- Record year for Audi in 2012
- 16,743 units sold to customers in South Africa
- 1,455,100 units sold globally
Audi South Africa enjoyed another consecutive record year of sales in 2012 having sold 16,743 units in the local market. The previous highest volume record was achieved at the end of 2011 where the brand delivered 14,531 vehicles to the South African market. This makes Audi the leading premium German brand in annual volume growth with a year-on-year increase of 15.5% within the South African market place.
The total premium market showed an increase of 5.6% growth from 75,636 units in 2011 to 79,563 units in 2012. The Audi brand set a new milestone by achieving a full-year share of 21.1% of the premium market, the previous highest share was 19.3% achieved in 2011.
Globally, the Audi brand surpassed 2011’s record of 1,302,659 deliveries and posted a full-year record of 1,455,100 units delivered to customers worldwide. This amounts to an 11.7% increase for the brand globally. “In 2012, Audi achieved new record totals in every region worldwide, including in Europe. We managed to buck the negative market trend and continued to grow there, extending our lead as the strongest premium brand,” says Luca de Meo, Member of the Board of Management of AUDI AG for Sales and Marketing. “Worldwide, our new models in particular gave us an extra lift over the past year, most notably the very popular Audi Q3: It has helped the entire Audi SUV family become a mainstay of our success, now accounting for one-quarter of all deliveries for the first time.”
In Germany, Audi increased sales by 3.6% to a new high of 263,163 deliveries. This gives the company the highest market share in its history: 8.6%. Over the past ten years, Audi has almost doubled its annual sales in the UK with a growth of 7.2% to 123,640 cars, again an all-time high. In the United States, Audi established a new sales record in every single month of the past year and by the end of 2012, 139,310 cars had been shipped to the United States, 18.5% more than in the previous year. Within the space of five years, Audi of America has thus increased the four rings’ customer base in the United States by almost 50%. Meanwhile in China, Audi remained the clear premium-segment leader at the close of 2012 with 405,838 deliveries.
A large number of emerging growth markets likewise became increasingly important for Audi in 2012 thanks to their high growth rates: These include South Korea (+46.0% to 15,100 cars), South Africa (+15.5% to 16,743 cars) and India,
where the brand’s sales gained 63.4 percent to 9,003 units.
“We are very pleased with our full-year 2012 sales performance and plan to continue the momentum into 2013,” said Ryan Searle, Head of Audi South Africa. “This year promises to be yet another exciting year for the Audi brand with numerous product innovations and new introductions. Audi South Africa and our partners in the Audi Dealer network remain committed to maintaining the number one position in Customer Satisfaction as measured by IPSOS, and plan to strengthen our position in the local premium market.” concluded Searle
This year, product innovations will include the exciting re-introduction of the allroad concept to South Africa in the form of the Audi A4 allroad; the Audi Q5 product improvement; Audi R8 product improvement as well as additional engines to the TT and A7 Sportback model ranges. The Audi A3 Sportback will be a new product introduction halfway through the year, with the S3 range following later in the year.
The year 2013 will also represent a “sporty” year for the Audi brand as it enjoys the launch of new RS models. The RS model range will be expanded to include the Audi RS4 Avant and RS5 Cabriolet, as well as the introduction of the RS7 Sportback at the end of 2013.
