9.10.2006
Saab and Chevrolet set all time European sales records

GM sold 1,527,275 vehicles in Europe in the first three quarters of 2006, achieving a similarly high number of vehicle sales in the first nine months as last year. GM’s share of the European market was at 9.2 percent for the first three quarters and at 9.5 percent for the month of September.

“September was a good month for us and, over the first three quarters, we continue to grow much faster than the industry average with Saab and Chevrolet,” said Jonathan Browning, GM Europe’s Vice President Sales, Marketing and Aftersales. “For Opel and Vauxhall, the remarkable order intake for Corsa of 95,000 cars is very encouraging, keeping in mind that its start of sale in most countries is only tomorrow and that our 2006 sales objective was 75,000.”

From January to September 2006 GM sold 122,350 vehicles in Eastern Europe, which constitutes a sales increase of 41,200 units (+51 percent).

With Europe-wide registrations totaling 1,203,918 in the first nine months of 2006, Opel/Vauxhall captured a market share of 7.3 percent. Especially in Central and Eastern Europe, Opel achieved substantial year-over-year sales increases for the first three quarters of 2006: Registrations in South-East Europe rose by 8 percent to 52,581 vehicles, in Poland by 9 percent to 19,551 vehicles, in Russia by 73 percent to 12,183 vehicles and in Ukraine by 138 percent to 6,605. In Western Europe, Opel sales increased mostly in the Netherlands, Belgium and Luxemburg (registrations up by 3,982 units to 90,769), and in Scandinavia (increase of 1,841 to 30,750 registrations). With Zafira and Meriva, Opel/Vauxhall continues to be the leading brand in the monocab segment in both, the January to September period and in the month of September. Compared to the first nine months of 2005, Zafira registrations increased by 45,000 units or 34.1 percent.

September is the second-largest month for sales in the UK due to a registration number change. Vauxhall's sales held up well in a tough market with registrations of 48,782 and a 10.95 percent market share.

Saab showed strong performance: The first nine months of 2006 have resulted in 70,565 cars sold in Europe, an increase of 18.2 percent over the same period in 2005. Saab continues to be the leading brand in Europe for vehicles running on Ethanol-85. Saab experienced record sales for the first three quarters of this year in Spain, and Belgium. For the month of September, Saab sold 9,434 cars in Europe, reaching a market share of 0.5 percent.

With 87,300* vehicles sold in the third quarter, Chevrolet reached a record quarterly sales volume and a record market share of 1.73 percent in total Europe. From January to September 2006, Chevrolet sold a total of 247,871 vehicles, increasing its European sales volume by 10.8 percent compared to the same period last year. Its market share for this period reached 1.5 percent. In a declining September market, Chevrolet Italia was able to increase its January to September sales from 25,558 to 27,695 units, reaching a market share of 1.4 percent. The largest volume increase took place in Russia, where Chevrolet sales grew from 47,586 to 77,292 units. Chevrolet had another strong month in September, selling 32,004 vehicles in Europe, compared to 30,158 in September 2005. The 6.1-percent growth was mainly driven by the Eastern European countries, where Hungary reached the highest market share in comparison to all EU countries with 7.41 percent of the passenger car market. The European market share for September was at 1.6 percent.

Cadillac continued to grow in Europe where 2,645 cars were sold in the first nine months of 2006, a plus of 30 percent compared to the same period last year. Also Corvette performed well in its niche market: from January to September it sold 1,046 cars. HUMMER tripled sales of the H2 and H3 to 1,230 vehicles, from 394 vehicles in 2005.

* Chevrolet figures include vehicles produced by GM Avtovaz for the Russian market and vehicles of US production.