French Vehicle Market in October 2023 grows for the 15th consecutive month, reporting 152,472 new sales and a double digit growth (+22.2%). YTD figures at 1.44 million are up 16.3% from the previous year.
Market Trend and Outlook
After having slowed down significantly in the second half of 2022 and in the first quarter of 2023, on the back of supply bottlenecks and higher energy and commodity prices, French GDP growth accelerated to 0.5% in the second quarter of the year. This was significantly more than previously expected (0.1%). The rebound was driven by net exports, while domestic demand remained sluggish. The European Commission states: “GDP is forecast to grow moderately over the rest of the forecast horizon, as domestic demand starts to recover”.
The French Auto Market on the other hand still maintaining strong momentum, with October 2023 growing for the 15th consecutive month, reporting 152,472 new sales and a double digit growth (+22.2%). YTD figures at 1.44 million are up 16.3% from the previous year.
Looking at cumulative data up to October 2023, brand-wise Renault rises 1 spot into 1st with 230,454 sales (+19.0%), followed by Peugeot with 205,769 (+0.5%), Dacia with 130,715 (+24.1%) and Citroen with 108,381 registrations (-1.0%).
Volkswagen with 95,123 (+25.8%) maintains 5th place, followed by Toyota with 85,168 new registrations (+8.4%), in front of BMW at 44,593 sales (+27.9%) and Tesla at 43,966 registrations (+143.8%).
Ford falls into 9th with 42,169 units sold (+9.2%) and Hyundai closing the top 10 with 40,859 sales (+4.3%).
Looking at specific models the Renault Clio becomes the new best selling car with a 54.6% year-on-year increase in sales. The Dacia Sandero follows in second with a 10.5% rise in volume.
Medium-Term Market Trend
In the last decade the French market has had many ups and down. From 2010 to 2013 the French vehicle-market fell year after year starting from 2.3 million sales in 2010 and reaching the lowest point in 2013 with 1.8 million sales. Following this period the French market began a 6 year growth bringing sales nearly back to previous levels in 2019 (2.2 millions sales).
With the arrival of the pandemic in 2020, causing dealers and manufacturing plants to close down, the French auto-market took a substantial hit, losing 23.7%. This brought sales to an all time low, with almost 1.7 million registrations.
Post-Covid, sales stayed at 1.7 million in 2021 and in 2022 fell 7.8% to 1.53 million. Lower demand was consequential to the current European sentiment that is pushing more towards EVs, a substantially more expensive alternative for French consumers. This will continue to slow sales going into 2023.
Another factor that will put negative pressure on demand in 2023 is the disruption in the global supply chain caused by a lack of raw materials for microchips. This has led manufacturers to increase prices and waiting times.
Tables with sales figures
In the tables below we report sales for all Brands, top 10 Manufacturers Group and top 10 Models.
