European car sales statistics are a little bit like financial news from The Old Country: Up one day, down the next. This is one of those next days. In June, new passenger car registrations dropped by 8.1 percent in the EU to 1,233,298 units. Over the first six months of 2011, a total of 7,120,499 new cars was registered, or 2.1 percent less than in the first half of last year. This according to data provided by the European Manufacturers organization ACEA.
| June | June | % Chg | Jan – Jun | Jan – Jun | % Chg | |
| ’11 | ’10 | 11/10 | ’11 | ’10 | 11/10 | |
| LITHUANIA | 1,344 | 663 | +102.7 | 6,623 | 3,277 | +102.1 |
| LATVIA | 682 | 556 | +22.7 | 4,000 | 2,048 | +95.3 |
| ESTONIA | 1,333 | 820 | +62.6 | 7,503 | 3,895 | +92.6 |
| ICELAND | 1,166 | 1,135 | +2.7 | 3,056 | 1,925 | +58.8 |
| BULGARIA | 1,823 | 1,451 | +25.6 | 9,166 | 7,299 | +25.6 |
| SLOVAKIA | 6,298 | 6,154 | +2.3 | 34,183 | 27,710 | +23.4 |
| NETHERLANDS | 50,683 | 50,681 | +0.0 | 329,274 | 270,106 | +21.9 |
| DENMARK | 16,491 | 15,551 | +6.0 | 87,253 | 73,763 | +18.3 |
| FINLAND | 11,213 | 12,236 | -8.4 | 71,328 | 62,446 | +14.2 |
| IRELAND | 11,030 | 8,401 | +31.3 | 77,134 | 67,593 | +14.1 |
| SWEDEN | 27,485 | 28,270 | -2.8 | 157,042 | 138,079 | +13.7 |
| AUSTRIA | 32,018 | 32,957 | -2.8 | 187,593 | 169,675 | +10.6 |
| NORWAY | 10,354 | 11,119 | -6.9 | 68,505 | 61,969 | +10.5 |
| GERMANY | 288,382 | 289,259 | -0.3 | 1,622,579 | 1,468,791 | +10.5 |
| HUNGARY | 4,194 | 4,259 | -1.5 | 23,112 | 21,537 | +7.3 |
| SWITZERLAND | 28,086 | 31,746 | -11.5 | 158,474 | 148,505 | +6.7 |
| BELGIUM | 48,353 | 53,872 | -10.2 | 326,445 | 320,203 | +1.9 |
| SLOVENIA | 5,769 | 5,663 | +1.9 | 32,942 | 32,403 | +1.7 |
| EU10* | 70,981 | 75,620 | -6.1 | 376,287 | 370,833 | +1.5 |
| FRANCE | 210,172 | 240,531 | -12.6 | 1,225,084 | 1,212,436 | +1.0 |
| CZECH REPUBLIC | 16,156 | 18,538 | -12.8 | 88,284 | 89,026 | -0.8 |
| EU27 | 1,233,298 | 1,341,815 | -8.1 | 7,120,499 | 7,275,603 | -2.1 |
| LUXEMBURG | 4,256 | 5,155 | -17.4 | 28,596 | 29,677 | -3.6 |
| POLAND | 24,776 | 27,231 | -9.0 | 138,716 | 147,002 | -5.6 |
| UNITED KINGDOM | 183,125 | 195,226 | -6.2 | 1,029,638 | 1,108,662 | -7.1 |
| ITALY | 168,832 | 171,753 | -1.7 | 1,012,849 | 1,165,396 | -13.1 |
| ROMANIA | 8,606 | 10,285 | -16.3 | 31,758 | 36,636 | -13.3 |
| PORTUGAL | 17,152 | 26,029 | -34.1 | 91,905 | 115,250 | -20.3 |
| SPAIN | 83,385 | 121,484 | -31.4 | 442,217 | 604,162 | -26.8 |
| GREECE | 9,740 | 14,790 | -34.1 | 55,275 | 98,531 | -43.9 |
Being at the halfway mark of the year, let’s look at the countries. Who was naughty? Who was nice? Ignoring pocket-sized markets such as Latvia and Iceland for a moment, a pattern evolves: There are well-to-do countries in the northern half of Europe with double digit growth. And there are the Mediterranean patients with double digit losses. The UK however is getting close to Mediterranean levels of doom.
| June | January – June | |||||||||
| %Share | Units | Units | % Chg | %Share | Units | Units | % Chg | |||
| ’11 | ’10 | ’11 | ’10 | 11/10 | ’11 | ’10 | ’11 | ’10 | 11/10 | |
| ALL BRANDS | 1,233,298 | 1,341,815 | -8.1 | 7,120,499 | 7,275,603 | -2.1 | ||||
| VW Group | 22.6 | 20.9 | 278,415 | 279,943 | -0.5 | 22.7 | 21.0 | 1,613,989 | 1,526,757 | +5.7 |
| PSA Group | 13.2 | 13.7 | 162,316 | 184,143 | -11.9 | 13.2 | 13.9 | 938,589 | 1,010,604 | -7.1 |
| RENAULT Group | 9.5 | 11.0 | 116,806 | 147,588 | -20.9 | 9.7 | 10.6 | 688,122 | 771,559 | -10.8 |
| GM Group | 9.5 | 9.7 | 117,386 | 130,103 | -9.8 | 8.8 | 8.5 | 628,647 | 618,112 | +1.7 |
| FORD | 8.1 | 7.4 | 100,487 | 99,333 | +1.2 | 8.1 | 8.5 | 576,727 | 617,178 | -6.6 |
| FIAT Group | 7.4 | 7.4 | 91,181 | 99,412 | -8.3 | 7.3 | 8.2 | 521,852 | 597,675 | -12.7 |
| BMW Group | 6.5 | 5.8 | 79,706 | 77,680 | +2.6 | 5.8 | 5.1 | 410,112 | 370,135 | +10.8 |
| DAIMLER | 5.3 | 5.0 | 65,767 | 67,615 | -2.7 | 4.7 | 4.6 | 337,489 | 331,979 | +1.7 |
| TOYOTA Group | 3.1 | 3.9 | 38,836 | 52,365 | -25.8 | 4.0 | 4.2 | 281,780 | 306,964 | -8.2 |
| NISSAN | 3.2 | 3.0 | 39,357 | 40,828 | -3.6 | 3.4 | 2.8 | 239,096 | 205,552 | +16.3 |
| HYUNDAI | 2.9 | 2.4 | 35,382 | 32,416 | +9.1 | 2.8 | 2.5 | 200,499 | 185,520 | +8.1 |
| KIA | 2.1 | 1.7 | 26,198 | 22,959 | +14.1 | 1.9 | 1.9 | 135,142 | 135,874 | -0.5 |
| VOLVO CAR | 1.8 | 1.6 | 22,634 | 20,866 | +8.5 | 1.8 | 1.6 | 127,862 | 113,309 | +12.8 |
| HONDA | 0.9 | 1.3 | 10,761 | 17,839 | -39.7 | 1.1 | 1.4 | 76,653 | 99,674 | -23.1 |
| SUZUKI | 1.1 | 1.2 | 13,837 | 16,259 | -14.9 | 1.3 | 1.4 | 91,301 | 99,547 | -8.3 |
| MAZDA | 1.0 | 1.3 | 12,395 | 17,320 | -28.4 | 1.0 | 1.3 | 74,208 | 97,226 | -23.7 |
| OTHER | 0.3 | 1.0 | 3,512 | 13,281 | -73.6 | 0.8 | 1.0 | 58,383 | 71,439 | -18.3 |
| JLR | 0.6 | 0.6 | 7,194 | 8,503 | -15.4 | 0.7 | 0.7 | 47,836 | 50,424 | -5.1 |
| MITSUBISHI | 0.7 | 0.7 | 8,473 | 9,519 | -11.0 | 0.8 | 0.6 | 57,742 | 45,090 | +28.1 |
| CHRYSLER | 0.2 | 0.3 | 2,655 | 3,843 | -30.9 | 0.2 | 0.3 | 14,469 | 20,985 | -31.1 |
Looking at manufacturer groups, Volkswagen continues to grow and adds market share. Second ranked PSA and third ranked Renault suffer from contraction and loss of share. Amongst the American brands, the GM group adds 0.3 percent of market share, while Ford loses 0.4 in the first half of the year. The Japanese brands are earthquake-induced weak, with the exception of Nissan (+0.5 percent market share) and Mitsubishi (+0.2). Hyundai continues its climb up the ranks. Fiat looks pale around the nose.
The interesting story is Nissan: It hails from tsunami-territory, however, it grows 16.3 percent in the first half year, extending its lead over Hyundai both in growth and market share. With Renault losing nearly a point of share and Nissan gaining in Renault’s back yard, this will make for interesting discussions in the Renault boardrooms.
Full data are available as PDF and Excel. The worksheet contains finer grained data. For instance, it tells you that the GM growth goes on account of Opel. The big Chevy gains in Germany are a flash in the pan. Europe-wide, Chevrolet sold fewer cars in the first half of 2011 than in the same period of 2010, and barely maintained its market share of 1.3 percent.
Good to have some data. I don`t know why Chevy was specifically commented on. It’s sales performance continent wide is uneven (Germany a “flash in the pan”, although growing well in the continents largest market is better than doing so in say Iceland) but then that holds for other companies too like Ford who does much better in the UK than Germany.
What I find most interesting is that taking 2010 data so we exclude the earthquake induced reason for some Japanese companies not doing too well (although Nissan and Lexus did well) is that Chevy and Honda had essentially the same market share (1.3vs 1.4%). Honda has been established in Europe much longer and is well regarded in the US, why so poor in Europe? Even Suzuki sells as many as Honda!
Toyota is another company that disappoints, again based on 2010 so no earthquake, they had only 4.2% market share which is just less than half of Ford’s share. The Japanese really don`t do well in Europe.
Bertel specifically mentions the earthquake as an issue for some Japanese companies. I wonder how Lexus (part of Toyota) managed to increase sales by almost 30%? Admittedly still a pitifully small 12500 cars over the whole continent in 6 months – BMW sells more cars than that in one month in the US, or the UK, or Germany!
Just noticed that Alfa did extremely well with a 48% increase in the 6 months to June. I wonder what has lead to such an improvement and if it means Fiat will not sell Alfa as had been rumoured in the past.
Chevy is mention because July 13 TTAC post base on flaw premise.
Geozinger – I agree that the title will bring in some hits. Being from the UK I would have read this anyway.
Secret Hi5 – The July 13th article was not based on a false premise. I have just re-read it and it was a short factual article saying sales surged in Germany. True. No link to a wider European sales surge was made. Just as there are regional variations in vehicle sales in the US there are in Europe – even more so since there are many local manufacturers. For example Peugeot does best in France, Fiat in Italy etc.
@Mike978: Yes, I could understand your interest being from the UK. Me, not so much.
This blog doesn’t use it, but many have the search terms of greatest interest in varying sizes alongside the posts. I’d love to see what words would be the biggest in that list.
The Chevy comment was two-fold: One, to link back to a story from the other day, and two, to gain hits.
Now really, would you have looked at this article if that headline were worded differently? I know I’m not that interested in European sales results.
“Chevy Gains No True”
????????
What kind of grammar is that? That is what got my attention, though, as I wasn’t aware anyone across the pond bought a Chevy.
Honda has been established in Europe much longer and is well regarded in the US, why so poor in Europe?
The Japanese automakers have gained minimal presence in Europe. A combination of automotive nationalism, tariffs, limited access to distribution, a strong local fleet/company car market and a wide array of competitors with long histories of making compact cars has not made it easy for them to penetrate. There’s not much comparison to the US market.
The key reason is that the European manufacturers rose to the challenge, they didn’t try to evade it like the D3 did.
There have been no tariffs for years, just like the US market. With regards nationalism, there is some but the US also has that to some degree. All the reasons you cite are just as relevant to Chevy, Hyundai and Kia who have grown strongly in the past few years.
I completely agree with Hildy that the European companies rose to the challenge. It is helped that they only had to focus on cars and not SUV’s or trucks like the big three in the US.
Europe protected its market by going diesel, America by going truck. Exporting a diesel is almost impossible but all you need to do to export the car is put in a gas engine. A Truck is difficult to export and changing the engine doesn’t change a thing
There have been no tariffs for years, just like the US market.
You’re wrong on both counts. The EU has a tariff on imported cars of 10%. the US has a tariff of 2.5% on cars, and the infamous 25% “chicken tax” on trucks.
The key reason is that the European manufacturers rose to the challenge
There wasn’t much of a challenge. In the 70’s, the Japanese makers were able to offer small cars to Americans that were not available from Detroit, and Detroit’s ventures into the small car market produced some notably dismal reputation destroyers such as the Vega and Pinto.
In Europe, automakers were already making small cars, so there was not as much reason for consumers to switch. France, Italy and the UK had barriers that limited import market share to low percentages, plus the Japanese faced barriers in obtaining access to dealer networks, which limited their ability to sell their vehicles. While Japan was gaining a substantial foothold in the US during the 70s, they had no chance to do that in Europe.
European compacts were generally a failure in the US. The British, French and Italians all retreated, while VW lost ground to Toyota, Honda and Datsun. Aside from the easily evaded chicken tax, there weren’t many US barriers to entry, and the US market was large, homogenous and lucrative enough to encourage them to make a go of it.
For the first 6 months GM is up 10,500 units while Ford is down 40,500 units!! Toyota with all the production losses is only down by 25,000 Units, which is pretty impressive IMO.
True, and it makes me wonder if the productions losses were all that major since Toyota have quite a few factories within the EU. They are also coming back to full production several months quicker than originally thought which is great, so any “losses” due to the earthquake should hopefully be minimal.
@mike978: From the start I thought the disruptions would be minimal. These companies have facilities all over the world. In Toyota’s US ads, they brag about how much they source locally. It would only make sense to have volume models’ supply chains kept in good order.
Maybe for some unusual option packages on a high end model there may exist a shortage of parts or whole cars, but what shortages did we see in the US? (Seriously, I don’t really follow the Japanese makers that closely.)
I noted another post, in my area, they still have incentives on Toyotas and Nissans. If these were in short supply, would they be blowing them out with sweet financing deals?
There have been many comments made over the past few years how Sergio Marchionne is such a fine turn-around artist or master planner or some such. I can’t help but notice that over the past year Fiat Group sales and market share have been on an overall downhill trend, even now when their home region is experiencing growth. If this is the leadership and technology source that is to make Chrysler resurgent, my pessimism for Chrysler is, unfortunately, reinforced.
Fiat as brand have not launched a single new car for a few years now. All they did was update the grande punto with the worst design refresh in the recent history. Their other bread and butter car Panda is now seven or eight years old. The new one has been postponed.
They did launch the Alfa Giulietta which accounts for the Alfa Romeo growth which is impressive in percentages but not nearly so in the absolute numbers. They will finally launch the new Lancia Ypsilon and based on the photos I have seen it will be another design miss.
On the other hand they updated the whole range of their engines although the multiair technology and the two cilinder turbo aren’t proving such a breakthrough as the marketing would have us believe.
They may be putting all their powers into the Chrysler rejuvenation and therefore the Italian brands suffer. I would say 2011. and 2012. are crucial for Fiat, the new panda, punto and bravo will make it or break it.
Fiat home region is Italy and a little bit Spain and Poland. All great performing car markets this year. Their strong point is also cheap small cars. That market shrank in Germany