Volvo has managed to limit the impact of the corona crisis on its sales figures. In the first half of 2020, the brand felt the effects of the pandemic, but overall sales grew in the second half of the year. SUVs in particular are selling like the proverbial hot cakes.
Volvo also had to close the factories briefly in 2020 due to the outbreak of the corona virus. This obviously had repercussions on the sales figures, but Volvo caught up nicely. Over the year as a whole, the brand in China and America even showed growth in sales numbers of 7.5 and 1.8 percent respectively. Unfortunately, that was not enough to fully absorb the sharp 15.5 percent dip in the European market – still Volvo’s largest sales area. In the other markets, the number of cars sold fell by 4.5 percent. Volvo sold a total of 661,713 cars in 2020, of which 391,571 in the second half of the year. Compared to 2019, total sales decreased by 6.2 percent.
The SUVs are largely responsible for that number. The XC60 is Volvo’s best-selling model with 191,696 cars, followed by the XC40 with 185,406 units. The bottom step of the podium is with a number of 92,458 pieces for the XC90. Furthermore, 29 percent of all Volvo cars sold is a Recharge variant. In most cases these are plug-in hybrids, the XC40 P8 Recharge is Volvo’s only EV for the time being. This will soon change: Volvo’s goal is that by 2025 half of the sold models will be fully electric, to sell only electric cars by 2030. The brand is soon taking further steps in that direction: Volvo will pull the curtain on its second EV in March.