European car sales analysis June and first half 2015 – brands

After a few months of slowing growth rates, European car sales are back with a bang in June: +14,5% to just over 1,4 million units. This is the largest monthly year-over-year increase since December 2009 vs. December 2008. However, this excellent result must be viewed with some skepticism: being the last month of the second quarter and of the first half of 2015, a lot of dealers, importers and even manufacturers have pushed sales to reach their targets. As a result, a lot of the increase in sales can be attributed to pre-registered or self-registered cars, which haven’t yet found an actual buyer. We’ll have to see what happens in the next few months before getting all excited about a real recovery of the European car market.

All the major markets posted double-digit growth in June, with Spain (+23,5%), France (+15%), Italy (+14,4%), Germany and the UK ( both +12,9%) leading the way. Year-to-date, the increase in car sales for the first half of 2015 is a healthy 8%, to 7.371.208 units.

Before we continue, one side note: have you noticed we’ve uploaded historical brand sales figures for Europe as far back as 1990 now? Click on the brand name on this page or use the drop-down select box in the top right-hand corner of this site to check the brand sales and market share all the way from 1990 to 2014. That’s 25 years of verified data, sourced by ACEA, the European Automobile Manufacturers Association. Bear in mind, the EU has added countries over the years, and these sales include all countries within the EU at that point of time. Data from 2006 onwards also includes the countries of the European Free Trade Association EFTA (Norway, Switzerland and Iceland).

If the Volkswagen Group had a dismal month of May, with declines for its namesake VW brand and its premium Audi brand, and stable sales for Seat and Skoda, in June the manufacturer easily makes up for lost ground, with almost 50.000 additional sales on June 2014. This leaves Renault-Nissan back in second place of biggest winners, just ahead of it French rival PSA Peugeot-Citroën. Honda is the only manufacturer to post lower June sales.

Relatively, the smaller players are making the biggest waves, with Mahindra & Mahindra leading the pack again thanks to its SSangYong SUV brand, at sales up 80,2%. Tesla also has an excellent month at +71,2% and topping 2.000 sales for the second time this year and the first non-March month ever.

Brands-wise, Volkswagen has a blockbuster month with sales up more than 25.000 units on June 2014, and with over 165.000 its best June ever and its best non-March month since April of 1999. The love is shared by all of its eight brands, as each records a solid increase for the month. Ford also celebrates its return to the biggest winners top-3 for the first time this year, while Audi more than makes up for its loss of 3.889 sales in May by adding almost 11.000 sales in June.

On the loser side, Chevrolet is down “only” 1.783 units because it had already started its decline more than a year ago. But with only 10 brands out of 53 losing sales this month, of which just five lose more than 100 units, not much is needed to hold on to the title it’s held since Daihatsu also left the continent over a year ago.

Honda makes it 5 negative months out of 6 this year, with only the CR-V (just) in positive territory, as does Lancia-Chrysler, which is now for 95,5% dependent on the Ypsilon minicar and for 88,6% on its Italian home market.

Relatively, Jeep is again the fastest growing brand in Europe with sales up 175% thanks to the Renegade, followed by Lamborghini thanks to the Huracan and Smart thanks to the simultaneous introduction of its new generation Fortwo and Forfour. Great Wall and Tata continue to lose most of their already low sales in select countries.

Finally, we congratulate DS with reaching the 500.000 cumulative sales milestone this month. Since its introduction late 2009, over half a million units of the three model DS line-up have been sold in Europe. Two thirds of this volume comes from the subcompact DS3, with the DS4 accounting for just over 100.000 sales and the midsized DS5 adding another 62.000 sales.

June winners and losers

Manufacturer biggest volume increase	Volkswagen Group	49.580		Manufacturer biggest volume lost	Honda	-712
	Renault-Nissan	17.291
	PSA	16.619
Manufacturer biggest % increase	Mahindra & Mahindra	80,2%		Manufacturer biggest % lost	Honda	-6,4%
	Tesla Motors	71,2%
	Mitsubishi Motors	52,1%
Brand biggest volume increase	Volkswagen	25.226		Brand biggest volume lost	Chevrolet	-1.783
	Ford	13.592			Honda	-712
	Audi	10.947			Lancia-Chrysler	-432
Brand biggest % increase	Jeep	175,8%		Brand biggest % lost	Chevrolet	-92,6%
	Lamborghini	92,0%			Great Wall	-82,2%
	Smart	89,0%			Tata	-40,0%

H1 2015 sales

Year-to-date, the excellent month of June helps Volkswagen Group reclaim the title of biggest winner from Renault-Nissan, with Daimler holding on to third place as both of its brands show impressive gains on new model introductions and despite being passed by its rival BMW in the year-to-date ranking. Both brands still gain ground on the luxury-leader Audi.

Only three manufacturers are still in negative territory by the halfway point of the year, with Aston Martin only down 17 sales (1,9%) and GM down only 1,6% as successes at the Opel brand have been able to absorb the losses at Chevrolet, although General Motors is still down 13% on 2013 in a market up 7% since.

Renault doubles its year-to-date advantage over Opel/Vauxhall for third place, while Nissan consolidates its newfound leadership as the best-selling Asian brand over Toyota. Citroën also passes Toyota YTD, as does Kia with Dacia. These two brands have been swapping places since the beginning of 2015 and it will be interesting to see who comes up on top when December ends. I’ve got my money on Kia as it’s just launched the new Sorento large crossover, but for the rest both brands don’t have any new models planned for the rest of the year.

H1 2015 winners and losers

Manufacturer biggest volume increase	Volkswagen Group	125.937		Manufacturer biggest volume lost	General Motors	-7.883
	Renault-Nissan	109.841			Honda	-6.823
	Daimler AG	55.567			Aston Martin	-17
Manufacturer biggest % increase	DRB-Hicom (Proton / Lotus)	55,8%		Manufacturer biggest % lost	Honda	-9,4%
	Mahindra & Mahindra	54,1%			Aston Martin	-1,9%
	Mitsubishi Motors	51,8%			General Motors	-1,6%
Brand biggest volume increase	Volkswagen	69.942		Brand biggest volume lost	Chevrolet	-32.862
	Nissan	51.648			DS	-8.783
	Renault	48.215			Honda	-6.823
Brand biggest % increase	Jeep	180,3%		Brand biggest % lost	Chevrolet	-96,4%
	Lamborghini	112,8%			Great Wall	-78,3%
	Mahindra	69,8%			Tata	-50,8%

 

 June 2015 brand ranking

	Brand	June 2015	June 2014	change
1	Volkswagen	165.612	140.386	18,0%
2	Renault	110.458	105.077	5,1%
3	Ford	104.704	91.112	14,9%
4	Opel/Vauxhall	101.034	92.500	9,2%
5	Peugeot	84.391	74.786	12,8%
6	Audi	75.111	64.164	17,1%
7	BMW	71.503	64.298	11,2%
8	Mercedes-Benz	69.663	59.932	16,2%
9	Fiat	65.316	57.087	14,4%
10	Skoda	60.301	52.023	15,9%
11	Citroën	58.400	51.252	13,9%
12	Nissan	52.851	43.188	22,4%
13	Toyota	51.366	46.453	10,6%
14	Hyundai	41.891	38.762	8,1%
15	Dacia	39.439	37.417	5,4%
16	Kia	37.756	32.406	16,5%
17	Seat	34.978	31.294	11,8%
18	Volvo	26.663	21.887	21,8%
19	Mini	20.064	15.215	31,9%
20	Mazda	18.752	15.218	23,2%
21	Suzuki	15.497	13.629	13,7%
22	Land Rover	13.376	9.213	45,2%
23	Mitsubishi	12.826	8.434	52,1%
24	Honda	10.345	11.057	-6,4%
25	Smart	9.128	4.829	89,0%
26	DS	8.352	8.486	-1,6%
27	Jeep	8.336	3.022	175,8%
28	Porsche	6.407	5.040	27,1%
29	Lancia-Chrysler	6.398	6.830	-6,3%
30	Alfa Romeo	5.497	5.770	-4,7%
31	Jaguar	3.837	2.839	35,2%
32	Lexus	3.231	2.432	32,9%
33	Subaru	3.046	2.783	9,5%
34	Tesla	2.047	1.196	71,2%
35	SSangYong	1.389	765	81,6%
36	Maserati	644	571	12,8%
37	Infiniti	527	302	74,5%
38	Ferrari	276	264	4,5%
39	Bentley	254	218	16,5%
40	SAIC MG	234	196	19,4%
41	Aston Martin	165	160	3,1%
42	Lada	162	130	24,6%
43	Chevrolet	142	1.925	-92,6%
44	Lotus	104	75	38,7%
45	Lamborghini	96	50	92,0%
46	Dodge	55	67	-17,9%
47	Rolls Royce	54	64	-15,6%
48	Mahindra	51	34	50,0%
49	Cadillac	41	32	28,1%
50	Tata	18	30	-40,0%
51	DR	16	20	-20,0%
52	Great Wall	5	29	-82,8%
53	Daihatsu	1	0	–

H1 2015 brand ranking

 

	Brand	H1 2015	H1 2014	change
1	Volkswagen	895.506	825.564	8,5%
2	Ford	546.340	514.221	6,2%
3	Renault	514.724	466.509	10,3%
4	Opel/Vauxhall	495.195	469.794	5,4%
5	Peugeot	446.602	420.935	6,1%
6	Audi	398.890	384.380	3,8%
7	BMW	370.775	345.112	7,4%
8	Mercedes-Benz	370.354	333.754	11,0%
9	Fiat	351.896	322.244	9,2%
10	Skoda	316.267	298.331	6,0%
11	Nissan	301.323	249.675	20,7%
12	Citroën	291.894	283.602	2,9%
13	Toyota	290.188	280.272	3,5%
14	Hyundai	235.145	216.458	8,6%
15	Dacia	202.475	193.549	4,6%
16	Kia	201.766	184.862	9,1%
17	Seat	184.504	169.966	8,6%
18	Volvo	134.686	124.264	8,4%
19	Mazda	99.286	92.072	7,8%
20	Mini	94.642	70.473	34,3%
21	Suzuki	89.460	86.411	3,5%
22	Land Rover	77.062	65.720	17,3%
23	Mitsubishi	69.777	45.966	51,8%
24	Honda	65.522	72.345	-9,4%
25	Smart	50.646	31.678	59,9%
26	Jeep	44.292	15.799	180,3%
27	DS	40.423	49.206	-17,8%
28	Porsche	36.609	27.761	31,9%
29	Lancia-Chrysler	35.994	40.703	-11,6%
30	Alfa Romeo	31.016	32.689	-5,1%
31	Lexus	19.062	14.240	33,9%
32	Subaru	18.820	18.380	2,4%
33	Jaguar	15.842	15.897	-0,3%
34	Tesla	7.038	5.440	29,4%
35	SSangYong	6.120	3.990	53,4%
36	Maserati	3.410	3.113	9,5%
37	Infiniti	2.835	1.783	59,0%
38	SAIC MG	1.672	1.204	38,9%
39	Ferrari	1.549	1.489	4,0%
40	Bentley	1.261	1.351	-6,7%
41	Chevrolet	1.222	34.084	-96,4%
42	Lada	965	731	32,0%
43	Aston Martin	887	904	-1,9%
44	Lamborghini	498	234	112,8%
45	Lotus	455	291	56,4%
46	Rolls Royce	317	374	-15,2%
47	Mahindra	292	172	69,8%
48	Dodge	251	349	-28,1%
49	Cadillac	235	203	15,8%
50	DR	148	120	23,3%
51	Tata	124	252	-50,8%
52	Great Wall	48	221	-78,3%
53	Daihatsu	8	7	14,3%
54	Bugatti	3	5	-40,0%