2014 UK Car Market scored the highest performance since 2004 and fourth-largest of all time. The 2014 brand ranking confirms Ford on top with Renault the most dynamic among top manufacturers. Ford Fiesta is again the best-selling car in UK.
In December 2014 according to data released by S.M.M.T, total new Car Passengers sold have been 166.198, up 8.7% from the correspondent month last year. Every month in 2014 saw an increase, with December rise the 34th consecutive month of growth.
Full Year 2014 sales have been 2.476.435 (up 9.3% from the previous year), the highest performance since 2004 and fourth-largest of all time; only 2002, 2003 and 2004 saw more cars registered.
UK remains second largest market in EU (behind Germany and ahead of France, Italy and Spain), and recorded second-largest growth of these top five EU markets.
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.”
Looking just at the full year ranking (you can sort it on the table’s top line), the 2013 podium was confirmed, with Ford kept leadership with 326.643 sales, +5.1%, with share at 13.2%, down only 0.5 points from year ago.
Opel was second with 269.177 units, +3.8% and a share of 10.9%, while Volkswagen was third with 214.828 sales, +10.7% and share at 8.7%.
However, the year will be remembered for a very good performance scored by Renault in 15th absolute place with 66.334 sales, +43.7% from the previous year, together with Dacia (23rd), Mitsubishi (25th) and Jeep (30th).
In the best-selling models ranking, the 2014 confirmed the top 3 of year ago. Ford Fiesta was again on top (as in 2013) with 131.254 cumulative sales, +7.6%, followed by Ford Focus and Vauxhall (Opel) Corsa respectively with 85.140 and 81.873 sales.
2014 saw a remarkable surge in demand for ultra-low emission vehicles (ULEVs): registrations of plug-in cars increased four-fold from 3,586 in 2013 to 14,498 in 2014
Tables with sales figures
In the tables below we report sales for all Brands, top 10 Manufacturers Group and top 10 Models
