Here Are 2019’s Sports Car Sales Winners And Losers So Far
We all know that the modern age isn’t exactly primed for peak sports car sales, despite the fact that they remain the cars we lust after most of all. However, the actual figures in Europe make for some pretty grim reading – with a few exceptions.
Twitter account CarIndustryAnalysis has released a trio of tweets showing sales figures for sports and supercars in Europe over the first half of 2019, along with percentage changes versus the same period in 2018. The sheer scale of the falls is pretty alarming for anyone whose heart drives a sports car but there are a few silver linings to this cloudy outlook.
The all-conquering Porsche 911 coupe recorded a massive 48 per cent plummet, dropping to 4533 cars sold. The 991.2 car was on the way out, though, and a lot of buyers were holding off in wait for the 992. We expect a sales rebound this time next year once the 992 range has filled out. The Bentley Continental had already been reborn anew, though, and was up 316 per cent on 866 cars.
In the Sport Small category the mighty ND Mazda MX-5 is down nine per cent on 7745 units sold, while its cousin the Fiat 124 Spider has fallen off a cliff with 33 per cent fewer cars shifted; 2943 found owners from January to June this year.
The Lotus Elise has actually grown in sales volume by a useful 16 per cent versus the first six months of 2018, making it the moral winner in the Sport Small sector. It’s coming from a low baseline, though, and still only saw 162 examples leave Norfolk.
In the Sport Compact Coupe category, home of the Toyota GT86, the big winner is the Alpine A110, up by 304 per cent over January to June 2018. It only went on sale part-way through the same period last year, which makes the vast leap somewhat misleading, but with 2533 cars bought, it’s still a big deal and has almost doubled the sales of the Jaguar F-Type. The only rival that sold more was the Audi TT, which itself was down 29 per cent to 4318 cars.
Elsewhere in that sector the Porsche Cayman 718 has crashed by 40 per cent to 1601 cars, the GT86 has fallen 24 per cent to 531 cars and the Lotus Evora has plummeted 40 per cent to a mere 53 cars. On the convertible side the BMW Z4 has utterly dominated the opposition, selling 5838 cars – which bodes well for the Toyota Supra. Everything else around it has taken a big hit, though, from the 26 per cent lower Mercedes SLC to the 23 per cent drop seen by the Porsche 718 Boxster and the 59 per cent dip of the ageing Alfa Romeo 4C Spider.
Interestingly, it has been a good six months for American muscle. The Ford Mustang is up nine per cent, the Chevrolet Camaro is 17 per cent better off and the Camaro soft-top is up some 30 per cent.
Comments
ok now this is supra cool
Why did they put wrong pictures for all the McLarens in the second one?
I assume this has to do with the mentality of “why bother with a sportscar when I can have an SUV or hatchback with the same power”, therefor not understanding what a sports car is about.
I’m sure most buyers know what a sports car is about and that’s exactly the reason why they don’t tend to buy them. Most buyers care about practicality even if it’s their secondary car, which is why so many people choose the RS 3 over the TT RS or the Octavia RS over the Golf GTI.
Im sorry if i missed it, but isn’t this statistic slighlty misleading? Would it not be better to look at total sports car sales as for example the alpine a110 might have been bought instead of a 718, therefore the total number stays the same, whilst the statistic for the porsche would decrease.
I absolutely agree with you mate. Some cars on that list are just outdated and old while the other new ones are new and logically gaining on popularity. What I would personally see as a useful statistical analysis is the comparison of sports cars sold within the first two years of their release and compare that with previous generations models, or a general comparison back to back of the number of sports cars sold within consecutive years…
Looking at those numbers, the only thing I can think of is just how few and far between sports cars in general are being sold. By comparison, if a regular car reaches those figures, it’s either axed or evolved into something suitable for the current climate. It’s just a miracle that even in such a climate, a sports car is still being built and sold.
sadness noise
I feel like this is a little misleading, surely all cars sell fewer models as they age, right? At least in general. More become available on the used market and some newer, competing model comes out and takes the spotlight. Otherwise, companies would just keep making the 370- er… classic models forever.
I think it is because nowadays most cars offer decent performance and practicality, any German sedan with a six pot will give you enough power to show your exhaust to most of yesterday’s sport cars while taking your kids to school, so why bother. yes they aren’t as pure as they used to be, yes things have changed but nobody seems fo care anymore…