Britain's Car Production - By Brand 1991 & 2010

Things have changed over the last twenty years with British car production. Back in 1991, things were very different from today for UK car making. Rover (LR too), Ford (Jaguar also) and Vauxhall accounted for 82% of production. Rover was the largest producer, and remained so until 1999. Below are production figures for '91:

1991

Brand/Production/Share
Rover 360,000 29%
Ford 339,000 27%
Vauxhall 259,000 21%
Nissan 125,000 10%
Peugeot 88,000 7%
Land Rover 36,000 3%
Jaguar 23,000 2%
Others 7,400
Total 1,237,000


Moving to 2010, I won't go on about what BMW did to Rover but only the MINI continues under its control. Ford moved from making cars to engines exclusively. It seems to me that GM wants to get out of car making in the UK altogether, but the market is too important so token Astra production makes up the much reduced output. Peugeot opened production in lower wage Eastern Europe, then shut down their UK plant. Nice one.

Sounds gloomy then. Well, not quite. Nissan got really serious about the UK, while both Toyota and Honda moved in. TATA are doing well with JLR too and BMW have certainly succeeded with the MINI. 2010 figures below show the striking change:

2010

Brand/Production/Share
Nissan 423,000 33%
MINI 216,000 17%
Land Rover 183,000 14%
Honda 139,000 11%
Toyota 137,000 11%
Vauxhall 103,000 8%
Jaguar 56,000 4%
Others 16,500
Total 1,275,000

In summary: Without Japanese investment, it would look very poor indeed.