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Customers most often return to second-hand dealers for grey hatchbacks or estate cars. SUVs are also popular.

The favourite used car of the year 2014, to which customers stay loyal, is a grey Škoda hatchback.

Customers who repeatedly buy used cars show their loyalty in choosing the car’s bodywork and its brand. The choice of a second-hand car is influenced not only by the type of fuel it runs on or by its safety features, but also by its colour. Despite a slight decrease, Škoda still dominates all brands, followed by Ford and Toyota. Volkswagen and Renault also managed to squeeze into the Top 5. These are the results of the AAA Auto Index analysis, in which AAA evaluated its sales in the last five years.

Facts about customers’ loyalty out of AAA AUTO Index:
• Škoda dominates the brands customers most often return to. Even after a seven percent decrease the Czech car maker holds unassailable first position with 47.9%. Second Ford (25.1%) is followed by the Toyota brand (22.2%).
• As far as bodywork is concerned, customers choose hatchbacks (46.7%), followed by estate cars (37.4%) and sedans (23.2%). SUVs saw a noticeable progress (26%), an increase of 6.4% customers as opposed to the year 2013.
• The most sought after are the cars under 50 thousand crowns (48%). The category of used cars above 200 thousand crowns also saw a slight increase (47.9%).
• In comparison with last year, grey colour became considerably more popular (22%) when it surged from the third place to the first one, pushing blue colour (20.8%) to the second place. Black colour was closely third (20.5%).

“Just like with any other goods there is a high probability that a satisfied customer will buy the same product. That’s why we carefully monitor long-term user experience and tendency to return, to be able to get clients again every car they have been satisfied with in the past,” says Karolína Topolová, CEO of AAA AUTO, and adds:

“We are aware that our customer care and all services connected with the sale itself can have a considerable acquisition potential and bring new customers who haven’t had any experience with the brand so far.“ Strengthening customers’ loyalty won’t show just in repeated purchases (or in using of service stations), but also constitutes potential for further sales, i.e. buying other cars for the household from the same brand etc.

If the customer decides to go for something different in his next used-car, he will most often buy instead of Škoda a Ford (7.8%) or a Volkswagen (7.7%). Hatchback owners choose an estate car as an alternative (23.4%) or a sedan (13.4%). It’s the other way round when estate car owners choose new bodywork. They choose a hatchback (30.8%) or a sedan (10.7%). The favourite colour of this year, grey, is exchanged for a blue, or possibly a silver or black colour. The difference between changing the type of fuel is almost the same. In 36.3% of cases diesel motor owners switch to petrol engines, while it’s 34.9% the other way round.