That is the big picture for the regions market. Within it, however, are different stories of individual country markets – some tinged with optimism, some not. Fuchs Petrolub Head of Global Strategic Marketing Apu Gosalia told a number of them during an October presentation at this years congress of the Independent Union of the European Lubricant Industry.

Gosalia, who is also chief sustainability officer for Fuchs in Mannheim, Germany, analyzed Western Europes five largest lube markets – Germany, France, the United Kingdom, Spain and Italy – and an equal number from Central and Eastern Europe – Russia, the Ukraine, Poland, the Czech Republic and Hungary. From 2007 to 2009, results were quite uniform. Lubricant demand in nine of the countries dropped between 22 and 30 percent. The lone outlier was France, where the decline was 18 percent.

After 2009, there was more variance in performance of the individual markets. Germanys lube market achieved the best recovery, climbing back within 9 percent of 2007 demand by 2011. Poland, the Czech Republic and France were not far behind, all ending 2011 between 11 and 14 percent below 2007 levels, according to Fuchs.

Spain, Hungary and Italy fared the worst, as their markets ended the period down 26, 23 and 22 percent, respectively.

Gosalia also analyzed several other major economic indicators for each country (gross domestic product, car sales, production of cars, steel and chemicals) looking for threads to explain why some country markets fared better than others.

Much of the credit for Germanys weathering of the recession has gone to government incentives that boosted car sales. But Gosalia found stronger correlation with GDP, steel and auto production. In general he suggested that the countrys emphasis on industry aided its economy and lube market.

In Germany the share of industrial output in GDP steadily increased in recent years, he said, noting that industrial activity now accounts for 23 percent of GDP in Germany, compared to 16 percent in Italy, 13 percent in Spain and 10 percent in the U.K. and France.

The lube markets of Poland and the Czech Republic also have solid industrial bases, Gosalia said. Poland has a well-rounded industrial base, he said, Its GDP growth was slowed by the economic crisis but managed to [remain positive], which was not the case in other major Central and Eastern European countries.

In the Czech Republic car manufacturing continues to expand, and output in 2011 was 30 percent higher than in 2007. In contrast, Gosalia said, the U.K.s lubricant market suffered from a lack of industrialization. The U.K. was hit particularly hard, due to its large dependence on the financial sector.

But size of industrial base was not always a good predictor for lubricant demand. France, with the least industrial economy among the 10 studied nations, fared better than most. Spain and Italy are more industrial but their markets performed among the worst due to debt crises.

Perhaps the best indicator of trends in lubricant demand was the general direction of a countrys economy. In Germany, France, Russia, Poland and the Czech Republic, 2011 GDP topped pre-recession levels. In the other countries GDP dropped over that span.

Thats hardly surprising, but it doesnt bode well for lubricant suppliers in Italy, Spain or Hungary – or other European nations with distressed economies, such as Greece and Portugal. As long as their economic troubles continue, their lubricant markets will likely continue to suffer.

According to Gosalia, the future for Europes lubricant industry as a whole will continue to be challenging, to say the least. The latest data available at the time of his presentation showed lubricant demand this year down in France (3.6 percent through July), Italy (8.3 percent through September) and Spain (8.7 percent through August). Demand in Germany was up 3.2 percent through July, but Fuchs predicted it would end up unchanged for 2012. He summarized the outlook for Western Europe.

In the long term, demand will continue to decline, due to declining population, industrial production moving East and uncertainty caused by the Euro zone crises.