Renault's sales keep growing – and firm insists it's sustainable

Renault can sustain its recent sales growth to achieve its goal of selling more than two million cars per year by 2030, according to the brand’s sales boss. The French manufacturer sold 829,518 vehicles worldwide in the first half of this year, a rise of 2.6% compared to the same period in 2025 and the seventh consecutive half-year period in which it has grown sales. The firm remains Europe's second best-selling car firm. Overall, the firm’s growth was even between its current core market of Europe and international markets, which are a growing focus for Renault. The firm enjoyed particular success in Northern Europe (the UK, Ireland, Germany, Denmark and the Nordic countries), with a 14% year-on-year sales growth fuelled by a huge 81% year-on-year rise in EV sales. In depth: Renault's CEO tells us the secrets of the firm's success The Renault 5 electric hatch continues to grow sales, while the Renault 4 compact SUV has also posted gains – with Ivan Segal, the firm’s sales and operations chief, saying he expected the latter to grow rapidly as more competitors help grow the electric compact crossover market. While the new Renault Twingo city car has only just gone on sale, Segal said that the firm already had more than 9000 firm orders, but its impact would be felt more in the second half of the year. In total, around two-thirds of Renault’s sales in Europe are electrified (hybrid or battery electric), which is above the market average, with Segal saying that it was “surfing the right wave in EV and hybrid.” Renault has now reached a 6.5% EV market share and a 15.1% share of the full hybrid market in the region. Notably, the main growth area of Renault’s sales has been in the retail market, with the brand actively moving away from the rental vehicle and demonstrator market in order to help boost residual values. Renault claims its residual values are an average of five percentage points better than its key rivals. Meanwhile, Renault continues to grow its international presence in other markets. Turkey is its bigger market outside of Europe, accounting for 74,129 sales, a 25.7% year-on-year increase. How Renault plans to keep growing Segal said that Renault had “several tools” it could use in order to continue growing sales, including the “two-leg strategy” of focusing on full hybrid and battery electric vehicles. Segal noted that those are the two powertrain types that are growing in sales, and in which he said “natural demand is growing.” He noted that government legislation and initiatives to boost EV uptake – along with the rising price of petrol – meant that would continue. As a result, Segal said that ”we've got the right range of products, and the products are attractive. If you are where the market and the demand is, you will continue to grow. We believe that our range of products is refreshed, so there is no reason to feel that we're going to slow down because our products are not any more attractive.” That said, Segal acknowledged that “we need to adapt our products in terms of pricing compared to competitors, and also in terms of technology, such as battery capacity or charging speed.” He added that “we’re working on all of those to keep on track against new competitors entering the market.” To that end, the Renault 5 and 4 will shortly be updated with new batteries to increase their range and reduce charging times. But as well as product, Segal said that a big focus on continuing to grow sales will be on persuading current Renault owners to stay with the brand when they trade in their car. He said: “It's easier to keep customers than to prospect new ones, although we do want to prospect new ones. We want to reduce the natural loss of customers that we’ve had in the past who were going to new brands because of attractiveness of these new brands. We want to keep them, so we are very focused about our capacity to do with a kind of loyalty programme.” Segal views a loyalty programme as “something that the new players coming into Europe cannot play with because they have no car parc.” The focus will be on trying to improve PCP and other finance offers when it comes time for an owner to replace their cars. He added: “We’re working through financing models where we've got some PCP offers, and we’re trying to do with these offers. We can improve, by finding a golden moment where the residual value is still good. We want to make sure we contact the contact the customer at the right moment with the right offer with good residual value. Our policy on quality of sales is based on residual value: if your residual value is good you can make good offers for a new car to the customer, and this is win-win because the customer is going with a new monthly plan for a new car, and we get back a car for our dealers to be able to do a used car offer with some margins.” As well as boosting residual values one key area will be working on personalising the timing of such offers. Segal added: “Today, our golden moment is a little bit static: we try to contact our customers 12 months before the end of their contract. We believe we can improve thanks to AI. We are working on our capacity to grab some custom information, about the car itself, the number of miles driven, the maintenance of the car, to be able to be more intelligent to do the golden offer at the right moment.”

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Renault's sales keep growing – and firm insists it's sustainable

French brand says that high residuals and AI-powered PCP deals can help it keep increasing sales

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Renault's sales keep growing – and firm insists it's sustainable

French brand says that high residuals and AI-powered PCP deals can help it keep increasing sales

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