Jenna Baughan co-founded a car sales business after being frustrated by sexism at other showrooms - Jeff GilbertJust over 50 years ago, Mini ran an advert that now reads like an artefact from another planet. A beautiful woman, eyes wide with surprise and confusion, sits behind the wheel of a Mini Cooper, with the tagline: “The Mini Automatic. For Simple Driving”.Half a century on, the sexist ads may have disappeared, but the notion that female motorists are somehow trespassing in a world of dipsticks and brake horsepower is sadly still alive and kicking.Walking through the doors of a car showroom can feel like stepping through a portal into the past, where it is still somehow considered acceptable to patronise and intimidate female customers.AdvertisementAdvertisementA 2024 survey commissioned by Citroen found that almost half of women (44 per cent) who had sought help from male staff members when buying a car reported feeling patronised when doing so and that a similar number (48 per cent) believed the showroom retail experience was specifically tailored towards men.For many women, these numbers will hardly come as a revelation.The last time I bought a car, I went into a showroom knowing exactly the make and model I wished to purchase, ready to hand over £25,000. I was an informed customer, ready to buy, but I was treated as though I might have wandered into the showroom accidentally while looking for a handbag concession.Securing a test drive without my husband present was an unexpectedly drawn-out process that included being asked whether I’d like help getting in and out of the parking space (which I politely declined).AdvertisementAdvertisement“It’s quite a big car, you know,” I was told. “Just make sure you don’t scratch it!”It’s difficult to imagine any male customer receiving the same warning.Subsequently, I ended up driving 100 miles to buy a car from a less patronising outfit. And despite filling in a feedback form detailing my experience, I didn’t hear from the original garage ever again.Clearly, sales are being lost, knowingly or unknowingly, because of the flagrant sexism women are facing in the car sales business.Consumer research in recent years has repeatedly estimated that women direct or at least influence huge shares of household buying decisions – including cars – so why are they experiencing a different buying process?Radical responseJenna Baughan, 26, was so incensed by her treatment when trying to buy a car that she co-founded a dealership specifically focused on selling to women.AdvertisementAdvertisement“I was in my early 20s when I went to look for a car in a dealership,” Baughan says.“I hated every second of it. They asked if my father or boyfriend was going to come and look at cars with me. They just didn’t see me as a serious buyer, even though I had the money to buy.“They weren’t really interested in letting me look at the cars properly and were completely disinterested. They assumed I knew nothing.“I walked away without buying because I felt so intimidated and ignored.”Having identified an opening for a dealership catering to young women, Baughan and her father, David, founded the used car showroom So Pretty along with her brother, Laurence - Jeff Gilbert/www.jeffgilbert.co.ukBut after speaking about her experience with her brother, Laurence, and her father, David, she realised that she had an opportunity to change the experience for other women.AdvertisementAdvertisementDavid Baughan adds: “I hadn’t really considered the car-buying experience for women before, but I was absolutely horrified when Jenna told me what she’d experienced.”The trio saw a huge gap in the market and decided to launch their own used car showroom, So Pretty, aimed specifically at giving young women a positive car-buying experience.“Every person who came through our doors had a horror story about how they had been treated in a showroom,” says Jenna Baughan. “Nearly every female customer felt the need to bring a male friend or relative with them to buy a car, which made me quite sad.“We even had several men who came to us, who said they wanted to avoid the aggressive sales techniques they had experienced elsewhere, too.”Also ignored in the showroomSarah Knight also declined the opportunity to purchase a car because of the way she was treated in the showroom.Sarah Knight recalls attempting to buy a car while joined by her husband, James: ‘The salesman still refused to make eye contact with me and started talking about engine power to James’ - Lorne Campbell/GuzelianA business coach who specialises in coaching women in leadership roles, Knight says she was left “fizzing” with anger when a salesman ignored her and spoke only to her husband.AdvertisementAdvertisement“I was buying the car, but my husband, James, was with me,” she says. “The salesman instantly struck up a conversation with James, who explained that it was me, not him, buying the car and he had only come along because at 6ft 4in we wanted to make sure he could fit in it.“The salesman still refused to make eye contact with me and started talking about engine power to James, who once again told him we weren’t making a joint purchase and it wasn’t him who was interested in the car.“He had been speaking to James about sports performance, but when I took a test drive, he started mansplaining how to drive an automatic then offered to show me the air conditioning. He didn’t mention anything technical about the car – that I was actually interested in – once.“When we got back to the dealership, I told him I loved the car but I wouldn’t be buying it because he’d been incredibly rude.AdvertisementAdvertisement“He seemed completely oblivious as to why I was upset but also clearly didn’t care about losing the sale.”Lazy assumptionsKnight says the interaction seemed based on assumptions about who might be interested in buying a car – and has the money to do so.“Women have more purchasing power than ever, and I don’t think they will continue to put up with being patronised,” she adds. “Something will have to change.”The motor industry seems aware of the issue. A report that the car marketplace Autotrader commissioned into equality in car buying found that higher shares of women than men reported dissatisfaction when buying a car.‘Women have more purchasing power than ever, and I don’t think they will continue to put up with being patronised,’ Knight says - Lorne Campbell/Guzelian“The women in the research have told us they find car buying a jarring and disengaging experience,” Erin Baker, the editorial director at Autotrader, says, adding that it “needs to be addressed”.AdvertisementAdvertisementShe argues that while car buying can be complicated, “there’s no reason it can’t be the same experience for everyone”. She adds that “We need the industry to come together to address the gaps we’ve shone a light on.It might seem obvious, but one change could tip the balance. “Women reported feeling more comfortable and less intimidated when interacting with female staff,” adds Baker.Try full access to The Telegraph free today. 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