Sweden 1952 / 2012 Comparison

Back in 1952, any car market would be very different to now, and so it is with Sweden. Japanese brands were not around, but many European and US makes no longer exist either. When you look at the list below, you will see some marques you don't even know what they are.

BMC-Nuffield was mainly Austin and Morris, Leyland-Std represents the Standard and Triumph brands. Rootes was largely Hillman and Humber sales. US car company Kaiser included low cost brand Henry, and German car maker Borgward owned Goliath, which includes it's sales as well. EMW at the bottom of the list were basically BMWs made in the Soviet sector of Germany and BMW had no control over that. Some interesting data for those who like a bit of history.

Below are sales for the whole of 1952 and for nine months of 2012. The early 1950s was a less affluent time  and car sales numbers reflected that. 1952 was a poor year in particular as it happens, as sales were a little better before and grew strongly afterward.

	1952					2012
1	Ford	7,169	13.9%		1	Volvo	37,096	18.2%
2	Volvo	7,132	13.8%		2	VW	31,711	15.6%
3	VW	5,964	11.5%		3	Audi	12,957	6.4%
4	Opel/Vauxhall	5,020	9.7%		4	Kia	11,845	5.8%
5	BMC-Nuffield	4,864	9.4%		5	Toyota	11,686	5.7%
6	Fiat	2,581	5.0%		6	BMW	11,552	5.7%
7	Saab	1,975	3.8%		7	Ford	10,196	5.0%
8	Leyland-Std	1,840	3.6%		8	Skoda	8,728	4.3%
9	Renault	1,693	3.3%		9	Hyundai	8,389	4.1%
10	Mercedes	1,660	3.2%		10	Mercedes	8,293	4.1%
11	GM US	1,550	3.0%		11	Peugeot	7,943	3.9%
12	Citroen	1,397	2.7%		12	Renault	7,112	3.5%
13	Borgward	1,068	1.5%		13	Nissan	4,796	2.4%
14	Peugeot	1,038	2.0%		14	Opel	4,421	2.2%
15	Rootes	997	1.9%		15	Citroen	3,942	1.9%
16	Chrysler	702	1.4%		16	Fiat	3,317	1.6%
17	Kaiser-Henry	612	0.2%		17	Subaru	3,252	1.6%
18	Moskvitch	611	1.2%		18	Mitsubishi	2,669	1.3%
19	Skoda	527	1.0%		19	Suzuki	2,058	1.0%
20	Simca	513	1.0%		20	Honda	2,005	1.0%
21	DKW	472	0.9%		21	Chevrolet	1,743	0.9%
22	Jowett	304	0.6%		22	Mazda	1,592	0.8%
23	Rover	288	0.6%		23	Seat	1,465	0.7%
24	Tatra	226	0.4%		24	MINI	977	0.5%
25	Panhard	179	0.3%		25	Land Rover	602	0.3%
26	Singer	173	0.3%		26	Saab	577	0.3%
27	IFA/Wartburg	152	0.3%		27	Lexus	534	0.3%
28	Studebaker	147	0.3%		28	Dacia	453	0.2%
29	De Soto	103	0.2%		29	Porsche	407	0.2%
30	Nash	85	0.2%		30	Jeep*	372	0.2%
31	Jaguar	83	0.2%		31	Lancia	311	0.2%
32	Willys	82	0.2%		32	Alfa Romeo	228	0.1%
33	Hudson	81	0.2%		33	Amatorbygg	97	0.0%
34	Lloyd	69	0.1%		34	Jaguar	94	0.0%
35	EMW	63	0.1%		35	Ferrari	58	0.0%
	Others	325	0.6%			Others	233	0.1%
	Total	51,745				Total	203,711

Today, Volvo is king in Sweden and has been so since 1958. VW is making a serious attack on that position and it seems only a matter of time before the Swedish marque is dethroned.

A special thanks to bilsweden, the very obliging and altruistic organisation that made this possible.


For Swedish car sales from 1950 please click here 

Top pic: Wiki of a Borgward.