Volkswagen Golf Leads Europe Sales

Sales data released by JATO, provider of automotive business intelligence, show that Volkswagen is still Europe’s top selling brand. The success is due to the new Polo and the top-selling model, the Golf.

Talking about model sales, the VW Golf is at number one. So far this year (to the end of October), Golf sales in Germany (249,150) represent 18% of Volkswagen's total European sales (1,386,694 units). The second place is occupied by the Ford Fiesta, whose sales were up 61,7% in October.

Talking about automakers, Volkswagen is still in the lead. Renault is on the second place of the top 10 put together by JATO, thanks to the facelifted Clio and Megane. Fiat is still doing a good job and has a positive growth in cumulative sales this year.

Even with these figures, there are still concerns over the sustainability of these performances: "A cursory glance at this data would suggest we are moving into a recovery phase in the bigger markets, but a closer look at the figures shows this is not necessarily a natural level of demand and we are still below the pre-recession sales level," said David Di Girolamo, Head of JATO Consult.

"This is not necessarily good news," warns Di Girolamo. "You can look at Eastern Europe - with VAT increases, finance restrictions and lack of government incentives - as the natural level of demand. The worry for major Western markets must now be that their incentives last until 'true' demand catches up and they do not fall back to performances reflected elsewhere."