Philippe Emond, executive director of Bilia-Emond , will be in charge of the largest BMW dealership in the Greater Region. (Photo: Maison Moderne)

Philippe Emond, executive director of Bilia-Emond , will be in charge of the largest BMW dealership in the Greater Region. (Photo: Maison Moderne)

With the completion of the structural work on its future BMW and Mini dealership, the Bilia-Emond group is about to embark on the second part of a path traced together in 2016. Philippe Emond, executive director of Bilia-Emond, talked to Paperjam about the strategic importance of this project.

Philippe Emond: As is the case in the automotive sector, we can see that in the construction sector, the human element is still important. It's something else to be on site, within the walls, with people who are happy to see each other in the context of a beautiful project rather than being at a distance and looking at the same project on a screen or plans. This “party" was an opportunity to share things between the different trades, the promoter, the architect, BMW, our clients... The human element is starting to take over, and that's a good thing.

PE: It was important to show an evolution - to our customers, but also to BMW or Mini - and I think that's what everybody expected.

The changes were made possible by investing in the premises, but also by reorganising and involving the employees in our vision. Because without them, it is impossible to succeed and to obtain the levels of satisfaction that our customers are currently showing. It is also with them that we are preparing the future, with this new building which will be delivered next year. A favourable environment and a beautiful tool can only have positive impacts on our work and performance.

PE: I don't claim to want to do better than better. But we are currently in the top 3 in terms of new registrations. We are going to pursue our strategy, based on our partnership between Bilia and Emond, i.e. by pooling our resources and by stopping the exacerbated competition between two distributors of the same brand. With this new facility at the Cloche d'Or, we want to give ourselves the means to achieve our ambitions. This future dealership will be more accessible, more modern, more comfortable for both our customers and our employees, and will allow us to continue what we have been building for the past five years. We have only come part of the way.

PE: Yes, a project that is being carried out with the Schuler group and a real estate investment of €33 million, the price of the land is about €15 million, plus €7 million in equipment. If I calculate correctly, the investment is therefore €55 million.

PE: I don't know what the future will bring. We will have to pay attention to the market shares coming from digital, but also from proximity. I am no longer a beginner, and I can tell you that I have seen and heard a lot of things that did not come true. We were going to sell cars digitally, and it didn't work. The dealers were told that the future had to be multi-brand. We didn't do it. We were told that cars were going to be sold in supermarkets, and that didn't last long. Just like the private sale sites: it didn't work, except for rare de-stocking operations. I don't know who's going to take more risks between the one who's going to rely entirely on digital and the one who's going to keep a human contact.

I don't want to speak for the consumer, but there is still a future for direct distribution: we can see that if the health crisis stops tomorrow, the consumer will want to come back, enter the dealership, sit in a car... They will want to try it out and above all be able to talk to a human being when making choices.