Vauxhall car sales top BL

Vauxhall car sales top BL
By Edward Townsend Industrial Correspondent

Vauxhall continued its seemingly inexorable rise through the ranks of the British new car market in January overtaking BL for the first time in the monthly sales figures. With 18.68 per cent of the domestic market, Vauxhall demonstrated that its Cavalier model, launched in the summer of 1981, and others like the Astra are an unstoppable force at the moment.

The Cavalier was the second best selling car last month with 13,720 registrations. Vauxhall's popularity, particularly in the all-important fleet car sector, has been largely at the expense of Ford, whose market share last month dipped to 28.1 per cent. The Cavalier and the Ford Sierra (11,932 sales last month) are the leading contenders in the fleet market. They are sandwiched in the best-sellers list by the Ford Escort, still the country's favourite car with January sales of 16,577 and the BL Metro (11,115).
Total car sales last month were 161,844.

Mr David Lahti, Vauxhall-Opel's director of marketing, said the 26 per cent increase over last January's sales figures confirmed company forecasts that it would sell 300,000 cars in Britain this year.