Editor's letter: Why Genesis is targeting just 15 UK dealers

The Hyundai Group is the latest to try and crack the premium market with a new brand - perhaps one of the industry’s toughest tests - yet spend time in the company of Genesis’s management and your perception of it as another wannabe BMW or Audi soon shifts. Instead, Lawrence Hamilton, managing director of Genesis in Europe, sees a very different part of the market it can carve out. “The ambition is to build a loyal club of customers,” he says. “Once you’re in, you won’t want to leave.” That’s not just a sentimental statement, but rather one related to the only number Genesis is putting on its ambitions: the size of its dealer network. After a recent pivot away from solely online sales and brand experience spaces in shopping centres during its first two years on sale in the UK to working with retailers in an agency model, Genesis has signed seven dealers to start sales in early 2024 and plans to build a network of 15. BMW has more than 10 times that number. A small network means more personal relationships with customers, which is where Genesis thinks it has the edge. “The key to success is not only beautiful cars that perform well but relationships with customers,” says Hamilton. “This is where we can have an advantage; we can demonstrate value here. We call it a Korean phrase: ‘som mim’. It means honoured guest. Someone in your home - that’s the kind of relationship we want to build with customers. “The key to a luxury brand is the experience, the personal touch and thoughtfulness. Retail partners are as important as customers. If the retailer wins, the customer wins, and we win.” That size of network will be over a pretty even geographical spread and give Genesis a “frontline of 100-150 people working in dealerships”. Hamilton adds: “As an OEM, 150 is a very manageable number to get to know, train and spend time with. They get to know and understand the brand and become more aligned with us and build a strong culture. It’s the ‘cult’ of Genesis; get pride in the frontline and it’s going to do well with customers.” At the moment, Genesis operates in Europe in the UK, Germany and Switzerland. In the first half of 2023, the brand sold 1803 units across those markets, up from 849 a year before. The UK is its best-performing market, with 811 units (Germany was 641 and Switzerland 341, according to Jato figures), which makes it half the size of DS in the UK this year but still bigger than Alfa Romeo. Hamilton is happy with progress - all part of that learning before doing - and I’ll admit to being surprised that two years in, it has yet to expand beyond those three countries. Yet it’s part of the strategy of “steady growth, then stability and maturity”. “We’ve started small, testing and learning with direct sales. It’s the right strategy for now… [We’re now] ready to go for it, to put a long-term size and structure in place.” Genesis does plan to expand into other European countries, but only once the UK and German operations are more established (despite its smaller size, Hamilton is happy with Switzerland as its three-strong network there already gives a good geographic spread in a smaller country) and Hamilton knows which ones and when, although he won’t confirm where or when. France, Italy and Spain are understood to be in the frame. The firm has also focused heavily on building the brand and awareness of it, including high-profile sponsorship of the Genesis Scottish Open on the PGA Tour, an event won in July by Rory McIlroy that led to the sports pages being full of pictures of him holding the trophy in front of the GV70 Electrified he had just won. “Brand awareness is pretty good,” says Hamilton. “The perception of Genesis as a luxury brand has risen in 18 months. When people see us, they get a good impression. The biggest test is for them to see us as they see others [against the likes of BMW, Audi et al] and we’re being seen in the same company as we want to be.” Fast forward 20 years, I ask Hamilton, and what does success for Genesis in Europe look like? “I’d judge success as if globally we sell each car we make. [We won’t be] in each market. We’re not trying to be a huge player. The US and Canada are doing well – we believe at the end of the decade Europe will be at that level and that’s the ambition.” After a slow but steady start, Genesis is now about to move from “the learning phase to the doing phase” and the immediate goal becomes delivering volumes to the initial retailers to have profitable and sustainable businesses. For once in the automotive industry, the ambition seems modest, yet to take any share of the premium pie from the German brands is no mean feat. Still, Genesis thinks it’s found a niche through customer service that others haven’t, the same customers who will dictate the success in this most intriguing of new car brand launches.