A healthy load

摘要

The European wheeled loader market is relatively buoyant, according to specialist market research and forecasting company Off-Highway Research, with sales of machines over 60kW currently running at just above 10,000 units per year in Western Europe - the best demand has been since the global financial crisis a decade ago. This puts the value of the market at some US$2.15 billion (€1.9 billion). Within Europe, the major markets are largely what one would expect - Germany accounts for some 25% of demand and, together with France, Italy and the UK, these big four represent about 60% of regional sales. Besides these, Sweden and Norway are also large markets - certainly bigger than might be thought from their populations and the value of construction output. Last year, for example, wheeled loader sales in Sweden came close to 1,000 units, according to Off-Highway Research. The company said there were two reasons for this. First, the Nordic equipment markets are particularly buoyant at the moment, so equipment sales in general are high, and these countries represent an unusually large proportion of the European total.