After 2021, European car sales have not yet fully recovered from the epidemic. In the past year, the European market – that is, the EU + EFTA + UK – sold a total of 11.775 million new vehicles, down 1.5% year-on-year, or about 183,000 units. This figure is down a full 25.5% from the pre-pandemic highs in 2019 and the worst sales recorded by the European car market since 1990.
In fact, the main reason for the decline in the European market in 2021 is the lack of core. In December alone, sales in europe as a whole fell by 21.7%, which left the European market falling for six consecutive months and driving the market towards negative growth.
In addition, some people have counted the sales of new energy vehicles in 11 European countries, and the total sales volume of the whole year is about 843,000 units. Among them, the Volkswagen brand accounted for 123,000 units by relying on the ID. series, and Audi also sold 38,000 vehicles; followed by Tesla, Renault, Hyundai, Peugeot, Kia and so on. However, it is clear that Tesla and Hyundai Kia are both new cars and big cars, while Peugeot and Renault are still relying on small electric vehicles to barely hold their share.
Next, let's take a look at the market performance of the whole Of Europe, as well as the sales performance of key European countries, and which Chinese car companies will appear in the European market in 2021.
● Sales performance in Europe
Among the five major European markets, Germany still had the highest sales volume at 2.622 million units, down 10.1%, followed by France with 1.659 million units, and the United Kingdom ranked third with 1.647 million units, respectively, while the two markets increased by 0.5% and 1%, respectively, followed by Italy, which increased by 5.5% year-on-year to 1.458 million units, and Spain, which increased by 1% to 859,000 units. Therefore, the poor sales volume in the European market in 2021 is mainly due to the excessive decline in the German market, while the remaining main markets are not satisfactory.
The fastest growing markets are Iceland (+35.8%), Norway (+24.7%), Croatia (+24.7%), Greece (+24.6%), Estonia (+19.1%) and Ireland (+18.5%), all in double digits. However, the overall sales volume of these countries is not large, basically ranging from tens of thousands to 100,000 units, slightly larger is that Norway has reached 176,000 units, while the annual sales of small countries such as Iceland are only about 12,000 units.
However, it is very interesting that in countries with rapid growth, such as Norway and Iceland, the proportion of new energy vehicles in them is already very high. Especially in Norway, the proportion of new energy vehicles in this cold Nordic country is as high as 91.7%, which is completely exaggerated.
In medium-sized countries, such as Belgium, Austria, the Netherlands and other countries with annual sales of 300,000 to 400,000 vehicles, the decline in sales is also obvious, often double digits.
▲The Kia Niro became the best-selling model in the Netherlands in its second year of launch
● Performance of major European car companies
In terms of the position of the car group, the top three have not changed – the Volkswagen Group, Stellantis and the Renault-Nissan-Mitsubishi Alliance. However, all three auto groups have encountered a decline in sales, with the Renault-Nissan-Mitsubishi combination falling by 12.7%, and it will be mentioned later that Renault and Nissan have both fallen sharply, while the Volkswagen Group has fallen by 3.7%. The only one that performed well was Strantis, mainly thanks to the fact that the declines of Opel/Vauxhall and Citroën were controlled, so the entire group fell only 1.6% in the European market.
The fourth place is a little different - in 2021, Hyundai Kia Group achieved a breakthrough of 1 million vehicles with a growth rate of 21.1%, and also surpassed the BMW Group to become the fourth largest car company group in Europe. This was followed by a 9.6% increase in the Toyota Group, leaping ahead of Daimler to sixth place with sales of 760,000 vehicles. So this year is not BMW, Daimler did not work hard, can only say that Hyundai Kia and Toyota these East Asian opponents are too hard.
In addition, the situation of three echelons of the European market has now been formed.
The head group is a 1.5 million vehicle scale group represented by Volkswagen, Strantis, Renault-Nissan-Mitsubishi, but Volkswagen is the only one who leads the way and is a group with a scale of three million vehicles.
The second echelon is the East Asian team represented by Hyundai Kia and Toyota, and the traditional luxury forces represented by BMW and Daimler, each of which has a million opportunities, but now it is divided into 70 to 1 million vehicles for various reasons.
There is actually only one third echelon, Ford Motors. But with the commissioning of Tesla's Berlin factory, perhaps the third echelon will increase Tesla's annual sales of 500,000 vehicles, and this year Tesla only sold about 166,000 units in the European market.
● What brands Europeans like to buy
So far, the sales data of individual models in Europe has not been finally released, but the top 30 brands in terms of sales have been revealed.
The Volkswagen brand is still as stable as Taishan, even if it has fallen by 5.2%, it is almost twice as good as the second and third places in the European market. However, the Toyota brand has put pressure on Peugeot, and Toyota, which previously sold only 600,000 vehicles a year, rose to 712,600 vehicles in 2021 with a year-on-year increase of 10%, leaving only 12,000 vehicles behind.
At the same time, Yaris is said to have become the largest single model sold in Europe, including yaris, Yaris Cross, and mazda2, its bicycles have been manufactured in Europe with more than 200,000 units.
Skoda, Ford, Hyundai, Kia, as well as Opel/Vauxhall, Fiat, Citroen these brands, single brand sales are 500,000 vehicles, in fact, there is still a strong product momentum.
As an American car company with a separate engineering center and design center in Europe, and the only American brand that is still competing in the fuel vehicle market in Europe, it can still win a market share of 500,000 vehicles, which is enough to prove that Ford has deep roots in the European market.
However, it has to be said that although Ford Europe is working hard, the biggest problem is that Ford Europe has no way to share the cost with the global market and enhance the competitiveness of Ford Europe through the scale advantage brought by the global market. This makes Ford seem to be more and more isolated in the European market, Focus, C-MAX, PUMA and other models, although they are very successful, but only limited to the European market. How to solve this problem is what Ford's current CEO Jim Farley needs to think seriously, especially with the independence of China, the future demand for Ford Europe in China will be less and less.
Another brand that is also getting tougher in Europe is Nissan. Once Nissan was half a European local brand, but now Renault-Nissan has become a good fit, in addition to struggling to maintain some of the common platforms jointly developed before, Nissan's products themselves are becoming less and less competitive in the European market. With Renault releasing the latest five-year plan, Nissan Europe seems too meaningless, coupled with the Uk's departure from the European Union, it is even worse for Nissan Europe, which uses the UK as the production, research and development, and design center.
From the perspective of sales in 2021, Nissan's annual size is less than 250,000 units after falling by 14.2%, coupled with the weakness of new energy products, Nissan may be more on the edge in the European market in 2022 - if less than 200,000 vehicles, then the European market will have the same significance to Nissan as Honda. Honda is now in Europe in tens of thousands of vehicles, has no sense of existence, and once exported From China to The Accord, Jazz to Europe is long gone.
Volvo's annual sales are still growing further, about 300,000 units. In fact, Geely Group is also planning opportunities to land in the European market, for example, Lynk & Co has already entered the Nordic market where Volvo excels in 2021, obtaining cumulative sales of more than 5,000 vehicles. In addition, Polarstar , a Volvo-Geely joint venture — sold 29,000 vehicles last year, most of which was contributed by the European market. In this way, Geely/Volvo Group together can also go to the scale of 400,000 vehicles, which is very rare.
On the brand sales list, another very interesting data comes from MG MG. The brand, which is controlled by SAIC, sold 52,000 units in Europe, a threefold increase in the UK market.
● What cars do Germans buy
The Volkswagen brand is the absolute king of the German market, and its share has increased to 18.7% against the background of the decline in sales in the entire market, with a total sales volume of 490,000 units. In Germany, the second and third places are Mercedes-Benz and BMW, with a difference of only about 3,000 vehicles. The only non-local brand that sells well in Germany may be Hyundai, with annual sales of about 100,000 vehicles, and it is preceded by Opel, Skoda and Ford, which are more or less local battles.
In terms of The Germans' favorite models, the Volkswagen Golf has been the top seller for 41 consecutive years and the 46th in the past 47 years. The next two models are also Volkswagen's - Tange and Tiguan are both 50,000 vehicles, and the fourth is Opel's CORSA.
Among the all-electric models in the German market, the Tesla Model 3 won the championship with 35,000 units; the second place was the Volkswagen ID.3, with sales of 26,700 units, followed by the Renault ZOE with about 24,000 units. The ID.4, the main model of the ID.series in China, sold 12,900 units on the German side, and the performance can only be said to be barely strong.
● What cars the French buy
The French still prefer French cars, but have now moved from Renault to Peugeot and Citroen. In full-year 2021 sales, the Peugeot brand surpassed Renault for the first time since 1939 with a record of 286,000 units, which sold 269,000 units in 2021. In third place was Citroen, with annual sales of 162,000 units and a market share of nearly 10%. Fourth place is Dacia, fifth place is Volkswagen, sixth place is Toyota, and in seventh place is Mercedes-Benz. In other words, the French people are still more concerned about ordinary life, and do not pursue brand seniority so much - of course, strictly speaking, Peugeot's positioning in the European market is similar to Audi' positioning.
In terms of models, the Peugeot 208 is undoubtedly the hero of Peugeot winning the French sales championship, with sales reaching 88,000 units. This was followed by the Renault Clio, which sold 85,000 units, an increase of 1.4 percent. Next are Peugeot 2008, Dacia Sandero, Citroën C3, Renault Captur, etc., which are basically familiar products, and the real as a foreign brand in the French market is Toyota Yaris, with sales of 32,300 vehicles.
Tesla is still the catfish that stirs up the French new energy vehicle market, and the sales volume of the Model 3 single model ranks fourteenth, with sales of 24,900 units, a growth rate of 284.6%, which has surpassed the previous highest-selling electric vehicle in France. However, the performance of the Fiat 500 in this year is amazing, with a growth rate of 39.5%, with the advantage of more than seventy vehicles, pressing the Model 3, so as not to make the American brand too arrogant.
● What cars the British buy
On the British side, the Ford brand has been hit hard, and the American brand may be the first time since 1968 that it has not won the sales championship in the British market, and this title has been taken away by the Volkswagen brand. Not only that, but in fact, Ford did not even get the second place - the second place was Audi. Not only that, even BMW surpassed the Ford brand, ford is only 272 BMW, and finally ranked fourth with a sales performance of 116305 vehicles, a total decline of 23.9%.
Behind Ford, there are Toyota, Mercedes-Benz, Vauxhall and other brands to catch up, these brands are 9-10 million vehicles.
The blow to Ford didn't stop there, with the Voxha Corsa becoming the uk's first annual model to surpass a Ford model since 1971, with sales of 41,000 units. Ford's largest model in the UK market in 2021 is the PUMA, ranking eighth, with only 28,700 units, close to the sales of another frustrated car company, Nissan.
▲ Vauxhall Corsa became the number one model in the UK in terms of sales
The second-place model was surprising, but not so unexpected, and that was the Tesla Model 3, which accumulated 34,800 units for the year. The model grew 82.5% year-on-year for the full year, selling 9,612 units in December alone, twice as many as the entire MINI series and nearly four times that of Vauxhall.
● What cars italians buy
It is inevitable that Italians will buy Fiat, with its annual sales of 223,600 units accounting for 15.3% of the Italian market. However, this sales performance is actually the second lowest in history. The second place is the Volkswagen brand, which sells just over half of Fiat's, with 126,000 units. Then there are Toyota, Peugeot and Ford, each with about 80,000 vehicles, each with a market share of about 20%. Jeep also performed well in the italian half of his hometown, selling 63,600 vehicles in 2021 and reaching a market share of 4.4%. I thought Italians would love Alfa Romeo, but the local luxury brand sold only 11,300 units, down 34.4% year-on-year.
It seems that Italians love crossovers, which is probably not unrelated to the cobblestone and towering curbs of Italian streets.
The first seller is the Fiat Panda, which sold 112,300 vehicles in one model, equivalent to half of Fiat's - comparable to the position of Nissan Xuanyi and Volkswagen Langyi in the Chinese market.
The Fiat 500 sold a record second place, with 44,800 units sold, of which 70% were MHEV models and 24% were BEV models.
Jeep Liberty also sold very well in Italy, ranking fourth in bicycle sales, reaching 35,300 units. Looking back at the third place is the Lancia Ypsilon, which is relatively unfamiliar to Chinese consumers, with bicycle sales of 43,750 units, but this car is also too aesthetically tested.
The next one is the crossover, the Fiat 500X, also known as the "Liberty Man Shell Car", which has sold about 32,000 bicycles. In fact, yaris crosses also sold very well, just listed in December to buy 2390 units, and even let the Yaris hatchback version in December fell 70% of sales.
Anyway, there are really many SUVs or crossovers in Italy's annual Top 10, as well as Sandero, Jeep Guide, Ford PUMA and so on. Ten others ahead are Volkswagen Detective, Renault Captur, Peugeot 2008, Volkswagen T-Cross and more.
By the way, among the pure electric vehicle sales in Italy, the Fiat 500 is more than 10,000 vehicles, and the Smart Fortwo, Renault Twingo, Renault Spring, and Tesla Model 3 behind it are about 5,000 vehicles. What is the Renault Spring? In fact, it is the cheap small electric SUV that EasyJet built in China in cooperation with Renault-Nissan and Dongfeng, which is called eNo, Venucia is called e30, and there is a version of Fengshen.
● What cars the Spaniards buy
As Europe is not so rich market, Spain's car sales figures for 2021 are not so good. For example, the private sales market fell by 12.8% to only 372,600 units, and the remaining 334,500 units came from the rental market.
In Spain, the most popular brand is SEAT, which is also the thirteenth time the brand has won the title in the past 14 years. The second-ranked brand is Peugeot and then Toyota, and the Volkswagen brand seems to have naturally weakened its presence here.
In the model sales list, Seat Arona's sales growth reached 42.8%, with a record of 21946 units to win the 2021 sales championship. However, Seat's victory was not unexpected, and the surprise was that the second place - Hyundai Tucson actually sold 21258 vehicles, an increase of 66.8% year-on-year, which is very exaggerated.
▲Seat Arona won the model sales championship in the Spanish domestic market for the first time
After that, there are no new products, all small models for third world countries, and it can be seen that the private consumer market in Spain is really not very good. It wasn't until the thirty-third place that the Audi Q3 appeared, and the annual sales volume was only 8776 vehicles, which was really not good. Among luxury brands, bmw, which ranked first, sold only 35,200 vehicles, followed by Audi 34,700 and Mercedes-Benz with 33,700 vehicles, ranking 10th, 11th and 12th.
● What cars do Belgians buy
Belgium is also a unique market, with more than 300,000 vehicles, the BMW brand topped the annual sales with 39,000 units, 10% more than the Volkswagen brand. Then there are Peugeot, Audi, Mercedes-Benz, in other words, the BBA directly gathered in the top five of the Belgian market. In addition, three China-related brands also performed well in Belgium – Polestar sold 1,003 units, higher than Lexus; MG brand annual sales of 746 units, ranking 34th; followed by Lynk & Co with 731 units sold. Not only that, on the Belgian sales list, you can also see the products of Chinese brands such as Aichi, BAIC and JAC, with annual sales of 41, 37 and 9 vehicles respectively.
● What cars Norwegians buy
Norway is an inevitable country for analyzing the European car market, and the Nordic country, which sells 176,000 vehicles a year, has a share of new energy models as high as 91.7%. You read that right, we didn't miss the decimal point, it's true that more than 90% of the models are electric vehicles, and last year, The sales of electric vehicles in Norway increased by 37.1% to 162,000 units.
In the Norwegian market in 2021, Tesla's sales increased by 133.5%, directly winning the position of Norwegian car sales champion brand, which is also Tesla's first national car annual sales champion in the world. On the other hand, in addition to the common European brands on the sales list, a large number of Chinese new energy vehicle brands are also shining in the Norwegian market, and this Nordic land is regarded as the "overseas origin" of Chinese new energy models.
Polestar, ranked 14th in the Norwegian market in 2021, with annual sales of 4109 vehicles, an increase of 44.8%; MG sales were higher than Mazda's, reaching 3111 units, but this was also down 16.4% compared to 2020; BYD Tang performed well in Norway in its first year, selling 1066 cars; Xiaopeng sold 442 vehicles, Chase 261 vehicles and Niolai 200 vehicles in Norway. In addition, Hongqi sold 25 vehicles, as well as two Dongfeng Xiaokang DFSK.
● What cars the Swiss buy
In the wealthy Swiss market, the Volkswagen brand is within reach, while the Volkswagen Group is out of reach. The leading edge of the Volkswagen brand, which sells 25,800 units a year, is not obvious, followed by Mercedes-Benz (21,600 units) and BMW (21,000 units), but then Skoda (18,700 units) and Audi (17,000 units).
Tesla Model 3 is the largest annual sales model in Switzerland, reaching 5074 units, followed by Octavia, Audi Q3, Tiguan and so on. In addition, the Sales of Volkswagen ID.3s is also good, reaching 2423 units, and may be able to enter the top ten next year.
● What cars do Swedes buy
On the Swedish side, the volvo S60/V60 series ranked first, with annual sales of 14,900 vehicles, which is still down nearly 20%. In second place, volvo XC40, sales increased by 18.9% to 12,200 units; third place was volvo, XC60 model, with annual sales of 11,900 units. Of course, the eleventh place is Volvo's S90/V90 series, with annual sales of 5689 vehicles, which is indeed a Swedish treasure. In addition, the Polestar 2 sold 2855 units in Sweden, and the gap with the Model Y was only more than a hundred. Even, Lynk & Co 01 sold 1,040 units in Sweden last year, and the Swedes really love Volvo.
● What cars do Russians buy
Sales in Russia are actually counted in the whole of Greater Europe, but they are not classified as five core markets. This should be the reason why Russia itself does not have too many mainstream European car companies involved.
In fact, the entire light vehicle market in Russia will sell about 1.667 million units in 2021, second only to Germany and more than France. SUV models accounted for 47.3% and LCVs accounted for 7.8%, while only 1,001 pure electric models in the global market last year were sold in Russia.
In Russia's annual sales ranking, Lada still ranks first with a sales record of 350,000 vehicles, and there is a gap of 150,000 vehicles with kia in second place. But overall, new car sales in Russia are concentrated in the relatively cheap segment.
What is more interesting is that the Haval brand has sold 39,000 vehicles in Russia, second only to Mercedes-Benz, ranking 11th, more than double the sales volume in 2020, and perhaps in 2022, it will become the top ten brands in Russia. Behind Haval is also a Chinese brand, Chery, with sales of 37,100 units, up 224% year-on-year. Geely also sold 24,600 units in Russia in 2021, up 58.9% year-on-year. In addition, Changan has a sales performance of 5705 vehicles, FAW also sells 3137 vehicles, and GAC, Lifan and Dongfeng Motor are all triple-digit performances. Even we see on the sales list that Zotye sold 51 vehicles and Futian had 37 vehicles, which is also very amazing.
Text| JackieLXX
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