2014 proved to be a milestone year for most of the car makers especially for the luxury car makers. Home grown manufacture, Maruti Suzuki achieved record sales in 2014 with over 11 lakh units sold and Korean car maker Hyundai registered over 4.10 lakh units this year which is their highest ever sale in 2014 plus Elite i20 getting car of the year award. Honda India also witnessed over 67% growth in 2014 and 163 percent growth in December 2014.
Success and achievements isn’t limited to Brands like Maruti, Hyundai, Honda, Tata etc but luxury car manufactures like Rolls Royce, Bentley, Audi, Mercedes and Volvo also enjoyed record sales in 2014.
BMW owned Rolls Royce has achieved their highest ever sales in their 111 year of existence and selling record number of cars for fifth consecutive year. Company sold 4063 units globally registering overall growth of 12 percent. Main contributors in this achievement were Australia with 75% growth, followed by Japan (60%), Bahrain (50%), Kuwait (45%), Europe (40%), Germany (30%) etc.
Currently Rolls Royce sells Ghost series II which they recently launched in India as well, Pinnacle travel, Waterspeed, Metropolitan and some special editions like Maharaja Phantom.
Torsten Müller-Ötvös, Chief Executive Officer, Rolls-Royce Motor Cars commented, “This fifth consecutive record year saw Rolls-Royce Motor Cars break through the 4,000 car sales level for the first time in its 111-year history. The result confirms that our strategy of balanced, sustainable and profitable growth is delivering and that Rolls-Royce remains the world’s leading luxury goods brand. This extraordinary success has been built on strong foundations: pinnacle products, dedicated people and a commitment to ensuring a balanced global sales picture.”
Bentley is yet another luxury car manufacture for which 2014 proved to be a record breaking year with sales reaching 11,200 units achieving growth of 9 percent over 10,120 units in 2013. American market saw most number of Bentley buyers and it contributed 29% of total deliveries with around 3180 cars. Apart from America strong demand for Bentley came from China, Middle East and Europe. In China Company sold 2670 cars as compared to 2191 cars in 2013 while in Europe with 4% growth Bentley sold 1539 cars.
In UK which is its home turf, Bentley has sold 1387 cars in comparison to 1381 cars in 2013 which Bentley have exported 87% of its cars.
Mercedes and Audi among other car giants who enjoyed 2014 with the exceptional sales figure, Audi became the first luxury car maker to surpass 10,000 cars mark in India followed By Mercedes with over 10,000 units against 9003 Vehicles in 2013. In 2014 both the luxury car makers achieved their highest sales ever in India.
Last but not the least the Swedish company ‘Volvo’ set a new record by selling 4.65 lakh vehicles with 8.9 percent growth in 2014 plus December 2014 becomes the 18th month of consecutive sales for the company. In 2014 China was the largest market for Volvo with 81,221 cars retailed and showed an all time high growth of 32.8% followed by Germany (25.5%), UK (18.3%) and Sweden (17.4%).
Håkan Samuelsson, president and chief executive, said “It has been a good year. Record sales underline how broad-based our performance has been in 2014. Moreover, we are profitable and we intend to stay profitable. This is crucial as it means our growth is sustainable,” “We also expect this growth to continue next year in all markets.”
