MILAN -- Stellantis will launch the reorganization of its European dealer network next week, starting with four specific markets before extending it further across Europe in 2024, the automaker said in a statement.
As part of its efforts to cut costs and support investments for electrification, the world's third-largest automaker had announced it was ending its previous sales and services contracts with European dealers for its 14 brands and moving toward a new distribution framework based on an agency model.
With the direct-sales model, automakers take more control of sales transactions and prices, while dealers focus on deliveries and servicing, no longer acting as the customer's contractual partner.
Stellantis said in its newsletter that it was completing the signing of the new contracts and that the revised retail model will be fully effective from Sept. 4, starting with Austria, Belgium, Luxembourg and the Netherlands.
The company said it signed more than 8,000 sales and more than 25,000 aftersales deals in recent weeks across 10 strategic countries in Europe.
The new framework will be progressively extended across Europe during 2024, with contracts due to be signed in the next few months, in line with the agreed framework, it added.
Uwe Hochgeschurtz, Stellantis' chief operating officer for the Enlarged Europe area, said the dialogue with European dealer associations and the group's entire dealer network had been "pragmatic, business-driven, based on full transparency and on highly mutually constructive talks and interactions."
