About the Sytner Group

In our state-of-the-art dealerships across the UK, Sytner Group represents the world's most prestigious car manufacturers. Our success has been built by every team member working together and contributing to our one team ethos. We strive to deliver an exceptional customer experience; our employees are highly trained, enthusiastic, knowledgeable and driven to deliver our fundamental commitment to our customers; of getting it right first time and making each and every interaction special.

Our ultimate aim is to be considered the best company to work for in the industry and the best company to do business with.

History of the Sytner Group

In 1968, Frank Sytner and his older brother Alan (previously the owner of the world famous Cavern Club in Liverpool) opened their first used car dealership in Nottingham. Just two years later, the brothers were awarded the BMW franchise for Nottingham and Frank began his successful motorsport career. Beginning in the single seater formulas in the 70’s and early 80’s, Frank’s career culminated with him winning two British Touring car championships in 1988 and 1990 with BMW.

It was after gaining these two BTCC titles that Frank decided to focus his energy on expanding the BMW business which he and Alan continued to operate in Nottingham. Putting his notorious energy and competitiveness to work outside of racing, the expansion of the company began in 1993 with the acquisition of a BMW dealership in Leicester and was quickly followed by a third BMW operation in Sheffield.

After spending many years working exclusively with BMW, the decision was made to diversify the Group to represent other prestige marques and by 1997 the dealership count had reached double figures; including brands such as Ferrari, Audi, Mercedes-Benz, Land Rover and Porsche. Later that year the company floated on the UK stock market and became Sytner Group PLC with long term Sytner director, Laurence Vaughan taking on the role of CEO.

The Penske Era

By early 2002, Frank and Laurence had rapidly expanded the company to make it one of the largest and most successful car dealership groups in the UK. It was at this point that it came to the attention of Roger Penske, the prominent US businessman, legendary motorsports team owner (Penske Racing) and former award winning racing driver. Roger was looking to further grow his successful US based car dealer group, Penske Automotive Group (PAG), by expanding into Europe.

Given Frank and Roger’s shared passion for motorsport and a culture of uncompromising focus on both employee and customer delight, it was perhaps inevitable that the two companies would join forces later that year.

In 2003, Gerard Nieuwenhuys, a long-standing Sytner director, took over from Laurence Vaughn (who became Chairman) as Group Managing Director. With the mighty resources of PAG now at his disposal, Gerard continued the company’s expansion at the same time as investing in developing our people and building some of the best car dealership premises in the world. After more than a decade leading the company, Gerard took over from Laurence as Chairman in 2014 with Darren Edwards, another long-standing Sytner employee taking over as Group Managing Director.

Present Day

At Sytner we understand that exceptional customer service can only be consistently delivered by attracting, motivating, training and retaining the very best team members. With this in mind, we put our employees at the heart of everything that we do by developing their talent and enabling them to build long term careers. Testament to this, we have been named by Glassdoor as the 14th best company to work in the UK; not only the highest ranked business in the Automotive Sector, Sytner were the top rated retailer ahead of other large national businesses like Apple and IKEA.​

The survey is based on direct colleague feedback via the Glassdoor website where Sytner have a 4.4 star overall rating, with 87% saying they would recommend a friend and 100% approving of the Company’s Chief Executive, Darren Edwards.

Today Sytner Group boasts state-of-the-art dealerships across the UK and is the number one retailer for many of our manufacturers. By working together with our manufacturer partners we are developing a growing presence in key European markets including Italy, Germany and Spain.

During 2018, Sytner Group were named 'Dealer Group of the Year' by both Automotive Management and Motor Trader Magazines, consolidating our position as the UK's largest and most successful dealer group.

Despite our continued success and growth, we're proud to still retain a strong 'One Team' ethos across all of our dealerships, working together to ensure we always delight both customers and colleagues.

We hope you enjoy browsing through our website and look forward to assisting you with your requirements.

Penske Racing image courtesy Team Penske Pressroom