Best Selling Cars of 2014

Published Date: 17th Jan 2015

The UK’s new car sales were the best for a decade in 2014, according to new figures released from the Society of Motor Manufacturers and Traders. We saw 2,476,435 new cars hit the roads in Britain last year, the best figures since 2004, and the fourth best year ever for sales.

This represents a huge 9.4 per cent rise over the 2013 figures, and marks a spirited recovery by the UK car market from the depths of the recession back in 2008, around one million more new cars found owners than in the period after the banking related recession.

            

UK new cars sales have constantly grown for the last 34 months, the SMMT reported. However, the outlook for this is year doesn’t look as promising, with sales predicted to rise between 1 and 2 per cent. Some 86 per cent of the UK market is accounted for by imports, a level of penetration that has been steady for some years now. The main exporter of cars from the UK is Nissan, who recently built there 2 millionth Nissan Qashqai at its Sunderland plant.

The UK comes in as the second largest market for new cars in the EU, closely following Germany and ahead of France.  The market was kept afloat by rising economic growth and stability, with new ultra-fuel efficient designs, and popular finance packages such as PCP (personal contract purchase)being the most popular, as well as a catch-up after the recent slump.

 

Mike Hawes, SMMT Chief Executive, explained:  "UK new car sales returned to pre-recession levels in 2014, as pent-up demand from the recession years combined with confidence in the economy saw consumer demand for the latest models grow consistently and strongly.

"The year was particularly strong for alternatively-fuelled vehicles as increased choice, coupled with a growing desire for reduced costs and greater efficiency, resulted in a quadrupling of plug-in car registrations over 2013. With a variety of new plug-in models expected in 2015, this area of the market will continue to grow significantly. For the market as a whole, we expect a more stable 2015 as demand from new car buyers levels off."