2023-09-25 16:58:56
“What is very important for the French is that we are very attached to cars. We love the car, and I love it,” enthused Emmanuel Macron during his television interview on Sunday evening. Figures to support these sweet words? Apparently, nothing might be easier. We offer you two massive statistics: as of January 1, 2022, 38.7 million cars were in circulation in France, according to the government. A number continually increasing year following year. And 75% of French workers use their car to get to work, according to the latest Alphabet France Mobility & Business barometer from November 2022.
But when you love, you don’t count. While these figures demonstrate the utilitarian aspect of the car, the Head of State speaks of love and passion. So, are the French really attached to their cars? “The car market remains emotional and not purely functional in the country,” says Eric Saint Frison, automotive consultant and director of innovation at L’Argus, a French magazine devoted to four wheels.
Passion more than functionality
Proof of this, according to the expert: the choice of cars by the French. He illustrates his point with a very specific example, the Citroën AMI, a car without a license. “A great commercial success among young people. Whereas at 45 km/h, you have the same mobility on a scooter, but cheaper and less bulky. It’s nice that the car has additional sentimental value. The same goes for licensed cars: it is rarely the purely functional ones that are successful. »
And on the heart side, the numbers are not lacking either. In a BMW-Odoxa France survey dating from 2020, those questioned associate the notions of freedom (88%) and pleasure (71%) with the car, alongside the notion of necessity (87%), the only utilitarian concept of the leading trio. Even more so, one in five French people give their car a little nickname, according to a study by the company Onepoll for CarNext in 2021. And no, you are not the only ones to talk to “Titine”. “The car is certainly seen as a more banal and consensual object than in the 1960s or 1970s,” recognizes Boris Descarrega, mobility specialist at the Society and Consumption Observatory. But the French retain a real love for her. She has lost her prestige, but not her emotional connection. »
A personal, sentimental purchase full of memories
Eric Saint Frison sees two reasons for this. Pragmatically, its price. “You are not going to invest several thousand or even tens of thousands of euros in a purchase without putting a little feeling into it. » In 2023, the median price of a new vehicle is 35,000 euros, and that of a used vehicle reaches 22,000 euros. According to a 2019 Elabe survey, one in two French people even see the choice of their car as a way of expressing their personality.
Second reason, “the car, through its daily use and its practicality, necessarily creates memories by attaching itself to warm moments. It’s the vehicle to take the kids to play football, to go on vacation…”, believes Eric Saint Frison.
Out of sight, close to the engine
The famous “next world” and the transition towards less polluting travel still seem far away. On the contrary, the health crisis would have strengthened attachment, according to Boris Descarrega. The restriction of individual freedoms and travel for several months would have “shown the importance of the car, and more particularly of the individual car”. Thus, if the Epinal image of the car was damaged in favor of collective, soft transport and carpooling during the 2010s, “the Covid-19 crisis put an end to this collective quivering, and the French have returned to the model of total freedom of the solo car,” announces the Observatory expert.
Are we witnesses of eternal love? “Our Observatory has been carrying out analyzes since 2014, and both utilitarian and sentimental attachment to the car remains relatively stable,” indicates Boris Descarrega. It seems that neither climate issues nor the rise of new mobility are really moving the lines. The heart has its reasons…
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