The boss of Bentley has warned the carmaker would move on the prices of threatened US tariffs to consumers, because the British luxurious automotive model reported a drop in earnings due to weaker demand from China.
The model, owned by Germany’s Volkswagen, on Wednesday reported an working revenue of €373m (£314m) in 2024, the fourth-highest within the firm’s 105-year historical past. Nonetheless, that was down greater than a 3rd from €589m the 12 months earlier than.
Frank-Steffen Walliser, Bentley’s chief govt since July, mentioned it had been a “constructive 12 months regardless of the headwinds”, however added that the specter of tariffs from Donald Trump was hanging over the producer. The US president final month mentioned that tariffs of as much as 25% on vehicles will power producers to shift manufacturing to America.
That’s unlikely within the case of luxurious manufacturers like Bentley, whose cachet relies upon partially on steady manufacturing at its manufacturing facility in Crewe, Cheshire. That signifies that worth will increase could be simpler to impose on clients with out hurting gross sales.
“We’re assessing completely different situations on deal with it, however it might finally be handed on to shoppers,” Walliser advised reporters.
Volkswagen’s premium Audi model mentioned on Tuesday it was contemplating “the extent to which we should move on at the very least among the tariffs to our clients within the type of worth will increase”, and looking for a “candy spot” between worth will increase and adjusting manufacturing, Reuters reported.
“The market challenges positively stay,” Bentley’s Walliser mentioned. “We’ve got a really unstable political scenario.”
Bentley made revenues of €2.6bn in 2024, however declined to share the variety of vehicles offered. It delivered 13,560 vehicles in 2023.
Executives claimed the corporate is shifting focus to “worth over quantity”, focusing on increased revenues from each automotive offered. About 70% of all consumers pay for profitable bespoke content material, together with one purchaser in 2024 who requested 3D-printed rose gold particulars inside a automotive.
Nonetheless, Walliser did say the primary motive for falling earnings in 2024 was weak spot in demand for vehicles in China. A slowdown in consumption on the earth’s second-largest financial system has weighed on gross sales of luxurious items.
Bentley finance boss Jan-Henrik Lafrentz mentioned he hoped Chinese language demand “will hopefully degree out this 12 months”.
An enchancment within the Chinese language market may assist Bentley and different carmakers to put money into the shift to electrical automobiles. Bentley has delayed a deliberate electrical sports activities utility automobile (SUV) to 2026, with the primary deliveries solely in 2027 amid an adjustment throughout the automotive business to lower-than-expected demand for electrical vehicles.
Bentley in November mentioned it is going to delay the tip of sale of petrol vehicles to 2035, 5 years later than initially deliberate. Walliser mentioned earlier plans for electrical vehicles have been doubtlessly “somewhat bit too bullish”.
Nonetheless, Lafrentz mentioned Bentley anticipated its electrical vehicles to be as worthwhile as its petrol and new hybrid fashions. “That’s a transparent goal,” he mentioned.
