As crossovers have gotten more popular, it only makes sense that a few automakers would try selling convertible versions. On paper, it’s a great idea, but the first two that we got — the Nissan Murano CrossCabriolet and Land Rover Range Rover Evoque Convertible — were sales disasters and quickly canceled. And yet, as Motor1 reports, over in Europe, the Volkswagen T-Roc Cabriolet is the most popular mainstream convertible through the first half of 2024.
So far this year, Volkswagen has sold 6,110 T-Roc droptops, beating the second-place Mazda MX-5 Miata and its 3,545 sales handily. T-Roc Cabriolet sales are actually down about 23 percent year-over-year, too, and it still took the top spot. Then again, it didn’t help that Miata sales are also down about 15 percent. As Motor1 points out, that may be because Mazda recently switched over from ND2 to ND3 production.
That said, there is an asterisk attached to this win. The Mini Cooper Convertible is considered a premium vehicle, not a mainstream one, and it took the top spot overall with 11,140 sales in the same period. Still, second place overall isn’t that bad. If it makes Volkswagen feel better, the T-Roc still beat the Porsche 911 Cabriolet’s 5,784 sales, as well as the 4,714 4 Series Convertibles that BMW sold.
Unfortunately for T-Roc Cabriolet fans, the fun is about to be over. Volkswagen has already announced plans to kill off the T-Roc. So even being one of the best-selling convertibles in the entire continent doesn’t seem to be enough to keep the convertible crossover around. Does this mean the experiment is finally over? Probably not. Eventually, some other automaker will probably try it again with an electric vehicle, but that’s probably years away from actually happening. Oh well.