Skoda Fabia vRS to be dropped due to poor sales. Is that a good idea?

The Skoda Fabia vRS – Skoda’s version of the hot VW Polo – is to be dropped next year due to poor sales. But is that a good idea?

The current version of the Skoda Fabia vRS has been with us since the Geneva Motor Show in 2010, and it’s a cracking little car.

It’s the Skoda version of the VW Polo GTI and comes with the same 1.4 litre TSI supercharged with a healthy 178bhp, 7-speed DSG gearbox and performance and economy that satisfies – 0-62mph in 7.1 seconds and 44mpg.

But it seems buyers aren’t queueing round the block to drive off in Skoda’s hot little Fabia so it’s going to be dropped.

According to Frank Walsh – Skoda’s Tech Development board member – the Fabia vRS is “…[a car]  that everyone likes but only a few people buy”, so , when the new Fabia arrives next year, there will be no vRS model.

Instead, Skoda will continue to offer the ‘Monte Carlo’ cosmetic package for the Fabia that attempts to turn the more prosaic Fabia’s in to performance lookalikes with stuff like gloss black highlights and more butch bits attached to the body.

But are poor sales enough reason to drop a model like the vRS from the range? Surely the biggest benefit of the vRS is that it shines a performance glow on the rest of the range? Aren’t those opting for the Monte Carlo pack doing so to make it look like a proper performance model?

If there is no vRS – which there won’t be going forward – will car buyers look at the Fabia as just another compact city car, rather than one with proper sporty pretensions?

If so, Skoda could find sales across the Fabia range drop without the vRS on offer.