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Slow start for the Volkswagen ID.3: the sales figures for the first quarter of 2021 show that there is still a long way to go to become “the people’s electric”.
Slow start throughout Europe, including Italy
The Wolfsburg brand presented it as an epochal model, on a par with VW icons such as the Beetle and the Golf. But the welcome, for now, is lukewarm. It is true that deliveries began only in September, after a complicated gestation by the known problems in the software. But it was legitimate to expect something more in this first part of the year and now everything suggests that, to make volumes, Volkswagen focuses more on ID.4, the SUV. Even in the home market, Germany, the ID.3 is not in the lead to the ranking of the best-selling EVs. Even surpassed by the Tesla Model 3, as well as the “little sister” e-Up.
In Germany, too, it chases in third place, behind the e-Up and the Tesla Model 3
And it’s not that much better in the other major continental markets. In France in March it was only 7th in the ranking of electric and in three months it registered just over a thousand cars, to be precise 1.030. It is no better in Italy, where the ID.3 struggles to get into top ten. To march it turned out to be eighth, with solo 270 machines sold.
Dealers not very convinced of the electric. And this size …
What’s wrong? It is not clear if they are still there delivery problems. And the set-up problems mentioned above certainly did not help the image of the ID.3. Mostly in Germany, then, Volkswagen comes to terms with the resistances of one sales network anything but enthusiastic of a switch to electric considered too hasty. The German press gave wide prominence to the dissatisfaction of several large dealers. Convinced that, whileand Golf “it sells itself“, For the ID.3 (and the electric ones in general), the negotiations to sell an EV are exhausting,”to the point that it no longer pays for itself“. That is, the profit margin is barely enough to cover the hours spent by the staff to close the sale. But perhaps there is another aspect to consider: the electricity market seems to polarize between small towns on one side and the cars more expensive and powerful on the other. In the middle it seems to have dug a groove in which another model of the size of the ID.3 ended up, the Nissan Leaf. We’ll see.
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