ARTHUR DALEY is dead and it's all because today's high quality cars have given a new lease of life to the smaller independent used-car dealer.

Dealers who specialise in low-priced cars are more professional than they've ever been, according to CAP, the independent observers of the motor trade.

Small dealers usually retailing cars from £500 to £5,000 are also more important than ever, both to the entire car retail industry as well as the public.

Tony Styles, senior editor of CAP's Black Book, said: "Cars are now better-built and more reliable than ever before, so their retail lifespan has extended to 12 years in many cases.

Shop around

"Main agents struggle to make a profit on such cars, because of their own expensive in-house reconditioning costs.

"That is where the smaller independent dealer really comes into his own.

"They have the freedom to shop around for more competitive maintenance and bodywork repairs which can often halve the reconditioning costs of franchised dealers enabling them to achieve a healthy profit while still offering great value.

"And in some cases they can make more profit per unit than their competitors in glass palaces.

"The old Arthur Daley image is now for the most part fiction. The car-buying public is too switched on these days to be taken in by bodywork filled with newspaper and gearboxes stuffed with sawdust.

"Thanks to the build quality and staying power of today's cars those dealers specialising in the budget end of the market are gaining sound reputations and respect across the market place.

"And they have to be good because the customer spending £3,000 is often harder to please than someone with £30,000 because they're using every last penny and absolutely demand the best value for money."