Super, Fantástico, Excelente are certainly all viable options to describe the continuing trend in the Spanish True Fleet Market. As yet another month of double-digit growth was recorded for May we looked back to discover that since January 2014 there has been only 8 months of non-double-digit growth, with that January actually being the last time a negative growth month was recorded in Spanish fleet. The Private market had a similar month to fleet with a + 12.3% and Special Channels were down with a – 1.9% recorded. This left the Total Market registrations at a healthy 141,000 or + 7.4% in terms of growth.
Brand performance
While the term “double-digit” has perhaps already earned enough places in the first paragraph it is also a correct term for the growth of 9 out of top 10 brands, though 2 of these are of the negative variety. The top 2 brands retained their places, VW in 1st while Renault followed in 2nd, though it was all change in the rest of the ranking. Peugeot in 3rd jumped 3 places and had perhaps the unlikeliest of models as their #1, the Partner model (including the all-new Rifter) took the crown for the first month ever helping the brand to a healthy + 27.4% growth. Toyota in 4th was the highest grower in percentage terms with a + 31.1% thanks mostly to the Prius Plus. Audi and Mercedes were the next two brands in the ranking and while the 4-ringed brand was slightly negative the 3-point star OEM was up by 19.4%. Home grown OEM SEAT also had a good month thanks to the Arona and its big brother the Ateca, with the brand recording a + 29.1% for May. BMW came in at rank #8 and Ford at #10, unfortunately these were the two double-digit negative brands, though on an individual basis both the X1 and the Fiesta for the respective manufacturers each achieved double-digit growths. Opel was 9th with a + 31.0% and certainly has its SUVs to thank. The Crossland X, the Grandland X and the Mokka brought the majority of the surplus for the manufacturer from Rüsselsheim. PSA-owned Citroën in 11th missed out on entering the top 10 by just 14 registrations which with the success of both Peugeot and Opel in May would have truly been the icing on the cake.
Vehicle segment performance
So, while last month made mention of the SUV segment we decided to look into True Fleets’ Small and Mini Car segment, both of which (year-to-date) are firmly in ascension. The Small Car segment is up by 16.0% while Mini Cars are up a staggering 102.3%! But of even more interest is the size of the growth from one region and just how large this region’s share is: The location is possibly unsurprising it’s Madrid and their share for all Spain is 53.4% for the Small Car market and (even) 62.1% for Mini Cars! Growth-wise Small Cars in Madrid accounted for 66.4% of the YTD growth* and for Mini Cars it was an astounding 87.4%! Now while we have no clearly defined way of assigning these cars to a particular activity a very high proportion were in the Spanish “Renting” sub-channel and given the rise in popularity of car-sharing in the Spanish capital, our guess would be that this is where a high number of these cars will reside.
*Growth percentages calculated using the sum of positive growth figures from the respective segment
