AutoBeta(AutoBeta.net)02/28 Report--

Sales of PSA in China have been declining in recent years. DPCA, which has two major brands, Dongfeng Peugeot and Dongfeng Citroen, sold 253000 vehicles in 2018, down 33% from the same period last year, while Changan PSA's sales of French high-end DS-branded cars are almost forgotten by the market, with only 5478 DS brands sold in China in 2018.

Despite poor sales, PSA is hopeful about the Chinese market. DS launched a brand recovery plan called the DS Trust Plan in China on Feb. 26, while Meng Nuo, president of Changan PSA, said: "I will never give up the Chinese market."

Last year, DS's performance in China was not very satisfactory. " Meng Nuo, president of Changan PSA, said that although China's auto market faces great challenges in 2018 and DS has experienced the pain of development in China, DS still has a bright future in China.

This is a plan that strives to enhance brand competitiveness in an all-round way at the levels of brand, product, marketing and users, which is specifically divided into three aspects. First, the brand and product enhancement plan. DS plans to release a new product every year from this year to better maintain brand vitality. Second, the city marketing plan, according to the plan this year, DS will invest resources to build a city-based, combined with local influential advertising and events to help improve DS sales. Then there is the customer satisfaction program, where word-of-mouth is a sore point for the development of the DS brand, which combines new digital experiences, connectivity, and DS customer clubs.

Meng Nuo, president of Changan PSA, also said, "the DS brand will unswervingly implement the luxury brand line, the only luxury brand from France, will have a place in the luxury car market." PSA Group will invest heavily in products, technology, management and channels for the DS brand, and Changan PSA will also become the strategic core of the DS brand in the Asia-Pacific region.

The DS brand has five domestic models and launched a compact SUV DS 7 last year, but failed to save the beleaguered DS brand. Last year, the best-selling model was the DS 7, with monthly sales of about 200. the rest of the models were in double digits, and many of them were at zero per month. The data show that in 2018, sales of DS 7 were 1846, while sales of DS 6 were 1709, down 51%. The annual sales of the three models, namely, DS DS 5LS, DS 4S and DS 5, were all less than 1,000. Finally, the DS brand sold 5478 vehicles in China, down 18% from the same period last year.

Low brand awareness and lack of market competitiveness of models lead to the dilemma of DS. When you see a DS car on the street, many people will even think it is a bad domestic brand.

It can be said that PSA has hit rock bottom in China, and outsiders once speculated whether PSA would withdraw from the Chinese market. However, PSA Group is still confident that poor sales in China are only temporary. Tang Weishi, CEO of PSA Group, once said, "this is just the darkness before dawn. China is the largest auto sales country in the world, and we will not give up this market."

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