VW Golf Keeps its Sales Crown in Europe for 2011, Polo Comes in 2nd And Ford Fiesta 3rd

The sixth generation of the Volkswagen Golf is in its final year with a replacement due to be unveiled at the upcoming Paris Motor Show this fall, yet it still managed to sell more cars than any other model in Europe in 2011 for a third year in a row, according to data provided from JATO Dynamics. Volkswagen delivered 484,547 units of the Golf in 2011, down 1.6% over the previous year. The German company also took second spot with the Polo that sold 356,490 cars, up 0.5%, while the Ford Fiesta with 348,465 sales (-13.3%), the Opel / Vauxhall Corsa with 313,325 units (-1.7%) and the Renault Clio with 294,172 (-13.1%) complete the Top 5.
We should note that all Top 10 best-sellers came from either German (7 models) or French (3 models) brands.
JATO Dynamics says that outside the top ten, certain models performed much better than their predecessors did including Peugeot’s new 508, which saw its sales rise almost three times achieved by its predecessor, the 407, in 2010, the new Ford C-Max/Grand C-Max, Citroën C4, BMW X3 and Kia Sportage.
Overall, the European market shrunk 1.2% over 2010 to 13,543,179 units in 2011.
Greece and Portugal recorded the largest drops with 30.7% and 31.3% respectively, while on the other side of the spectrum, Latvia and Lithuania posted gains of 72.5% and 66.0% respectively.
The top selling brand in Europe was of course Volkswagen with 1,678,279 units (+9.1%) followed by Ford with 1,087,912 (-2.8%) and Renault with 1,038,313 (-8.8%). Out of the top ten brands in 2011, only Volkswagen, BMW, Audi and Mercedes ended 2011 with no reduction in sales.
“Germany is clearly leading Europe in terms of a market for new cars as well as manufacturing models which appeal to consumers across the region. This is even more impressive considering the challenges we saw in the overall European market during 2011," commented Gareth Hession, Vice President, Research at JATO.