Toyota bZ4X sibling now takes 27% of UK Subaru sales
EVs and fresh Forester will drive growth and help Subaru get a bigger slice of the UK market, says new boss
Subaru will bring two new electric cars to the UK by 2026 as it seeks to build on the early success of the Solterra in pursuit of a bigger slice of the UK market.
The expansion of the Japanese firm’s line-up is part of an £8 billion electrification investment package, which will result in seven new EVs being introduced worldwide – three of which will be SUVs developed with technical partner and 20% stakeholder Toyota, as was the bZ4X-based Solterra.
Subaru UK managing director Lorraine Bishton, appointed in January after stints at Ford, JLR and McLaren, provided no further details but said the EVs will stay true to the brand’s core values: “Safe, tough and fun.”
In keeping with the current Subaru line-up (the Crosstrek, Forester and Solterra SUVs and the Outback estate), all future additions are expected to be practicality-focused high-rise hatchbacks, most likely with four-wheel drive, as that has been identified as a particular point of appeal for the brand’s core demographic.
Subaru has 65 dealerships across the UK, “mainly rurally based because that’s where our customers are”, said Bishton, “and they tend to be a family-run business”.
Some of these dealers are recognised as “pillars of their community”, she added. “Their customers know who they are and they trust them.”
The close relationship between its dealers and customers will be crucial to the success of Subaru’s upcoming EVs because of the extra support they can provide throughout that process.
“We often get asked that question about moving to an agency [retail] model,” said Bishton, “but actually we think, particularly as we’re going through a period of EV adoption, customers need support. They need people that they trust, who they’ve known a long time, to help them on that journey.”
As a testament to the efficacy of the wholesale retail model, Bishton highlighted that the Solterra now accounts for 27% of Subaru’s UK sales, putting it well clear of the 22% EV sales mix that it needs to achieve this year in line with the UK government’s new zero emissions vehicle mandate.
Bishton did acknowledge, however, that Subaru’s retail presence is predominantly in the north of the UK: “We’ve definitely got opportunities where we don’t have good representation today. The south-east is a good example.”
Bishton said the arrival of Subaru’s new EVs, plus a new generation Forester later this year, will kick-start a “period of growth” after many years of modest sales volumes. Subaru sold only about 2400 cars here last year, but it’s huge in the US, with 600,000 sales there in the same period being around 75% of its global total.
Subaru forecasts its global sales to nudge one million in 2024 and made heavy year on-year gains of around 30% in the UK from January to June.
However, Bishton said constrained supply over the next few months will make that growth curve tail off. Ultimately, though, she plans to boost Subaru’s UK share. At its peak in the 1990s, it was selling 12,000 cars a year.
While its UK volume today is small, it is vastly improved on the 951 units it sold in pandemic-blighted 2020, which represented a 68% year-on-year decrease, the heaviest of any car brand that year.
At the time, then MD John Hurtig called the performance “a disaster”, adding that Subaru needed to “rebuild the dealer network from the roots” and distance itself from the image of the old Impreza WRX STi, absent from the UK market for several years and unrelated to today’s range.
Bishton acknowledged that Subaru’s image has drastically evolved over the past 20 years but said it was a “little bit of a missed opportunity” to not talk about its sporting heritage.
She highlighted that Subaru’s factory racing team won its class at the Nürburgring 24 Hours earlier this year and said outlandish show cars like the WRX Project Midnight and Travis Pastrana’s GL Family Huckster stunt car (which both starred at Goodwood last month) are testament to the continued importance of motorsport for the firm.
Bishton said motorsport has a genuine influence on Subaru’s road cars: “Particularly with the Japanese factory team, a lot of those learnings go back into the development of cars, and particularly with some of the series they’re involved in on the BEV side of things. “We have an amazing heritage, we’re still involved and the brand can evolve.”
