The Fiesta helped Ford achieve its best European market share in 12 years, last month.
Ford Motor Co. is on a roll, and not just in its home market. The maker has just claimed the sales crown in Europe – for March, anyway – where its ongoing recovery yielded a hefty 16.1% increase in volume for the month and the company’s best market share in a dozen years.
In a market crowded with competitors, and where every sale is bitterly fought over, Ford gained 0.4 points of market share, to reach 10.4%, in March, based on the Continent’s 19 primary markets. Total Ford sales for the month came to 192,500 vehicles.
Nonetheless, a senior Ford executive warned that competition is intense, especially in light of Europe’s huge problem with over-capacity. Most manufacturers need to trim their operations, analysts have been echoing, but tough unions and restrictive national laws – complicated by the fact that few makers want to make the first big move – have led to near paralysis on capacity decisions.
At 10.4%m Ford achieved its highest level of market share since August 1998, and much of the credit is given to the automaker’s latest Fiesta subcompact. The model achieved a nearly 29% increase in sales last month, accounting for a full 35% of the maker’s European volume.
(A U.S. version of the Fiesta is scheduled for launch later this year, and will be followed by transplanted versions of the C-Max people mover and Focus compact, all part of the maker’s global One Ford strategy.)
Ford wasn’t the only automaker to have a good March, however, with overall industry sales, in Europe, rising 11.5% for the month. But the question is how much longer such improvements will continue.
Since the early days of the recession, various European governments have been struggling to find ways to prop up automotive demand, and many have turned to scrappage programs similar to the Cash for Clunkers campaign that spurred American demand.
But Ford of Europe Vice President Wolfgang Schneider warned, “we can expect some further challenges in the months ahead as more scrappage schemes are phased out,” during a news conference called to discuss Ford’s March sales.
For the first quarter of 2010, Ford has posted a 9.1% increase in European sales, total volume in the 19 national markets coming to 391,100.
Another potential problem for Ford and its industry rivals is the burgeoning debt crisis facing countries like Greece, Portugal, Spain and Ireland. While the European Union has agreed to step in, if necessary, the fundamental financial problems – and the impact on those and other European economies, could be significant.
Ford’s own forecast calls for a decline in volumes from 15.4 million, last year, to just 14.5 million cars, trucks and crossovers for all of 2010.
On a separate note, Ford’s Schneider weighed in on the ongoing issue of an Opel bailout. The European subsidiary of General Motors received some temporary help from the German government, over the last year, but Berlin backed away after GM aborted a planned sale of a majority stake in Opel to a Canadian-Russian consortium.
Opel is still seeking more European government aid, including $2 billion from the Germans, but Schneider said, “We are definitely against any support for Opel for restructuring of its business.”