SMT boss Paul Everitt said the return to growth reflected the trend of operators settling back into more typical replacement patterns.
He said: “With the commercial vehicle market up by over 20% for the year-to-date the industry is optimistic, but short to medium term economic uncertainty is likely to temper the rate of future growth.”
August is a below average sales month for vans with many operators putting off purchases until the September plate-change. It typically accounts for just 5% of total annual volumes.
Pick-up sales grew 36% to 809 last month, sales of vans under 2.0-tonnes crept up 2% to 1398, sales of vans weighing 2.0 to 2.5-tonnes shot up 52% to 1837 and heavy van sales grew 19% to 6424.
Major commercial vehicle manufacturers such as Ford, Vauxhall, Volkswagen and Peugeot saw solid growth but others such as Renault, Citroen and Fiat were down on August 2010.
