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When Ford talks about increasing its retail sales, the industry sits back and listens – especially when the new car market is in freefall.
As the UK’s biggest selling car brand, the blue oval dominates retail and fleet sales and suffered one of the biggest year-on-year falls during the September plate change when its sales plummeted by 23 per cent.
Yet the brand remains confident that it can hold its own in the retail sector and could continue to grow its dominant market share.
The timing of this month’s launch of the new Fiesta followed by January’s next generation Ka could not have been better. Retail buyers in the new car market are downsizing and these models are set to benefit.
This is welcome news for Ford dealers who can ill afford setbacks on the scale of September’s figures.
However, downsizing can cause cannibalisation. Ford, like its volume competitors, will need to address how to ebb the flow out of C and D segment cars, especially with the slowdown in the all-important fleet market which favours these sizes.
The coming months could see a growing trend becoming a significant and long lasting shift in buying patterns with major ramifications for all the volume players.