Kia announces 2025 Dealer Excellence Awards winners

• New Kia business strategy announced as ‘Shaping our Future’ for 2026, at the annual Kia Dealer Conference in Liverpool
• EMG Kia Cambridge announced as the outright ‘2025 Dealer of the Year’ and ‘EV Excellence Award’ winner
• Joint second place ‘Dealer of the Year’ awarded to EMG Kia Ely and Mantles Kia Royston
• EMG Kia Ely also named ‘After Sales Excellence Award’ winner
• Shelly Motors Kia Epsom named ‘Sales Excellence Award’ winner
• Gravells Kia Hereford and Ken Jervis Kia (Stoke-on-Trent) named joint winners of the ‘Customer Experience Award’

Kia UK has announced the winners of its annual Dealer Excellence Awards at the Kia National Dealer Conference in Liverpool, recognising the best-performing dealerships over the past year.

More than 1,000 Kia dealer staff and employees attended the conference, which opened with this year’s business focus, ‘Shaping our Future’. The conference outlines Kia’s performance over the past year – another record year in the UK – as well as honouring the dealerships that have led the way.

Kia’s dealerships are ranked amongst the best in the UK while the brand itself is often ranked by dealers as the number one franchise. Kia is ranked the number one volume brand franchise in the past six successive National Franchised Dealers Association (NFDA) Dealer Attitude Surveys.

Paul Philpott, President & CEO of Kia UK, commented: “I would like to say a very big thank you to all our partners for their continued commitment and investment in Kia, for their hard work, and for their partnership, without which Kia would not have achieved another year of record results in 2025.

“On behalf of all at Kia, our heartfelt congratulations go to all this year’s Dealer Excellence Award winners, who have each showed exceptional performance and consistency across their businesses. As we celebrate these achievements, we will continue to shape our future and remain focused on the opportunities and challenges that lay ahead.

“With the strength of our dealer partnerships, and the support of our expanding model line-up, we can be confident that 2026 will be another pivotal year for Kia. With a clear strategy and the continued dedication of our network, I’m confident we will reach even greater milestones together.”

Dealer Excellence Awards
The annual Kia Dealer Excellence Awards recognise outstanding performance across Kia’s nationwide network of 190 UK dealerships. This year’s honourees were celebrated for their exceptional commitment over the past 12 months, with the coveted ‘Dealer of the Year’ title awarded to the top performing retailer and the second and third placed dealerships each receiving a ‘Dealer Excellence Award’ trophy for their overall performance. For the second-year running, the ‘EV Excellence Award’ reflects the growing momentum of electric vehicle adoption. The award sits alongside the established ‘Sales Excellence Award’, ‘After Sales Excellence Award’ and ‘Customer Experience Award’. Each category names a single winner, supported by nine ‘Highly Commended’ dealerships.

This year’s awards were once again dominated by Grainger Motor Group (GMG), whose dealerships picked up the top three ‘Dealer of the Year’ positions for the second consecutive year.

The overall ‘2025 Dealer of the Year’ winner is EMG Kia Cambridge, which was the 2024 Awards’ second place winner. In addition to the outright win this year, EMG Kia Cambridge was also the ‘EV Excellence Award’ winner, while also picking up ‘Highly Commended’ in each of the other awards categories: ‘Sales Excellence’, ‘After Sales Excellence’, and ‘Customer Experience’.

In joint second place, Mantles Kia Royston and EMG Kia Ely were both named ‘Dealer of the Year’ winners. EMG Kia Ely has additionally been named the 2025 ‘After Sales Excellence Award’ winner. Both dealers showcased their business expertise throughout 2025. Mantles Kia Royston previously won three of the four main 2024 awards categories, and took home the outright ‘2024 Dealer of the Year’ award.

Bringing home the coveted ‘Sales Excellence Award’ this year is Shelly Motors Kia Epsom, building on its 2024 ‘Highly Commended’ award in the same category.

Finally, the ‘Customer Experience Award’ has jointly been given to both Gravells Kia Hereford and Ken Jervis Kia (Stoke-on-Trent). Gravells Kia Hereford was the 2023 Awards winner of the same award, while Ken Jervis Kia continues its outstanding work in this category year after year, having previously won the same accolade in the 2022, 2021, 2020, 2015 and 2013 Awards.

2025 Kia Dealer Excellence Award winners:

2025 Dealer of the Year
1^st        EMG Kia Cambridge
2^nd       Mantles Kia Royston, and EMG Kia Ely

Sales Excellence Award
1^st        Shelly Motors Kia Epsom

Highly Commended:

• Bells Kia Northampton
• Burton Kia
• EMG Kia Cambridge
• Gravells Kia Narberth
• Lookers Kia Stockport
• Mantles Kia Royston
• Piccadilly Motors Kia Knaresborough
• Premier Automotive Kia Dukinfield
• Tates Kia Pyecombe

After Sales Excellence Award
1^st        EMG Kia Ely

Highly Commended:

• Acorn Kia St Helens
• Brayley Kia Harpenden
• EMG Kia Cambridge
• EMG Kia Thetford
• Flear & Thomson Kia Dunfermline
• Flear & Thomson Kia Perth
• Peter Cooper Kia Southampton
• Premier Automotive Kia Rochdale
• S G Petch Kia Richmond

Customer Experience Award
1^st        Gravells Kia Hereford, and Ken Jervis Kia (Stoke-on-Trent)

Highly Commended:

• Acorn Kia Crewe
• EMG Kia Cambridge
• EMG Kia Ely
• F J Chalke Kia Mere
• Gravells Kia Abergavenny
• Lloyd Kia Carlisle
• Mantles Kia Royston
• Startin Kia Warwick

EV Excellence Award
1^st        EMG Kia Cambridge

Highly Commended:

• Citygate Kia Slough
• EMG Kia Ely
• EMG Kia Kings Lynn
• Gravells Kia Hereford
• Mantles Kia Royston
• S G Petch Kia York
• Snows Kia Guildford
• Snows Kia Newbury
• Startin Kia Warwick

Kia in 2025
Kia ended 2025 as the UK’s fourth most popular car brand, with a healthy 5.6% market share and having registered 113,436 units. Kia continues to add fresh consumer choices and updates to its multi award-winning model line-up. In 2025 alone, these include the updated new Sportage, new Stonic and new EV6 GT, alongside new model launches of the EV4, EV5, EV9 GT, K4, PV5 Cargo and PV5 Passenger. 2025 also saw the EV3 win both the ‘2025 World Car of the Year’ and ‘2025 UK Car of the Year’ awards. In addition, Kia’s first dedicated electric commercial vehicle, the PV5, picked up the ‘2026 International Van of the Year’ award along with a host of other prominent ‘Van of the Year’ awards from various automotive publications.

2026 and beyond
Kia kick started the year with the reveal of the EV2 at the Belgian Motor Show on 9 January. Following this, the model line-up will be further strengthened by the launch of the Seltos in the UK – a popular model in other markets – and various derivatives of the PV5 commercial vehicle. These models, supported by the rest of the line-up, will help Kia to aim for yet another record year in 2026.

Ends

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