Manufacturing cars in Western Europe isn't very cost effective. The standard of living has climbed as the wages improved. Any hint of a drop in that standard has quotes in the media of people wondering how they can make ends meet.
In the UK, this period commenced with six main brands (luxury marques and sports car makers aren't included). Three Japanese companies joined, BMW released the new MINI and Ford made a small number of Mazdas which brought the brands being made in the UK to ten by the late 1990's.
In a flurry of activity, BMW MINI came in, but Ford and Peugeot left and MGR went broke. So seven it was and with Infiniti briefly eight. Then Infiniti was withdrawn from most of Europe, Honda gave up on assembly in the region and Vauxhall became a smaller volume light commercial manufacturer.
Suddenly there were just five as there still are today. Nissan is moving toward electric production and the way that is presently plus profits being well down, not conducive to increased volume. MINI has capacity constraints so it won't be going up from here, Toyota has just one model and is sitting on that so we can only expect model cycle variances there.
Jaguar has cut back its production as it transitions to a low volume premium brand. Only Land Rover has the potential to grow but not with the subdued sales we see globally today. So while the UK car industry is still operational, it's not fizzing either.
The Chinese are coming to Europe but whether higher wage countries will become beneficiaries of investment is uncertain. The few that have committed so far have gone the lower wage route. So is the current situation as good as it gets for the UK?
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