Fiat and Alfa Romeo both
comfortably outperformed the relatively flat German new
car market last month, up 8.2 and 35.1 percent
year-on-year respectively. In total 266,251 new cars
were registered in Europe's biggest new car market,
which was up 2.6 percent year-on-year.
The Fiat brand is starting to put a disastrous year
behind it in Germany after the 'scrappage' schemes were
wound down and 8,674 new cars registered last month put
it up 9.2 percent year-on-year to give it a 3.3 percent
share of all sales.
Alfa Romeo posted very strong gains in Germany during
April; it was up by more than a third year-on-year
(+35.1 percent), albeit to just 873 units, as it was
driven by continuing demand for the Giulietta to take a
0.3 share of all sales for the month. That made Alfa
Romeo the fourth best performing brand on the German
market during April in year-on-year terms after Subaru
(+51.1 percent), Chevrolet (+45.1 percent) and Hyundai
(+38.3 percent).
Lancia however was right
at the opposite end of the spectrum as usual, and just
62 registrations during April was down by a half on the
same period last year (-48.8 percent). That meant that
Lancia continues to be undisputed as the German market's
wooden spoon holder, well clear of the other big
year-on-year fallers for the month: Jaguar (-33.8
percent), Chrysler Group (-31.7 percent), Lada (31.3
percent) and Honda (-27.6 percent).
For the year-to-date
the German new car market has seen 1,029,654
registrations, putting it up 10.7 percent year-on-year
for the four month period. The Fiat brand has 26,628
registrations in Germany so far in 2011, up 1.9 percent
year-on-year, and that gives the Turinese marque a 2.6
percent share of all sales.
Alfa Romeo has 3,895
registrations so far this year, up 77.2 percent, which
gives it a 0.4 percent of the market for the period. It
also means that Alfa Romeo is the best year-on-year
performer for the year-to-date in Germany, trailed by
Mitsubishi (+61.5 percent) and Subaru (+43.4 percent).
Making it Fiat Group Automobiles (FGA) brands at either
end of the year-on-year scale, Lancia is the second
worst performer in Germany so far this year, down by
more than a fifth (-21.4 percent) on the back of just
411 sales, keeping it behind only Daihatsu (-26.4
percent). The other big losers include the Chrysler
Group (-19.6 percent) and Peugeot (-8.0 percent). In
fact these are the only four carmakers to actually be
down on last year on this market for the year-to-date
period.
The Chrysler Group,
which Fiat is poised to take a controlling share in this
year, continued its fade away in Germany during April
although most of it continuing decline can be put down
to the withdrawal of the Dodge and Chrysler brands from
this market (they both appeared in the sales data last
year) as well as the wait for new Jeep models to filter
into the showrooms. The Chrysler Group sold a total of
394 cars in Germany last month, down 31.7 percent
year-on-year to take a 0.1 percent share of the market
for the month, while for the year-to-date the U.S.
carmaker is down 19.6 percent on the back of a total of
1,670 sales, a 0.2 percent share of the market for the
opening four months of the year.
