Counterpoint: Dacia Sandero is one of the best selling models in Europe
They're really among the more reliable cars according to ADAC (German AAA): https://www.adac.de/rund-ums-fahrzeug/unfall-schaden-panne/a...
It remains the cheapest car avaialble, though the 10,000 price point is a thing of the past.
Really? What about the Fiat Panda?
A Renault Clio is around 18,000 Euro, three, more likely four, months time to deliver.
The whole market is simply crazy in Italy right now, in the end we settled for a (more expensive, but actually also a little bit higher level) Hyundai I20, managed to get one in 10 days time (the only model they had available, with a few largely unneeded by us optionals) for around 23,000 Euro.
All the mentioned models are so-called "mild-hybrids", so - at least in the case of the Hyundai - you have an useless small battery that prevents from having a spare tire/wheel.
I only own it because it was dirt cheap second hand and was very satisfied with the previous gen model which was an actually good car. This one is not.
A 2019 one with relatively low mileage (50,000 to 60,000 km, maybe 70,000 km) is likely to be in the 9,000-10,000 Euro range.
I wouldn't however attribute the scarcity exclusively to high demand, for all we know it could simply be under-production (for whatever technical reason or as part of a plan to sell higher priced models).
Fuck me, 13,000 Euros is what the original owner of my used Panda paid for it back in 2013, while I got it in 2017 for 6000 Euros with full kit and an extra winter tire + wheel set. I'm guessing it was cheap because it hasn't got much demand for it on the used market so users wanting to get rid of it need to lower the price.
It's definitely not a 13000 car used.
People only buy Dacia because they can't afford anything else. If they could you would see the Dacia market share shrink to almost zero.
Some people cope with "Dacia is just a cheap Renault" the same they cope with "Seat (Spanish brand) is just a cheap Volkswagen", but deep down inside them they know they can't buy the car they really wanted.
Not everyone wants a status symbol, and not everyone wants a Go Very Fast Very Loud car. Some people genuinely want a car that's comfortable, reliable, and good for the environment.
I am very skeptical that this is true.
In much of Eastern Europe most people would just rather buy a beat up BMW or even a relatively decent one for 10-15k.
To be fair I kind of feel the same. Getting a 2-3 old car seems like a better option than a brand new Dacia
Let's be real here, new Dacias are bought by people who care about not visiting service every other month and total cost of ownership.
My point was that in a lot of places people who can’t afford a new car other than Dacia would still rather buy an older car from a more prestigious brand due to “reasons”.
For about 15 years I kept having a hyundai of one sort of another while my friend has Audis. Our regular planned maintenance and our repairs were about 500% different. Anecdata n=1 of course.
I thought they went and robbed a couple of banks like I do.
ngl, I occasionally ponder one
The only brand popular in both the us and the Netherlands is probably Tesla.
The ford model even has the same engine and transmission as their pickups (last I read).
People skip over the minivan because it's not "cool" or "too soccer mom" but JFC it's the best vehicle I've used.
Toyota is popular with the Yaris being highly rated and reliable as measured by ANWB (Dutch AAA). Anecdotally I see a lot of Hyundais around where I live; the EV6/Ionic is a popular eclectic model.
However the Honda Civic for instance seems to have had reasonably good sales figures in Europe between 2000 and ~2018 so there must still be some around.
Regarding overlap of non-pickups, usually the models that are popular in the Netherlands are different from the models in the us. E.g., Toyota Camry is very rare in the Netherlands, same for Honda Accord.
I thought we were talking about brands rather than specific models? But yeah the Camry is not that popular in Europe, RAV4 and Corolla are on both continents though.
But yeah, compact cars and hatchbacks are hardly a thing in the US and no sane person in Europe would buy a pickup truck unless they actually needed one for work.
Not the same ones.