Volkswagen Commercial Vehicles achieves sales record

With the delivery of 488,700 MPVs, motor caravans, light commercial vehicles, heavy trucks and buses, Volkswagen Commercial Vehicles once again achieved record shipment figures in 2007.

For the sales year 2007, this translates into another year of growth (10.7 per cent) against the previous year (441,500 deliveries). Stephan Schaller, CEO of Volkswagen Commercial Vehicles, said: “The sales performance of our products on the international markets impressively confirms that the course of growth our brand has taken is both a vigorous and a sustained one. 2007 is the third consecutive year in which we have achieved a double-digit global growth in sales.”

The Caddy, T5 and Crafter series produced in Europe recorded a combined increase in worldwide sales of 6.8 per cent to 384,500 delivered vehicles in 2007 (against 360,252 the year before). Individually, each of these models achieved the following:

Caddy: plus 7.7 per cent to 147,250 vehicles (136,660 in the previous year)

The T5 range (Transporter, Caravelle, Multivan and California): plus 5.2 per cent to 191,250 vehicles (previously 181,750)

Crafter: plus 10.4 per cent to 46,200 deliveries (previously 41,800).

Increases were likewise recorded for deliveries of the light commercial vehicles manufactured in Brazil:

T2: plus 28.8 per cent to 24,500 sold vehicles (19,000 in previous year)

Saveiro: plus 30.7 per cent to 32,950 deliveries (previously 25,200)

Of the heavy trucks and buses manufactured in Brazil, Mexico and South Africa, 46,500 vehicles were delivered to customers in 2007, denoting a plus of 25.8 per cent (against the previous year’s figure of 37,000). 38,600 of these vehicles were trucks – an increase of 27 per cent (30,420 in the previous year), with deliveries of buses up by 20.5 per cent to 7,900 units (6,563 in the previous year).

“Continuing delivery records in the international markets illustrate that a growing number of customers appreciates the added value our vehicles offer both in engineering terms and economically,” says Harald Schomburg, Member of the Board of Management of Volkswagen Commercial Vehicles with responsibility for Sales and Marketing. “This past year, our products achieved new sales records in 37 export markets.”

In Western Europe, deliveries by Volkswagen Commercial Vehicles rose by 6.6 per cent to 288,400 vehicles (270,700 the year before), while deliveries in Central and Eastern Europe were up 31.8 per cent to 40,300 vehicles (previously 30,600).

Deliveries in Germany remained with 122,048 vehicles nearly on the record level of 2006 (123,032 deliveries in the previous year). The strongest export markets in Europe in 2007 were Great Britain (30,400 vehicles against 26,800 the previous year, denoting an increase of 13.4 per cent) and the Netherlands (25,000 vehicles against 19,800 the previous year, denoting an increase of 26.5 per cent). 100,300 light and heavy commercial vehicles were delivered to customers in South America (77,800 the year before, i.e. an increase of 28.8 per cent).