It’s time once more for the Car Makers Premier League where each and every month we examine the top 20 manufacturers by number of units registered and see just how they look when compared with the previous month. At the end of the year who will be crowned champion? Who will drop out of the top 20 as the year unfolds and which high achievers will be promoted?
We carry on the season with March’s statistics (based on the SMMT new car registration figures for March 2012) and they are up 1.8% on last March (which was 7.9% down on the previous year), with an increase of 6,374 units to 372,835 cars registered for the month.
March is one of the biggest months of the year for new car sales obviously because of the plate change so let’s have a close look at which manufacturers have improved and the others which may need to take a long, hard look at themselves.
This month the top 13 positions all outperformed the market with the top two of Skoda (up from 14th last month with a whopping 32% increase on March 2012) and Nissan (a creditable 21% increase on last year) being some way out in front. Third and fourth come BMW and Land Rover both recording a respectable 14% increase on March 2011.
Biggest unit shifter in the top 20 in plate change month was Ford with 52,829 car registered for the month (18.6% of the top 20 total). Some way behind then are Vauxhall with 41,578 units (14% of the total) and in third VW with 28,069 (9.1%).
Biggest riser this month after the aforementioned Skoda and re-entrants Land Rover is third placed BMW moving up from 16th last month. Biggest fallers were Ford slipping down 12 places from top to 13th with a mediocre 2% improvement on last March and Mini also dropping 12 places from 7th into the danger zone at 19th with a disappointing 9% reverse.
Renault are seemingly in free-fall with a disastrous March slipping 2 places back to the bottom from 18th and with an astonishingly bad 50% drop in units registered (7,353 to be precise). Troubling times indeed for the French manufacturer.
The SMMT naturally still remain upbeat with chief Executive Paul Everitt commenting “the important March new car market performed above expectations rising 1.8% to 372,835 units, boosted by the third consecutive month of retail growth.”
We really hope the upbeat messages continue into what many still anticipate being an extremely challenging year for the business (just ask Renault).
Car Makers Premier League March 2012
| POS | Manufacturer | Mar 2011 | Mar 2012 | Diff | % |
| 1(14) |  | 6,421 | 8,507 | 2,086 | 32 |
| 2(5) |  | 16,951 | 20,586 | 3,635 | 21 |
| 3(16) |  | 17,987 | 20,566 | 2,579 | 14 |
| 4(-) |  | 10,083 | 11,490 | 1,407 | 14 |
| 5(8) |  | 20,736 | 23,416 | 2,680 | 13 |
| 6(3) |  | 10,007 | 11,178 | 1,171 | 12 |
| 7(12) |  | 16,183 | 18,032 | 1,849 | 11 |
| 8(4) |  | 14,776 | 16,334 | 1,558 | 11 |
| 9(13) |  | 28,069 | 30,756 | 2,687 | 10 |
| 10(15) |  | 11,337 | 11,715 | 378 | 3 |
| 11(6) |  | 8,509 | 8,730 | 221 | 3 |
| 12(9) |  | 18,597 | 18,969 | 372 | 2 |
| 13(1) |  | 52,829 | 53,830 | 1,001 | 2 |
| 14(11) |  | 12,921 | 12,995 | 74 | 1 |
| 15(17) |  | 6,981 | 6,869 | (112) | (2) |
| 16(10) |  | 7,251 | 6,817 | (434) | (6) |
| 17(19) |  | 41,578 | 38,624 | (2,954) | (7) |
| 18(20) |  | 11,021 | 10,134 | (887) | (8) |
| 19(7) |  | 9,319 | 8,451 | (868) | (9) |
| 20(18) |  | 14,717 | 7,364 | (7,353) | (50) |
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