You already have the bad news about February car sales in Europe. How did individual cars fare? JATO Dynamics provides us with a list of Europe’s Top Ten in February. With two exceptions, they are all down, some are way down. One exception creates great happiness in a suburb of Detroit.
As usual, Volkswagen’s Golf and Polo lead the list by wide margins. Like Volkswagen itself, Wolfsburg’s bestsellers lost only a little bit (compared to other losers,) thereby gaining market share. The strength of the Volkswagen Passat surprises for yet another month.
Ford’s Focus continues to amaze, achieving a 20.1 percent increase in a disastrous market. Its strength is particularly surprising as much of this sales growth comes from the declining market in France.
The French suffered double-digits losses of the Renault Clio and Peugeot 207. Opel’s bestsellers disappoint.
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
How much worse or better would the sales figures have been if we were to discount this year’s leap day? Did any of the automakers pile March orders onto Feb 29th for example?
Focus surge is not surprise, as Feb 11 sales referred still to the previous model,with weak sales last year against newer competitors.
+1 no surprise here, par for the course for a new model.
Hmm, I’d really like to know what numbers Ford expected for this Focus. In comparison with 2005 (when the last Focus was brand new) the numbers aren’t really that great (it did >400k in 2005). Even recognizing the smaller overall market and the stronger segmentation, the Focus doesn’t do that well either.
In 2005, the Focus was new and the Golf was ~2 years old. Difference between the two cars was less than 15% in sales. Now, the Golf is close to replacement, the Focus is brand new – and the difference is bigger than 40%. On the other hand, the Focus is (iirc) still missing its wagon version, which is surely holding back sales…
Still, I am not yet convinced that “One Ford” is really working all that well…
So, Panda is a top 10, but they think we wont’t buy it unless they make a craptastic version.
Peugeot 207 sales: No surprise. There is a 208 coming next month. (No station wagon version will be available for the 208 anymore.)
@Landcrusher: The Panda is in the top 10 because it simply is a small, cheap, good car for the no-frills seekers (although you even can get a 4WD). But I don’t think that such a car would sell very well in countries where size matters.