Stellantis temporarily halts production of the Fiat 500 e
- Due to a lack of sufficient orders, the Stellantis group is once again interrupting the production of the Fiat 500 e (battery electric) for a month and a half from September 13 to November 1, 2024. Sales of this model which reached 42,000 units in Europe in 2021 (3,500 per month on average) and 66,000 units in 2022 (5,500 per month), had fallen slightly in 2023, with 63,000 units (5,250 per month), but since January 2024, they have been collapsed to 26,000 units over eight months (3,250 per month), which augurs a volume of less than 40,000 units for the whole year.
- Two factors worked against the model: firstly its high price for an A-segment model (30,000 to 34,000 euros) and secondly the end of subsidies in Germany, although this country was the first customer of the Fiat 500 e ( 13,000 sales in 2021 and 30,000 sales in 2022). In 2023, sales of the model in Germany fell to 23,000 in 2023 and 6,000 in the first eight months of 2024 (or 9,000 sales for the whole year).
- Even Italy, its country of origin, quickly abandoned this model: 11,000 sales in 2021, 6,000 in 2022, 5,000 in 2023 and 2,000 over the first eight months of 2024 (i.e. 3,000 sales over the whole year). France became its first customer in 2024, with 13,000 sales over eight months (or 20,000 over twelve months).
- The Fiat 500 e nevertheless had the advantage of being the only battery electric two-door city car since the withdrawal of the Smart Fortwo, but that has not changed anything. Consequently, the carmaker announced that it would launch in one year a Fiat 500 hybrid derived from the Fiat 500 e which will be produced at the Italian Mirafiori site, like the Fiat 500 e.