Mercedes-Benz achieves a record quarter with the best month of all time

Mercedes-Benz sold 237,307 cars this March, surpassing its sales record from the prior-year month by 3.9%. March was the strongest-selling month that the company has ever achieved and the past three months were the most successful quarter of all time with a total of 594,304 customers taking delivery of their car with the three-pointed star (+6.0%). Mercedes-Benz was the premium-market leader with the most registrations in March in countries including Great Britain, Germany, France, Italy, Russia, Switzerland, Sweden, Portugal, Japan, South Korea, Australia, Canada and Brazil.

“We once again emphasized our claim to leadership in the first quarter: With sales of more than 237,000 Mercedes-Benz vehicles in March, we achieved our strongest-selling month of all time and our best-ever quarter,” stated Britta Seeger, Member of the Board of Management of Daimler AG responsible for Mercedes-Benz Cars Marketing and Sales. “We started the spring season with our Mercedes-Benz dream cars worldwide: The new C-Class Cabriolet and Coupé were presented to the world public for the first time in New York and the new CLS has been available in Europe since March,” she continued.

Mercedes-Benz unit sales by region and market

In the Europe region alone, 109,252 cars with the star were sold last month, setting a new sales record for a month, and 238,131 units were sold in the first quarter (+2.1%). Germany was responsible for a large proportion of this success with a 5.2% increase in first-quarter sales to 74,262 units. In nearly all major European markets, Mercedes-Benz delivered more cars in the first three months of 2018 than in the prior-year period. New records were set for first-quarter unit sales in France, Spain, Belgium, Switzerland, Sweden, Poland and Portugal.

In the Asia-Pacific region, demand for cars with the star reached the new high of 88,976 units in March (+13.1%). Since the beginning of the year, 249,106 customers there were delighted to receive their new Mercedes-Benz (+13.5%) – more than ever before in the first quarter of a year. The biggest sales driver worldwide was China with a new record of 169,932 cars delivered from January to March (+17.2%). More than two thirds of all the cars sold there were also produced in China. New sales records were set in the first three months of this year also in South Korea, India and Malaysia. In Thailand as well, Mercedes-Benz sold more vehicles than in any previous first quarter. In order to satisfy the growing demand in that market, Daimler and its local partner Thonburi Automotive Assembly Plant (TAAP) will together invest more than 100 million euros in the production facility in Bangkok by 2020. This investment will go into the expansion of the existing automobile plant and into a battery production facility at the location to ensure the availability of the latest technology for electrified vehicles and “EQ Power” plug-in hybrids from Thailand.

In the NAFTA region, 33,986 customers received their new cars with the star in March(-2.7%) and 93,375 in the first quarter (-0.8%). The very high prior-year levels were therefore nearly matched. In the USA, Mercedes-Benz delivered a total of 78,474 cars in the first quarter (-0.8%). In the first quarter, Mercedes-Benz was the best-selling premium brand in the USA.