The true impact of the Covid-19 lockdown and loss of new car production is beginning to be appreciated.
UK showrooms closed for over 12 weeks but the factories making cars closed for varying periods of time and this contrasted with other parts of the world where the impact was much less.
Although the global automotive industry has been hard hit due to COVID-19, the UK market has suffered severely.
Scrap Car Comparison has looked at the figures and they are dismal reading. UK vehicle production lines have been shut down for a total number of 41 days so far, the longest closure in Europe alongside Italy.
Currently, the average shutdown duration is 30 working days. The UK has already exceeded this, and has suffered a production loss of 262,715 vehicles.
As the production of vehicles came to an abrupt stop, this had a knock-on effect to the car sales market.
The closure of showrooms has significantly impacted sales figures:
- April 2020 saw a drop of 97.3% in car sales in the UK, a figure not seen since 1946, a year after World War Two.
- Only 197 cars were produced by British factories in April and only 4,321 cars were sold, compared to 161,064 cars sold in Britain in April 2019.
Dan Gick, founder and owner of Scrap Car Comparison, said, “In these unprecedented times, it is evident that the global automotive industry has been hit severely. The figures highlight the EU-wide impact of the crisis, we only hope the industry begins to recover as soon as possible.”
Scrap Car Comparison continue to urge any owners who are thinking about scrapping a vehicle during lockdown to use its no-contact Donate a Car scheme to give vital funds to one of their amazing partnered charities!