Adam90

Hi all,

I'm driving over to Spain and I've heard from a few people that car parts are really expensive over there? Is this true? And why is this the case?

I'm thinking about bringing some brand new parts over to sell there to cover my travelling costs but is it worth it?

Thanks guys

Domino

The answer to the second question is - probably a waste of money, and how do you know what are the most wanted parts without receiving specific orders.

The answer to the second question is - who says so ??
IME there may be a small premium on the prices I have paid between the UK dealer price and the Spanish dealer price but much of that can be accounted for in currency transfer.
I had some work done, they quoted 2.5hrs, my UK dealer said 1.5hrs, I accepted the 1.75 they charged me.

If you are being told that reclaimed spare parts are more expensive then probably yes, and there seem to be far fewer scrap merchants around as well. Surprisingly I see 10+ years old cars in far better condition than in the UK. Something to do with the dry(ish) weather ? ?

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Rosemary

As Concierge for the Spanish section of BE I would like to say hello and welcome.

BE is a very large expat website, so if you have problems finding your way around we have concierges who will try to direct you. The moderators for the Spanish forums are Mitzyboy and Fred James, moderators are there to ensure that the site runs smoothly within the rules of BE. Problems and complaints should always be addressed to a moderador who will look into the matter and deal with it efficiently and fairly. Our members who post in the Spain Forums are friendly and helpful with a wealth of knowledge of the issues of living in Spain. At the top of the page you will find a quirkily named thread called Free Beer which is full of important and useful information. Hope you enjoy your time participating in the forums.

Please let me know if you need any further help.

Rosemary

Mitzyboy

I doubt its worth it. You'd have to make a lot of money to cover travelling costs and how would you know what parts?

Rosemary

Also the average person here seems to take their car to the garage and do not do their own maintenance so surely he would need there to be a culture of home mechanics. In my town you are not allowed to do that sort of thing in the street and we got glared at by the local police when we were changing my tire due to a puncture.

Rosemary

Rosemary

Just realised that my comments on car maintenance are not relevant because I live in a Spanish area and of course he will be needing the Brits to buy the parts from him.

Not sure how many Brits do their own car maintenance here and equally not sure how many would want to rely on a stranger bringing the correct parts to them. Normally I would have thought that when people need a part they need it there and then so it would be impossible to predict what might be needed.

But then again you are all welcome to shoot me down in flames.

Rosemary

pete_l

The thing is that whatever you bring over you'd have to make sure it all sold. Otherwise all the unsold stuff would just add to the cost of your journey. If it was me, I'd make very sure that I was only bringing stuff that people had asked for and paid for. Especially if you're dealing with people you don't know.

Maybe get in touch with a "brit shop" in Spain and see what stuff they'd buy from you. Or possibly a van full of cheap ASDA jeans

p.s. I find it difficult to get shoes in Spain that are large enough.

pwwm

Hubby always used to do his own repairs in UK, he has found here it just is not worth it, we pay 26 euro an hour for labour and we import our spares from Craddocks for our Discovery at a fraction of the price here, luckily our local garaje is happy to use those parts.

Re importing stuff, as previously said you dont know what people need etc.

Adam90

Thanks for all your comments guys, sorry if I misled you on what I was getting at, I meant to say bringing parts over for garages not for public, for instance a garage has a car booked in next week for brake pads something which I could deliver well in time. That's obviously if parts like that are alot cheaper here?

Rosemary

How will you get these orders from garages? Are you hoping that there are a lot of Brits running gagares here.

Rosemary

Adam90

To be honest I'm looking at looking at mainly Spanish garages as im not sure if british garages are already gettn them from the Uk and spanish garages which I'm guessing don't source their parts from the UK and just go with the prices of Spain like they have their whole lives, I'm still unsure between delivering on a weekly basis with cash on delivery so there isn't any trust issues or mail ordering with a Spanish telephone number. Also from what I've learned parts do seem to be expensive in Spain but I will have to carry out alot more research in order to find out if this is true

agoreira

I've heard the same as you, from a good source, but you'll have to accept on this forum, nothing is cheaper in UK, Spain is cheaper for everything.

Mitzyboy

Errrr, what you doing Adam?

Domino

Adam, it is really no use you relying on the "knowledge" of half a dozen people on an internet forum. You will have to look very carefully at the potential market by actually coming out here and meeting your potential customers.
But they are going to want to know more about your pedigree, ability to supply, pricing structure, etc etc than you are going to get from them

Although there are people running around and saying "Spain is backward" "Spain has no business sense" etc etc there are people out there already in this line of business supplying the motor dealers and repair shops acrosss the country. There are all the main dealers, although their non-stock parts do come from central hubs from say Madrid the parts are usually in by the next day and the work completed. All the major manufacturers of consumable things like brake pads etc are also well represented.
I live 35k outside the city but we have a Peugeot, Citroen and Ford dealerships here in this large village/small town. No one has any problems getting parts and the Ford dealership does one heck of alot of insurance work.

For such a proposed enterprise to work it would have to be really specialised and hold some stock for immediate sale plus have guaranteed delivery dates for others.

I had to have my headlamps changed from RHD to LHD, they were here the next day and the price was similar to the Uk. I considered buying them from my UK dealer and off the internet but after paying delivery charges it was cheaper to do it at the main dealer.

hth

pete_l

But is that only expensive to the end user, i.e. the motorist? Could it be that the garages buy the parts at the same wholesale prices that other garages pay, in other countries and then just mark them up by a large amount? If that's the case then they wouldn't be prepared to pay higher prices to you as a supplier.

Also be aware that if you tried CoD, they could easily renege on the agreed price when you turn up with the goods and offer you much less, on the basis that who else could you sell (some very specific spare part) to?