Volkswagen History

The history of Volkswagen begins in Germany where it was founded in 1937 by the Nazi trade union called the German Labour Front. It was created to bring a car to the common people. During this time, it was rare for people to own anything other than a motorcycle, simply due to the expense associated with the cars of the time that were top of the line in luxury. Due to this, Hitler wanted to design a vehicle that could transport two adults, along with three children that was affordable in 1933, thus lead to Volkswagen as we know it today. The car that was designed for the first official Volkswagen was entitled 'The People's Car' and was available to those who belonged to the Third Reich through a savings plan, in which people would pay for the car over an extended period of time. Much similar to a car loan today. The car was designed by Dr. Ferdinand Porsche that utilized a better fuel system, reliability and easy to replace parts. Eventually around 336,000 people took ownership of the car and bought into the savings plan. These cars were not delivered to consumers until 1938, after Hitler received the first official car built.

After the war, the company was handed over to the British. The VW factory was kept as a military producing facility for some time, until finally the factory feel into a state of disrepair. But even then, the factory continued to produce cars. However, the factory was offered to a number of governments, including the British and American government, who refused to take on the dead weight of VW.

From 1948 and on, Volkswagen steadily became the face of the economy, despite rough past years. During this time the factory became in the hands of the West German government and the government of the state of Lower Saxony. During 1949, VW was introduced to the United States. However, most people did not like the cars, in fact, VW only sold two cars in the first year in the US. However, over the years, the production of the VW Beetle, the infamous car associated with VW, sold around one million of these cars by 1955.

Volkswagen also took their cars to Canada in 1952. The cars were widely accepted, and due to this acceptance, VW established a factory in Canada in 1957.

Over the years, Volkswagen became more widely accepted in the United States, and popularity continued to grow in Canada. In 1974 was the year that VW realized that they would need to develop new models of the car, as the popularity of the Beetle was diminishing. During this decade the Passat, Golf and Polo were introduced. To date, VW is still introducing new models and the popularity of the brand is still increasing, as it has become known as the best of German engineering with excellent fuel mileage and quality craftsmanship. In 2009, the manufacturer was ranked as the third largest automaker according to sales. The plans are for VW to become the top selling automaker by the year 2018.