Germany Full Year 2010: Golf #1 ahead of Polo & Astra

VW Golf

* See the Top 150 best-selling models by clicking on the title! Many thanks to Florian *

The German market is back to harsh reality this year after being artificially boosted by scrappage schemes in 2009. It is down 23% on 2009 and down 6% on 2008 at 2,916,260 registrations, its lowest level in 20 years. Encouragingly though, December was up 7% at 230,371 sales.

The VW Golf is #1 for the 29th consecutive year but drops faster than the market at -31% and 195,459 sales for a 6.7% maket share. For only the second time since 1958 (with 2008), only one model sells upwards of 100,000 units this year, and only two models are above 3% share, the 2nd one being the VW Polo, down 11% to 96,945 sales and 3.3%. Thanks to a strong December (3.1%), the Opel Astra finishes the year in third place at 2.5%.

Mercedes C Class

In 4th, the Mercedes C-Class is up a massive 9 spots with 69,439 sales, ahead of the BMW 3 Series, up 5 ranks to #5. This year’s best performer is the Mercedes E-Class, up 17 spots and 33% on 2009 to #6 and 67,409 units. The BMW 5 Series is also in great shape, up 16 ranks to #19 with 41,102 sales. The Audi A3, #8 overall at 2.2%, reaches its best-ever position in in May at #4 with 6,608 sales and 2.6% share.

The best-selling foreign model is the Skoda Fabia again, albeit down 11 spots and 53% to #16, followed by the Skoda Octavia at #18 and the Hyundai i30 at #25 (+17 ranks). The Nissan Micra delivered the best-ever position for a Japanese model at #8 in January with 3,648 sales and 2% share.

December Top 50, Full Year 2010 Top 150 and every Monthly Top 20 below.