Turkey sales, October: Citroen, Fiat, VW vans units report strong gains

The light commercial vehicle arms of Citroen, Fiat and Volkswagen increased October sales in Turkey by double-digit percentages. Those gains, however, couldn't stop the overall market from declining by 41 percent.

Citroen's LCV unit increased sales by 24 percent in October. Fiat's vans division was up 15 percent because of strong demand for the Doblo, which accounted for 65 percent of the LVC unit's volume last month. VW's Caddy van helped the LCV division report a 14 percent gain last month.

Maserati, Lexus, Subaru, Jaguar and Mazda were up by triple-digit percentages but from low bases compared with their volumes in October 2020, according to data from market researcher JATO Dynamics.

A number of brands reported negative numbers in October but beat the market. They included Honda (-4.5 percent), Citroen (-16 percent), Seat (-23 percent), Suzuki (-24 percent), Mitsubishi (-28 percent) and BMW (-29 percent).

The 10-month leaders in vehicle sales were the Fiat Egea, with a volume of 63,146, followed by the Toyota Corolla with 33,036 sales through October.

Rounding out the top five were Renault Clio (28,332) which for the third month in a row remained ahead of the Ford Transit Courier/Tourneo Courier (24,445), and the Megane (23,197).

The Fiat Doblo passed the Honda Civic to move into sixth place with a 10-month volume of 21,690.