Not everyone will like that Alfa Romeo is building an SUV– especially when it eliminated the Giulia wagon– however if you care about the brand, you better hope the Stelvio succeeds. It’s no overstatement to say that Alfa Romeo’s future sits on the Stelvio’s shoulders, following the sluggish sales start of its new Giulia sedan. Automotive News says that since going on sale last month, Alfa Romeo has sold under 19,000 Giulias in Europe and below 1700 in the US since that its December launching.
Fiat Chrysler CEO Sergio Marchionne forecasted Giulia sales to be around 75,000 to 100,000 units every year, so this brand-new sedan is way off in its first year of purchases. Marchionne goes for Alfa Romeo to sell 170,000 units this year, and for the brand to become successful for the first time in twenty years next year. With the Giulia lagging behind expectations, the Stelvio has a lot of slack to get.
Regardless of these less-than-ideal scenarios, we don’t have to give up all expect Alfa right now, since the Stelvio is showing up at the perfect time. Globally, there’s considerably larger demand for compact high-end crossovers compared to sedans, so it’s not unreasonable to anticipate the Stelvio to surpass the Giulia in terms of sales. Along with that, Jaguar has had a big hit in its first SUV, the F-Pace, so possibly the Stelvio could replicate the Jaguar’s success.
The report also suggest that Alfa has 2 more crossovers in development, though we’ll need to wait till 2019 to have either. One will be smaller compared to Stelvio, where as the other is larger, making it a rival to the Audi Q7, BMW X5, and others.
While we would like to see Alfa focus its attention on developing more sedans and sports cars. It is possible that Alfa’s SUVs will be a hit, and after that the company can keep developing the sorts of cars it made its credibility on.
