VW should sell their vans here, though they would likely need to make them in the US or Mexico, even with the euro at parity. According to an article in Business Week, it's advantageous to have "big footprint" vehicles in the product mix. The CAFE standards changed in 2011:
"Now, automakers' mileage targets vary depending on the "footprints" of the vehicles they sell-the area between the four wheels. Cars and trucks are still regulated separately, but within each class, fuel efficiency requirements drop as vehicles grow. That means automakers whose sales mix is weighted toward bigger vehicles have lower fuel-economy targets to meet. They no longer have to offset their big gas guzzlers with sales of small gas sippers to bring up the fuel-economy averages. As a result, there's nothing anymore to hold them back from selling lots of big trucks, which drive profits. Ford gets half its U.S. profit from large pickups, and General Motors gets about 35 percent, says Barclays Capital analyst Brian Johnson."
Full article here: http://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2015-02-19/bigger-pickups-are-result- of-change-in-fuel-standards
Stuart |
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