The Chevrolet Cruze hatchback - two-thirds of European buyers prefer 5-doors.
What’s more American, as the old ad slogan went, than “hot dogs, apple pie and Chevrolet?” Well these days, it’s not only the USA you can see in your Chevy.
The maker is giving European motorists a first look at the new Cruze hatchback at the 2011 Geneva Motor Show, the latest model in an expanding Chevrolet line-up on the Continent. Europeans actually got the original Cruze sedan a bit ahead of the U.S. because of bankruptcy-related delays. Now, bets Chevy, it can expand the compact model’s appeal by adding a 5-door.
Europeans have traditionally been far more open to the utilitarian hatchback than buyers back in the States – in fact, Chevy officials estimate 5-doors, including wagons, accounting for about two-thirds of European sales.
And cracking Europe is critical for the brand, which has become increasingly global. Until relatively recently, Chevy was limited to the North, Central and South American markets – in many, it is still the overwhelmingly dominant brand. But it is now spreading its wings around the globe, pitching buyers from Beijing to Berlin.
In Europe, Chevy was originally positioned at the low end of the market, supplementing the more mid-segment Opel. That strategy has largely been supported by product developed and often produced by General Motors’ Korean operations . What used to be Daewoo — and was recently renamed Chevrolet –produced about a quarter of all the Chevrolets sold worldwide.
An added urgency emerged in 2009, when GM began looking at the sale of a controlling interest in the struggling Opel. One possible scenario would have seen Chevrolet effectively replace Opel as GM’s mainstream brand on the Continent.
European sales rose 12% last year, in a market that declined 16% overall. By comparison to Opel, which range up 2010 volume of 1.2 million – a figure that includes the Vauxhall versions sold in the U.K. – Chevy is still small, with just 477,000 sales. But in just its sixth year in Europe, Chevrolet has become one of the fastest-growing brands on the Continent, gaining 0.2 points of share, last year, to reach 2.5%.
And for GM, that is a significant gain. Knocked off its pedestal by Toyota, in 2009, as the world’s largest automaker, the U.S. manufacturer came within about 30,000 units of regaining the title last year. With the launch of Chevy-badged products like the Cruze hatchback grabbing new customers, GM hopes to give its Japanese rival a run for its money in 2011.