What a year!
It may be the advancing years of the CarTakeBack team members (I’ll pay for that comment) but a year seems to go very fast these days! Luckily we have plenty to show for it, which gives us something to raise a glass to when it gets to the 31st December!
Here’s a quick look back at the last 12 months and some of CarTakeBack’s highlights…
January 2019 started with a relatively up-beat Scrap Car Price Update as we were looking at figures 35% higher than January 2018, and we are always happier if we can offer you all higher prices for your old car!
Love was in the air in February… no, not an office romance to report on, but clean air! The Mayor of London used the #LoveCleanAir summit to announce a new car scrappage scheme to support London’s Ultra Low Emission Zone (ULEZ) in 2021, to help lower income families who have older cars over the emission limit. This was followed by a van scrappage scheme to help small businesses and charities. CarTakeBack was chosen to work with Transport for London and vehicle manufacturers to collect and recycle vehicles being scrapped as a result of the scheme.
In March, after a brief dip, scrap prices showed a rise, and with Spring in the air we were full of useful advice for the future – giving you information on buying hybrid vehicles, how kids can become Global Recycling Citizens and how to drive in the EU after Brexit (not quite so helpful with hindsight!).
April’s scrap prices continued to rise (maintaining a 34% increase on this time last year) and we had lots of happy customers taking advantage of those figures. We absolutely love receiving your farewell selfies and we’ve even got quite emotional in the office after reading your comments about some long-loved cars. Our favourite goodbye photo is going to be featured on Facebook soon!
Not only was May a record month for scrap prices we were able to give you all lots of useful driving advice. Obviously our ‘May The 4th Be With You’ blog probably isn’t the top of your reference list, but our step-by-step guide to dealing with a car accident, news on brand new EV battery developments and how to stop your keyless car getting hacked were hopefully more helpful!
June was home to Clean Air Day and a huge date in our diary. Helping you to get old polluting cars off the road is what makes us tick and we were able to share plenty of advice from this vital campaign to help make your journeys healthier wherever possible. Even better, the Clean Air Day charity joined our scheme Charity Car so old car donations could help fund the campaign and raise awareness.
By now you are probably aware we don’t shy away from blowing our own trumpet and in July you would have heard us even if you’d set off on your summer holidays! CarTakeBack won the Feefo Gold Trusted Service Award 2019. The CEO of Feefo describes the Trusted Service award as their “most prestigious accreditation” and “recognising those companies that excel beyond the norm”. We take great pride in our service and were thrilled to keep our title from last year.
More good news in July came from our Charity Car scheme. The team announced hitting an incredible milestone having passed on over £500,000 worth of donations to charity partners! Including the biggest ever single donation – an auctioned car that generated £6444 for Alzheimer’s Research UK. The charity was thrilled: “It’s great to think that these old cars are funding ground-breaking research that will one day bring about a world free from the heartbreak of dementia. This one donation will fund over 300 hours of research…”
August brought the heat but that didn’t put off many of you getting round to dealing with your old wheels. We saw some more cracking farewell selfies over Summer, including Linda saying goodbye to ‘DD’ – after 17 years and 200,000 miles on the clock!
There are a few big dates in the CarTakeBack calendar and September’s home to two whoppers – World Car Free Day and Recycle Week! As much as we love cars it’s becoming painfully clear we all have to take responsibility for using them less, so we took the opportunity to give you as many alternatives as we could. We also gave you an insight into our recycling process, although you can still leave all the dirty work to us!
October saw Halloween scare down the price of scrap a little, but we were here to cheer you up with our essential (!) rundown of our favourite Batmobiles! We also had some useful advice to give you on idling laws, which were popping up all over the news, and we kept you up to date on the V5C Registration Certificate changes.
In November we were excited to tell you about our official support for the ULEZ car and motorcycle scrappage scheme. We also gave you useful tips on Blue Badge changes, the support available for disabled drivers and covered the latest developments in tyre recycling. Apparently you could be driving on what used to be your old tyres!
So we’ve reached December, another year nearly over and a huge year to look forward to in 2020! We’re seeing out 2019 with a small increase in scrap prices and the average car generating over £100. To celebrate, the CarTakeBack team are in the festive spirit and matching attire… We didn’t have to be asked twice to take part in Save the Children’s Christmas Jumper Day campaign with our colleagues at Charity Car.
Wishing you and yours a very Happy New Year from everyone at CarTakeBack, see you in 2020!
