Romford Road: the story of East London's car dealer district

I leave Gallows Corner, eager to encounter my first one, which soon heaves into view. There has been a Gidea Park garage on this site since 1919, while Gidea Park Motors, the present business, has been in the same family for the past 50 years. I reckon a little thing like a pandemic isn’t going to knock it off course.

Paul, who looks after sales, isn’t in today, but his colleague tempts me with a 2010 Vauxhall Corsa 1.4 auto for £3795. How’s business, I ask: “Cars are so expensive now. With the ULEZ now in force [London’s Ultra Low Emission Zone, which penalises older, more polluting cars], everyone is rushing to buy younger ones. Prices have taken off.” 

Judging by their scarcity, so have dealers. After Gidea Park Motors, I don’t see another dealer until, west of Romford, I chance across Cars Hunt. 

“We used to make up to £2000 a car, but now we’re lucky if we earn £600,” manager Imran Latif tells me. “£600 on a nearly new Mercedes E-Class! In 14 years of selling cars on this road, I’ve never seen anything like it. Customers don’t want to pay anything but we’re having to pay everything.”

There are more dealers at this end of town, including Chariots of Romford – a reference, perhaps, to the fact that, way back, the A118 was a Roman road linking London with Colchester in Essex. Anyway, it’s Caesar’s day off, so Geoff takes my enquiry.

“An automatic?” he asks. “They’re the crown jewels for us: hard to find but easy to sell. Prices are rising fast for the best ones.” 

I tell him his place is pretty rare. He explains: “This road used to be chocker with dealers, but now flats have a bigger value than cars.”

It seems he’s right. Save for some franchised showrooms, I spy no more used car dealers until Seven Kings, just east of Ilford, when a miniature strip of them suddenly appears. I realise I was last here for my previous story four years ago. Remarkably, given everything that has happened between times, they seem to be the same businesses, too. Brexit and the way Eastern Europeans suddenly stopped buying cars was the big talking point then. Now it’s car prices and high rents

“Used cars are getting more expensive all the time while high rents and Covid have forced many dealers out of business,” says Iyaz.

Not his near-neighbours, though, as Mohammed at Car Planet reminds me: “We’re not going anywhere. We’ve been here a long time.”

As long as Gladwell Motors, another dealer 500 yards down the road? “My uncle opened this place in 1963,” Ron, the owner, tells me. 

“When I started, I had hair. A lot of people will rip you off around here, but we’re old-school. Got a problem? We’ll sort it. We’ve got loads of good reviews but a few moaners, too. You can’t please everyone. We only buy nice cars from nice people, but they’re getting more expensive and harder to find. The cars and the people.”

Farther along is Amanah Prestige, my first upmarket dealer of the day. They have a 2020 Volkswagen Golf 2.0 TDI Style DSG with 12,000 miles for £22,990. All things considered, it’s a competitive price. “One of the cheapest around,” Mo assures me. “It has just had a new battery and some injector work carried out under warranty, but otherwise it’s a great, one-private-owner car. Ones like it are becoming very hard to find and expensive, too.”

Past Ilford, under the North Circular and, at last, the A118 becomes Romford Road. A Glyn Hopkin MG dealership stands guard and, a quarter of a mile or so later, Arina Cars (no one appears to be around), but as I drive westwards I see no other dealers. 

There’s MR Motor Services (surely a survivor from the old days) and Muscle Mansions in Forest Gate where a 19-year-old body builder called Arnold Schwarzenegger lived and trained for two years in the mid-1960s but no more Rons of Gladwells and his ilk until, at the end, I clock the cars behind the wire mesh fence that opened this tale. Looks like Geoff at Chariots was right.