UK 1997: Ford Mondeo starts with a bang, Fiesta leads at year-end
Ford Mondeo
* See the Top 30 best-selling models by clicking on the title! Many thanks to Florian *
In 1997, the Ford Fiesta stays on top for the second year in a row, but it didn’t look like it at the start of the year: boosted by its facelift, the Ford Mondeo was leading by a rather comfortable margin, with 6.8% share in January and 5.4% in February.
Ford Fiesta
However, the Mondeo finished the year 3rd behind the Ford Escort. The Vauxhall Vectra, Astra and Corsa follow, making the Top 6 identical to 1996. The Peugeot 306 progresses again and beats the foreign model annual volume record for the third year in a row at 66,888 sales, reaching a best-ever 7th place, the highest position a foreign model has reached at year-end in at least 40 years! In fact, Peugeot places 3 models in the Top 4 best-selling foreign cars with the 106 at #12 (+14%) and the 406 at #13 (+33%).
Peugeot 306
There are a few newcomers in the Top 30: the Citroen Saxo at #19, the Renault Megane landing at #22 and the Scenic at #24 for their first year of sales in the UK, the Ford Ka at #23 and the Volvo S/V40 at #30.
Full 1997 Top 30, January and February Top 10 Ranking Tables below.
UK Full Year 1997:
| Pos | Model | 1997 | /96 | 1996 | Pos |
| 1 | Ford Fiesta | 119,471 | -14% | 139,522 | 1 |
| 2 | Ford Escort | 113,522 | -12% | 128,760 | 2 |
| 3 | Ford Mondeo | 107,239 | 6% | 100,725 | 3 |
| 4 | Vauxhall Vectra | 93,778 | 6% | 88,245 | 4 |
| 5 | Vauxhall Astra | 89,537 | 4% | 86,008 | 5 |
| 6 | Vauxhall Corsa | 79,898 | 5% | 75,740 | 6 |
| 7 | Peugeot 306 | 66,888 | 15% | 58,316 | 8 |
| 8 | Rover 200 | 62,365 | 16% | 53,562 | 10 |
| 9 | Rover 400 | 61,913 | -3% | 63,789 | 7 |
| 10 | Renault Clio | 58,033 | 8% | 53,781 | 9 |
| 11 | VW Polo | 56,235 | 20% | 47,000 | 13 |
| 12 | Peugeot 106 | 50,069 | 14% | 43,821 | 15 |
| 13 | Peugeot 406 | 47,395 | 33% | 35,549 | 19 |
| 14 | Fiat Punto | 45,551 | -5% | 47,986 | 12 |
| 15 | Nissan Micra | 42,858 | -3% | 44,141 | 14 |
| 16 | Renault Laguna | 40,324 | -1% | 40,807 | 18 |
| 17 | BMW 3 Series | 40,312 | -4% | 41,958 | 17 |
| 18 | VW Golf | 39,986 | -24% | 52,436 | 11 |
| 19 | Citroen Saxo | 36,855 | 232% | 11,100 | n/a |
| 20 | Honda Civic (e) | 36,600 | 9% | 33,523 | 20 |
| 21 | Rover 100 (e) | 32,000 | -24% | 42,009 | 16 |
| 22 | Renault Megane (e) | 30,700 | new | 0 | - |
| 23 | Ford Ka | 29,350 | 1010% | 2,645 | n/a |
| 24 | Renault Scenic (e) | 27,000 | new | 0 | - |
| 25 | Nissan Primera (e) | 26,800 | 17% | 22,900 | 23 |
| 26 | Audi A4 (e) | 24,600 | 5% | 23,400 | 22 |
| 27 | Fiat Bravo/a (e) | 22,500 | -1% | 22,800 | 24 |
| 28 | Rover 600 (e) | 22,300 | 12% | 19,900 | 28 |
| 29 | Toyota Carina | 21,816 | -4% | 22,628 | 25 |
| 30 | Volvo S40/V40 (e) | 20,200 | 267% | 5,500 | n/a |
UK February 1997:
| Pos | Model | Feb-97 | % | Jan-97 | % | Pos | 2m 1997 | % | Pos | 1996 |
| 1 | Ford Mondeo | 8,798 | 5.4% | 14,100 | 6.8% | 1 | 22,898 | 6.2% | 1 | 3 |
| 2 | Vauxhall Vectra | 8,195 | 5.0% | 8,497 | 4.1% | 4 | 16,692 | 4.5% | 4 | 5 |
| 3 | Vauxhall Astra | 7,609 | 4.7% | 8,299 | 4.0% | 5 | 15,908 | 4.3% | 5 | 4 |
| 4 | Ford Escort | 7,299 | 4.5% | 11,102 | 5.4% | 2 | 18,401 | 5.0% | 2 | 2 |
| 5 | Ford Fiesta | 7,250 | 4.5% | 10,606 | 5.1% | 3 | 17,856 | 4.8% | 3 | 1 |
| 6 | Vauxhall Corsa | 6,110 | 3.8% | 8,279 | 4.0% | 6 | 14,389 | 3.9% | 6 | 6 |
| 7 | Peugeot 306 | 6,093 | 3.7% | 5,810 | 2.8% | 7 | 11,903 | 3.2% | 7 | 8 |
| 8 | Rover 400 | 5,344 | 3.3% | 7 | ||||||
| 9 | Rover 200 | 5,311 | 3.3% | 5,396 | 2.6% | 8 | 10,707 | 2.9% | 8 | 11 |
| 10 | Renault Megane | 5,295 | 3.3% | |||||||
| Peugeot 106 | 5,284 | 2.6% | 9 | |||||||
| VW Polo | 5,107 | 2.5% | 10 |
Source: SMMT, Wikipedia, Manufacturers.
Many thanks to Florian for sharing the data!
(e): estimate
