2014 was fourth best ever for car sales
THE UK new car market grew by almost 9.4% in 2014, making it the fourth best year ever for the industry, official figures have shown.
The Society of Motor Manufacturers and Traders said 2,476,435 new cars were registered in the UK last year – the most in a calendar year since 2004. Only 2002, 2003 and 2004 have seen more cars registered over a 12-month period.
The 9.35% market growth put the UK well above the EU average of 5.7%. The UK now remains the second largest market in Europe, behind Germany and ahead of France, Italy and Spain.
December saw an 8.7% rise in registrations compared with the same month in 2013, meaning every month in 2014 saw an increase, while December was the 34th consecutive month of growth.
Mike Hawes, SMMT Chief Executive, said: “UK new car registrations returned to pre-recession levels in 2014, as pent-up demand from the recession years combined with confidence in the economy saw consumer demand for the latest models grow consistently and strongly.
“The year was particularly strong for alternatively-fuelled vehicles as increased choice, coupled with a growing desire for reduced costs and greater efficiency, resulted in a quadrupling of plug-in car registrations over 2013. With a variety of new plug-in models expected in 2015, this area of the market will continue to grow significantly. For the market as a whole, we expect a more stable 2015 as demand levels off.”
Of the manufacturers themselves, nearly all showed an increase in registrations compared with 2013.
Audi (11.93%), Bentley (19.58%), BMW (9.81%), Jaguar (13.52%) and Mercedes-Benz (13.67%) were all above the UK average of 9.35%, while Ford (5%), Land Rover (2.74%), Mini (3.33%), Toyota (6%) and Vauxhall (3.75%) all improved on their 2013 performance.
BMW Group in the UK achieved its best ever sales in 2014 with both BMW and Mini brands setting new UK records. The latter is particularly significant because for the first quarter of the year buyers were awaiting the launch of a new model.
Ford retained its place as leading brand, aided by the continued success of the Fiesta – which with 131,254 registrations was the year’s best seller by some margin. Vauxhall retained second spot thanks to a very strong December, which actually saw the Fiesta knocked off its perch for the only time in the year at the expense of the Corsa.
Few manufacturers fared worse than 2013, although Aston Martin declined 6.7% although this equated to just 62 cars. In the volume sector, Honda fell 3.8% and Peugeot 1.77%.
Best performer of the year was Birmingham-based MG, the Chinese-owned brand seeing an overall rise of 361.5% – although volumes remained small at 2,326 compared to 504.
