Jaguar Land Rover targets record half a million global sales this year

VEHICLE manufacturer Jaguar Land Rover has said it remains on course to sell more than half a million cars this year the first time in the company’s history.

The announcement comes after the company revealed record sales in three of its key global regions during May.

Nevertheless, group sales were down on those for the corresponding month last year when the company achieved sales of 38,831 vehicles, while for the first five months of last year sales totalled 200,778 vehicles.

During this May, the company sold a total of 38,017 vehicles – Land Rover’s share being 32,412 vehicles with Jaguar retailing 5,605 cars.

Sales of the all-new Discovery Sport continued to be strong with 5,624 dispatched to new owners during the month. Elsewhere there were solid sales performances from the Defender (up 40%), Discovery (up 8%), Range Rover (up 7%) and Range Rover Sport (up 3%).

For the calendar year-to-date JLR has delivered 199,610 vehicles globally – Land Rover amounting to 169,266 and Jaguar 30,344 vehicles.

Commenting on the month’s performance, Andy Goss, JLR Group Sales Operations Director said:  “I am personally delighted to see that three of our key regions, the UK, Europe and North America have delivered their best ever May sales this month.

“Following our fifth successive year of growth in sales, we anticipate retailing over half a million vehicles this year for the first time in the company’s history.

“As expected, initially there will be some short term change in our sales as we gear up for our new product launches, during what will be a landmark year for Jaguar Land Rover.”

For Jaguar, the F-Type continues to resonate in the marketplace, up 16% for the year-to-date. While with three all-new Jaguar vehicles already announced for 2015/16 – the XF, XE and all-new F-Pace crossover – the company is looking at setting an impressive product tone in the Big Cat’s 80th year.

JLR plans 12 new vehicles and model year updates in 2015 but it is the early performance of the new Discovery Sport and the soon-to-be launched Jaguar XE that continue to impress.

The Land Rover Discovery Sport is already outselling the Freelander it is replacing and has notched up over 50,000 global sales since launch earlier this year. The Jaguar XE, the first of a series of all-new Jaguar models, has had a very strong start with around 25,000 vehicles already ordered. Customer deliveries of the XE begin this month in the UK, followed by Europe and then the overseas markets.