China Becomes Audi's Largest Market

Bertel Schmitt
by Bertel Schmitt

Supposedly, the Chinese car market is doomed and has crashed into its Limits of Growth. Not so, says Audi. China has turned into Audi’s largest single market, says Automobilwoche [sub], bigger than Germany. By the end of April, Audi had sold 78,487 Audis in Germany. How many were sold in China?

87,788 Audis changed hands in China in the first four months of the year. While others worry whether the Chinese market will fall 10 percent or grow 7.4 percent, Audi China chief Dietmar Voggenreiter wrote a plus of 20 percent for Audi into his business plan. And knowing my German friends, they never write anything into their business plan they are not absolutely sure they have already as good as achieved. The reason for Voggenreiter’s optimism sits in the north of China.

The Audi plant in frigid Changchun had been capacity constrained for a while. There are more buyers than cars. This year, the capacity of the plant will be increased by 50 percent to 300,000 units per year.

Last year, Audi sold 227,938 cars in China (made-in-China and imported). In the same year, Audi sold just a few more in Germany, 229,157.

Bertel Schmitt
Bertel Schmitt

Bertel Schmitt comes back to journalism after taking a 35 year break in advertising and marketing. He ran and owned advertising agencies in Duesseldorf, Germany, and New York City. Volkswagen A.G. was Bertel's most important corporate account. Schmitt's advertising and marketing career touched many corners of the industry with a special focus on automotive products and services. Since 2004, he lives in Japan and China with his wife <a href="http://www.tomokoandbertel.com"> Tomoko </a>. Bertel Schmitt is a founding board member of the <a href="http://www.offshoresuperseries.com"> Offshore Super Series </a>, an American offshore powerboat racing organization. He is co-owner of the racing team Typhoon.

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  • Tstag Tstag on May 30, 2011

    Considering Audi make cars there then is this actually a surprising result? This is JLR's second biggest market already and they don't even have a car factory there! If I were Germany's big 3 I'd be looking at JLR's numbers and worrying. When JLR open their car factory then suddenly China's well off will be able to buy premium SUV's from the best 4 x 4 maker by far!

  • Robert Schwartz Robert Schwartz on May 30, 2011

    Of course Audi is going to do better in a market where people have had no experience of owning Audis.

    • Slowtyper Slowtyper on May 30, 2011

      Haha ... government officials couldn't care less because every year they have budget to refresh their fleet and the single biggest reason why Audi is doing so much better than other makes in China is because the Communist Party has chosen it since early '90s.

  • Davekaybsc Davekaybsc on May 30, 2011

    No experience owning Audis huh? So the fact that they've been there since 1988, and they've sold over a million cars there, you'd describe that as "no experience"? I guess that's what happens without a fake news ratings grab.

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