I agree the 38 sounds high, but it comes from stats on the largest dealers, apparently, and I imagine if you remember many showrooms have associated service facilities maybe it is right. In any case as that is based on actual figures I would not overrule it based on just my opinion.

Reading through stuff on car sales over the last 12-15 months the relatively poor sales have been blamed in many things, one of which is consumer confidence over Brexit. That's not proven of course, and it might be completely unfounded.

I am not convinced car showrooms will be too affected by automation, though it will to some extent of course. But a car sale is a much more a matter of person-to-person persuasion: it is a different experience than picking an item out of a catalogue.