{"id":8582,"date":"2016-04-06T14:20:57","date_gmt":"2016-04-06T14:20:57","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.vanrental.co.uk\/vanblog\/?p=8582"},"modified":"2016-04-06T14:20:57","modified_gmt":"2016-04-06T14:20:57","slug":"van-registrations-up-3-3-in-march-as-growth-levels-off","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.vanrental.co.uk\/vanblog\/archives\/8582","title":{"rendered":"Van registrations up 3.3% in March as growth levels off"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Light commercial vehicle registrations rose by 1.2% during the first quarter of 2016, compared to the same period last year.\u00a0In March, registrations rose by 3.3% to a total of 63,913 units,\u00a0according to the latest figures from the Society of Motor\u00a0Manufacturers and Traders.<\/p>\n<p>March&#8217;s growth was restricted to the\u00a0the\u00a02.5-3.5t segments, where\u00a0registrations rose by 14.2% to 38,847. This growth offset a 9% decline in the 2.0-2.5t segment, and a 15.9% decline in\u00a0vans under two tonnes.\u00a0There was also a sharp 43.1% fall in pickup registrations, which fell to 1,336 units versus 2,349 units in March 2015.<\/p>\n<p>It seems fair to say that the CV market is\u00a0now levelling off after several years of strong growth, although as yet there&#8217;s no obvious sign of weakness:<\/p>\n<div id=\"attachment_8583\" style=\"width: 647px\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\"><img aria-describedby=\"caption-attachment-8583\" loading=\"lazy\" class=\"size-full wp-image-8583\" src=\"https:\/\/www.vanrental.co.uk\/vanblog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/04\/smmt-lcv-reg-0310-0316.jpg\" alt=\"UK van registrations March 2010 - March 2016\" width=\"637\" height=\"450\" srcset=\"https:\/\/www.vanrental.co.uk\/vanblog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/04\/smmt-lcv-reg-0310-0316.jpg 637w, https:\/\/www.vanrental.co.uk\/vanblog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/04\/smmt-lcv-reg-0310-0316-300x212.jpg 300w, https:\/\/www.vanrental.co.uk\/vanblog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/04\/smmt-lcv-reg-0310-0316-624x441.jpg 624w, https:\/\/www.vanrental.co.uk\/vanblog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/04\/smmt-lcv-reg-0310-0316-50x35.jpg 50w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 637px) 100vw, 637px\" \/><p id=\"caption-attachment-8583\" class=\"wp-caption-text\">UK van registrations March 2010 &#8211; March 2016 (courtesy of SMMT)<\/p><\/div>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>Commenting on the figures, Mike Hawes, SMMT Chief Executive, said:<\/p>\n<blockquote><p>\u201cTraditionally one of the busiest months of the year for the new British van market, March&#8217;s new 16 plate gave a welcome boost, closing the first quarter on a positive note after a more subdued start to the year. Following the sector&#8217;s record performance set in 2015, we expect to see steadier growth over the coming months.\u201d<\/p><\/blockquote>\n<h2>Who&#8217;s winning the race?<\/h2>\n<p>Among the big winners in March was\u00a0Ford. The firm&#8217;s van range is gaining market share steadily and the Transit Custom and Transit are first and second respectively in the UK commercial vehicle sales league.<\/p>\n<p>This helped Ford&#8217;s van sales hit a new record of\u00a020,877 units in March. This\u00a0means that the blue oval sold almost one in every three vans\u00a0registered in the UK last month!<\/p>\n<p>Renault is also performing well. The\u00a0firm&#8217;s UK van sales rose by 20.8% to 6,618 vehicles during the first quarter, giving Renault a 6.6% share of the UK van market.<\/p>\n<p>Overall, a strong performance which suggests\u00a0the market is mostly holding onto last year&#8217;s gains and could continue to perform well.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>UK van registrations rose by 3.3% in March compared to the same period last year, consolidating a very strong year of growth in 2015.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":8583,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[8],"tags":[310,1885],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.vanrental.co.uk\/vanblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8582"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.vanrental.co.uk\/vanblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.vanrental.co.uk\/vanblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.vanrental.co.uk\/vanblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.vanrental.co.uk\/vanblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=8582"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/www.vanrental.co.uk\/vanblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8582\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":8585,"href":"https:\/\/www.vanrental.co.uk\/vanblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8582\/revisions\/8585"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.vanrental.co.uk\/vanblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/8583"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.vanrental.co.uk\/vanblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=8582"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.vanrental.co.uk\/vanblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=8582"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.vanrental.co.uk\/vanblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=8582"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}