Volkswagen Golf strikes trouble

The global semi-conductor crisis has done in October what no other car-maker has been able to do in nearly 30 years – knock the Volkswagen Golf and the Volkswagen Group from their pedestals as Europe’s best-selling car and car-maker.

The crisis handed the October sales glory to the Peugeot 2008 compact SUV from Stellantis, which also rolled the Volkswagen Group to head the month’s sales charts as a group.

While the rest of Europe’s car-makers smell blood in the water, there is a word of caution: the Golf retains its number one slot in year-to-date sales, with 186,444 to the end of October.

And it’s not being chased by the 2008, but by Toyota’s Yaris, which lies 22,000 units behind it.

In year-to-date terms, the 2008 is only fifth and unable to conquer even France (where customers prefer the 208 hatch).

But the chip shortage has clearly claimed its biggest scalp yet, with Volkswagen forced to hand-brake Golf production in favour of its new ID.3, ID.4 and ID.5 EVs and for higher-profit larger cars and compact SUVs.

The bad news for Australia, where Volkswagen supplies have also taken a big hit, is that none of those models will be released here any time soon.

According to sales data from JATO Dynamics, the Peugeot 2008 surged to the lead of a shrunken European new-car market in October, while the Golf dropped out of the top 10 altogether.

The scramble to source semi-conductors has left every car-maker juggling where to put scant supplies and what to sacrifice, and in Volkswagen’s case it has sacrificed the car closest to the heart of its workers.

Built in Wolfsburg in the shadow of VW’s global headquarters, the Golf has been Europe’s one automotive constant, and its annual sales leadership never wavered even during the Dieselgate scandal.

But the chip crisis has the Wolfsburg plant running at its lowest production levels since 1958, in the time of the Beetle. The factory, which builds the Golf, the Touran, the Tiguan and the Seat Tarraco, is capable of 780,000 cars a year, but has so far only built around 300,000 this year.

The Golf, whose sales of 11,174 represented a 59 per cent dive from October 2020 levels, wasn’t even the best-selling Volkswagen last month. That honour went to the T-Roc compact SUV, which just snuck into the European top 10 with 12,116 retail sales.

Peugeot sold 18,109 of its 2008s in October. To give an indication of how dire the struggling new car market is in Europe, that’s just 877 more cars than it sold during the COVID-19 crisis last year.

The European market has plummeted 29 per cent this year and Peugeot has navigated both crises better than most, with its 2008 available in both electric- and combustion-powered forms.

Where the Germans crumbled, the French stood firm, with the 2008 trailed home in October by the Renault Clio, Dacia Sandero and Peugeot 208.

The first German-made car home wasn’t a Volkswagen either, but the Cologne-built Ford Focus, ranking fifth with 12,704 sales despite dropping 15 per cent of its volume over 2020.

Fiat chimed in to show there is life left in both the 500 and the Panda, claiming sixth and seventh spots respectively, with part of the 500’s surge down to the inclusion of a full electric version.

Pointedly, it was the only car in the top 10 to grow its sales, by 12 per cent.

The Panda, the tiny five-door hatch beloved of village dwellers across the continent, maintained seventh spot despite a 35 per cent sales slide.

In a good month for Stellantis (which includes Peugeot, Citroen, Fiat, Alfa Romeo, Opel, Vauxhall and Maserati, to name a few), the Opel Corsa chipped in to rank eighth.

Renault’s Captur compact crossover rounded out the top 10, leaving a 1650-vehicle gap between second and 10th and giving the Renault-Nissan Alliance three cars in the top 10 – without any of them being an actual Nissan.