on the Southern Motorway. Part of the Nissan site has been leased from the Transport Agency, leaving the rest of the site "unviable for a volume dealership".
Engineering, Printing and Manufacturing Union organiser Enzo Giordani said he was negotiating redundancy terms for about eight mechanics on the site.
