Peugeot Relaunches Brand in South Africa with Two New Cars

In what amounted to a relaunch of the Peugeot brand in South Africa, the company introduced the market to two new models, a hatchback and an SUV, with the promise of more launches.

At an event last week, reported almost exclusively in the car media, managing director of Peugeot Citroen South Africa, Xavier Gobille, was reported saying “This Peugeot brand relaunch is the first wave of attack by the group, with more to come.”

Peugeot withdrew from South Africa in 1986 and returned in the 1990s, although “the brand has had a troubled existence in our beloved country,” wrote Chad Luckoff in AutoTrader.

He said Peugeot South Africa last week presented “key elements elements of their strategy to improve the perception of the brand, improve customer satisfaction and offer the buying public a hard-to-ignore proposition.”

“From 1.7 million vehicles sales in 2015, Peugeot has managed to drive sales up by 11 percent to 2.1 million sales in 2017. 2018 saw them claim the honour of the best selling SUV manufacturer in Europe, the segment of the market with the largest increase in volumes,” Luckoff wrote.

Besides focusing more on service, Luckoff added, Peugeot would be adding two new models to the South African market, “an affordable city car in the form of the new Peugeot 108 (and) their flagship SUV, the remarkable Peugeot 5008; a competent and flexible 7-seater with tech to rival the established marques.”

Gobile was reported in City Press as saying that it was not only the brand relaunch in South Africa of Peugeot SA but of the PSA group, which is the parent company of Peugeot, the French multinational that also has the brands Citroen, DS Automobiles and Opel.

Citroen will reportedly relaunch in October.