What Van? Britain's biggest and best van buyers' guide

Supply and delivery shortages continued to hit the new van market in the plate-change month of March and the sectors covering compact vans did not escape the impact.

Registrations of light vans weighing from 2.0 to 2.5t vans were down by 27.6%, to 5,577, while city vans weighing less than 2.0t plummeted by 70.8%, with just 903 registrations.

The Citroën Berlingo was the UK’s best-selling compact van in March with 1,671 registrations and the sixth best seller overall, ahead of its Stellantis stablemate the Peugeot Partner (1,285), which was the ninth top selling LCV overall.

The Berlingo and Partner were also the UK’s most popular compact vans in the first quarter of this year, continuing the trend established in 2021 when they outsold the Ford Transit Connect, Vauxhall Combo and Volkswagen Caddy.

A significant departure from the compact van sector during the first quarter of 2022 was the car-derived Fiesta Van, which Ford withdrew in February as a result of it having halted production of the three-door derivative of the Fiesta passenger car, on which the commercial version was based. The Fiesta Van was powered by Ford’s 1.0L 125hp petrol EcoBoost engine and was also available with the 1.5L TDCi diesel engine with 120hp until 2020. 

In the sub-2.0t sector Ford is now represented solely by the Transit Courier. Moving one step up the weight scale and the manufacturer will continue to market the current Connect compact van until the final quarter of 2023 when it will replace it with a model produced in conjunction with Volkswagen Commercial Vehicles, as a result of the collaboration between the companies. The new van is likely to be based on the next generation Caddy, as VW is taking the lead on small vans in the joint project deal.

Eagerly anticipated this year is the imminent arrival of Renault’s new Kangoo, along with the Mercedes Citan and Nissan Townstar, which piggyback its platform.

The Kangoo and the Citan were the first of the trio to break cover and were named joint winners of the International Van of the Year 2022 just before the end of last year.