“With double-digit growth, the United States and China again take the lead in Audi’s positive performance in August. We are therefore well on track to reach our strategic target of 1.5 million deliveries this year,” says Luca de Meo, Member of the Board of Management for Sales at AUDI AG. “In Europe, there is still a strong headwind in many markets. The A3 Sedan will be launched here beginning next week and will provide an additional impulse.”
In August, high demand for the new three-door A3 and the A3 Sportback brought additional customers to Audi dealers. Worldwide sales of the entire A3 family rose year-on-year by 16.6 percent to around 14,150 units. For the Audi Q3, which will enter the US market next year, deliveries in August increased by 45.0 percent to around 10,750 units. For the Q5, sales were up 40.9 percent to around 19,800 units. Customer handovers for both of Audi’s best-selling sedans also increased significantly last month: the notchback version of the A4 by 10.8 percent to sales of about 19,100 units and the A6 Sedan by 11.0 percent to around 18,250 cars.
Beside the A6, sales from the entire full-size category of the brand with the four rings grew substantially last month in the United States. Audi’s success in this prestigious segment was recently accelerated by the highly popular TDI clean diesel engines, available since July for all full-size category models. In August, combined sales of the A6, A7 Sportback, Q7 and A8 models exceeded their year-on-year delivery performance by 31.2 percent. Their share of total Audi sales in the United States thus accounted for 35 percent; that figure was 18 percent in 2010. With 3,845 SUVs delivered to customers, sales of the Q5 rose steeply last month (+91.6%) as well; its TDI clean diesel version was also launched in the United States in July. Across all models, Audi sales in the United States in August climbed by 21.5 percent to 14,005 cars.
In Europe, however, the challenging economic development in many countries was reflected in the sales figures for Audi. Though a year ago, the brand with the four rings achieved strong growth against the market trend, its sales were down this August: minus 3.4 percent to around 46,100 units. Since the beginning of the year, cumulative deliveries for the premium manufacturer were 2.3 percent lower year-on-year at about 490,450 cars. Audi’s business in Europe however continues to perform more robustly than the market as a whole and it remains the leading premium brand in the region.
As in its global sales, AUDI AG celebrated another special premiere in China in August: over 300,000 sales in just eight months. And with a cumulative increase of 19.6 percent to 312,683 deliveries since the beginning of the year, the company came to within just a few cars of the sales performance from 2011 as a whole. Over the course of that entire year, Audi had delivered 313,036 cars to customers in China. In the sales month just completed, the SUV models Q3 and Q5 contributed significantly to the strong growth of the four rings. Audi sold a total of 42,778 cars in the Middle Kingdom and thus 22.9 percent more than in August 2012. In the Asia-Pacific region, Audi sales were further strengthened by markets like Japan (+12.6% to 1,935 cars) and South Korea (+47.0% to 1,852 cars).