Ford Fiesta top in EU
April 20th, 2010 by Richard Aucock
FORD’S Fiesta continues its market leading sales position by becoming Europe’s best-seller, too!
March sales saw it take the slot from the Volkswagen Golf by a hefty 11,785 units.
It’s also thus now ahead in the year-to-date sales, too – 140,496, compared to the Golf’s 135,048. This performance was aided by a near-26 percent jump in Ford Fiesta sales over March 2009.
As researchers JATO point out though, it’s not through any weakening in Golf sales: they’re actually up, too. But the Fiesta’s were up by more. Indeed, it actually accounted for 34 percent of all new car sales in the UK last month.
‘What may appear to be a sudden change in fortunes is actually a continuing trend,’ explained David Di Girolamo, head of JATO Consult.
‘Fiesta has been closing the gap to Golf through 2010 and there are a number of factors behind this.’ These include strong sales markets in Fiesta strangleholds, plus the ending of scrappage in the UK and Italy.
‘The last time Fiesta was ahead of Golf in European sales was March 2009, so it remains to be seen whether it can hold top position this time round.’
There was also a big honour for the UK market overall. We were the LARGEST European market of all in March!
Here, though, Di Girolamo sounded a warning. ‘There remains the shade of scrappage in these figures, so we need to remain cautious.’
‘Germany has lost almost 200,000 sales in the first three months of the year, without the incentives that are still helping other markets…’
Jato also released top 10 lists of the best-selling cars and brands across Europe, which we’ve listed below.
Top 10 cars
1 Ford Fiesta
2 Volkswagen Golf
3 Renault Clio
4 Vauxhall Corsa
5 Peugeot 207
6 Ford Focus
7 Vauxhall Astra
8 Volkswagen Polo
9 Fiat Punto
10 Fiat Panda
Top 10 brands
1 Ford
2 Volkswagen
3 Renault
4 Vauxhall
5 Peugeot
6 Fiat
7 Citroen
8 Audi
9 Toyota
10 BMW
Tags: best seller, fiesta, Ford, Golf, jato, Volkswagen