Lotus Claims Six-Fold Sales Growth, Delivers £10m Profit
Revised vehicle portfolio awarded Lotus a sales increase in Europe, a market which had been commandeered by their competitors.
Lotus is a very special company, and for many reasons. Besides their automobile manufacturing business, they have an outstanding engineering company involved in many cutting-edge projects. More importantly, the machinery they build remains true to Colin Chapman’s ideology: make it lightweight, and make it fast.
There’s only one problem with building such niche vehicles — money. Lotus has barely gotten by for decades, each year flirting with bankruptcy and having to be rescued in one way or another. According to an official press release, that ends now.
Lotus has delivered a radical turn around, delivering a profit before tax improvement of £10m (approx. $11m US) in the second half of the 2016-17 financial year. In retrospect, Lotus had claimed a £41.2m loss the year before. Even more shocking, is the fact that the first half of the current financial year they still trailed a £11.2m loss.
What happened in the second half of the year? For starters, the saucy new Lotus rides were shown off to the media. Not too long after that, they were delivered to hopeful customers who prayed the iconic British manufacturer got it right this time. Thankfully, it seems they have.
The new benchmark sports cars such as Evora, Exige and Elise have been praised throughout the world for their incredible driving dynamics. Then again, that’s nothing new for the Chapman bunch. While this is certainly good news, fans of the brand can only hope this growth and success is sustainable for years to come.
