THE Nissan Qashqai and Nissan Juke have recorded strong sales in January, with both models featuring in the top 10 best-sellers list.
Nissan dealers registered an impressive 4,839 Qashqais in January, pushing it up to second place in the SMMT new car registrations.
It outsold the VW Golf by more than 1,000 units, making the Qashqai the nation’s second most popular car as well as re-confirming it as the country’s favourite crossover.
Meanwhile its crossover cousin – the Juke – raced into sixth place, with 3,446 units registered by the network last month.
The stellar performance of the Juke placed it above the likes of the VW Polo, Audi A3, Vauxhall Astra and Mercedes-Benz C Class.
The Nissan crossovers are also out-performing others across Europe. Figures released by research body JATO this week reveal Nissan is leading the way with more than 376,000 units registered in 2015, resulting in an 11.8% market share.
The performance has helped the SUV become the best-selling sector in Europe, outselling traditional segments for the first time.
In the UK, the new car market got off to a positive start in January, with registrations climbing 2.9% compared with the same month in 2015 to reach an 11-year high of 169,678 units.
Private and business buyers drove this growth with demand for new cars up by 8.2% to 73,061 and 5.0% to 6,716 units respectively, while the fleet sector declined slightly by 1.1% to 89,901. The month marks the highest number of new cars registered to private buyers in January in 12 years.
Alternative-fuel vehicles also grew in popularity – and market share – with registrations up by 32.1% on January 2014, to account for a record 3.6% of registrations.
Demand for diesel, which just retained the majority market share, remained stable, up 0.6%, while petrol registrations grew 3.7%.
Mike Hawes, SMMT Chief Executive, said: “January’s solid performance puts the new car sector in a good position to start the year. Providing consumer confidence remains strong, we expect a more stable 12 months ahead, broadly similar to 2015 which was, of course, a record year.”
