AIR CONDITIONING IS A HOT OPTION
LONDON Air conditioning has become the hottest option in Europe's small and medium car segments this summer.
Suppliers of compressors are rapidly building new plants as carmakers use air conditioning promotions to boost sales.
'Demand is rising so fast we badly need extra capacity to meet the growth we anticipate over the next five years,' says John Kill,true religion jeans outlet, chief engineer at Ford Automotive Components Division's climate control division in France.
London based DRI /McGraw Hill estimates that the factory installation rate in Europe has risen to 36 38 percent this year, from 33 35 percent in 1995. That compares with just 16 percent in 1992.
DRI's David Smith Tilley forecasts that penetration will reach 65 percent in the next decade.
'Air conditioning has become a greater feature of marketing strategy and tactics,' says Smith Tilley.
Europe has lagged behind North America and Japan in fitting air conditioning. A key reason is that drivers in Europe, where fuel costs about four times as much as in the US, are more sensitive to its impact on fuel economy.
So in recent years German supplier Behr GmbH Co has promoted air conditioning as a safety feature that contributes to alertness as well as driver comfort.
Behr believes the campaign has helped considerably to change consumer opinion at least in Germany and France. In the UK, industry sources suggest that last year's hot summer changed people's attitudes towards air conditioning.
Industry experts also cite the increasing rake of front windshields,longchamp, which raises the temperature inside, and the increasing time spent sweating in traffic jams.
A new generation of small cars in Europe is being designed with air conditioning as an option. The predecessors of the current Opel Corsa and Volkswagen Polo did not offer air conditioning even as an option,ralph lauren france.
But climate control is only the latest in a series of optional features that have been marketed aggressively in recent years. European automakers' marketing departments have successively run through anti lock brakes, air bags, audio equipment and now air conditioning.
In January,toms outlet, Volkswagen launched a promotion in Germany offering air conditioning for the same price as a sun roof option on its best selling Golf. Opel responded with a similar offer on its Astra in February.
Air conditioning for the Astra now costs DM1,150 ($742),burberry scarf, compared with DM2,185 before the campaign began. For the Corsa the price has tumbled from DM1,christian louboutin shoes,965 to DM960.
The result of such promotions is that 41.5 percent of all new Golfs sold in Germany in the first five months of the year were fitted with air conditioning, compared with just 20 percent in the last half of 1995.
'It's very easy for customers to understand, and we know that customers are becoming more and more interested in air conditioning' said a VW spokeswoman.
Volkswagen hit on the promotion idea after fitting air conditioning to an unsold stock of Golfs at Wolfsburg last autumn at the request of southern European dealers. They convinced VW that they could sell the cars if VW retrofitted the option. Delphi Automotive's Italian air conditioning subsidiary, Diavia, did the work and the cars sold briskly.
In the UK,louis vuitton handbags, Peugeot made air conditioning standard on the 405 in 1995. VW followed suit with standard air conditioning on the Passat, starting December 1995, when 1996 fleet sales started. The introduction of air conditioning, combined with a reduction of 1,600 ($2,432) in the car's price, helped Passat sales rise 22 percent in the current model's final months on the market.
Installation rates on Golfs sold in the UK rose from 5 percent in 1995 to 12 percent after a campaign at the beginning of March 1996, which cut the price of air conditioning to 500. The promotion pushed installation rates on Polos from 0.3 to 5 percent.
A recent innovation by Ford is a cooled glove box on its Fiesta. Ford sees greater operating efficiency as critical in Europe because of fuel prices. Ford ACD has developed a new compressor technology that promises to cut operating costs,mcm backpack. The new scroll type compressor will reduce by one third the average 15 percent fuel consumption penalty that goes with air conditioning. The unit will be offered on Ford's entire European car line up by 2001.
Demand has been so strong that there have been shortages of certain components, says Smith Tilley.
Two new compressor plants have been announced in the past 12 months. Delphi and Calsonic are investing FF350 million ($67 million) in a second plant near Douai, France. The factory is due to start production in late 1997. It will double the output of the partners' first plant, which comes on stream in September 1996. At present there is no compressor capacity in Europe. All compressors are imported from the US and Japan.
Ford ACD is constructing a $150 million plant in Setubal,cheap true religion, Portugal, to manufacture compressors for its in house air conditioning business. Production will start in 1998.
Sanden International Corp. of Japan is the market leader in OE compressor supply in Europe. Sanden has accelerated plans for the development of its compressor plant at Tinteniac in France,coach factory outlet, which opened this spring.

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