Kiwi sales recover from Covid better than expected
Drop in volume not as significant as predicted — main challenge for 2021 is getting enough stock . . .
The New Zealand newvehicle industry finished 2020 with total registrations of 119,398: well down on 2019 but still performing much better than expected when the country was in the midst of lockdown.
“Although the 2020 market was down 23 per cent, the result is much better than anticipated back in April when we were in the depths of the Covid-19 lockdown period, where we thought it could be down as much as 35 per cent,” says Motor Industry Association (MIA) chief executive David Crawford.
The last time the overall market dipped below 120k was 2013 (113,294).
The top three models for 2020 were the Ford Ranger (7975), Toyota Hilux (5796) and Toyota RAV4 (5341).
The top “car” (not a ute or SUV) was the Toyota Corolla with 2567 registrations, just a few units ahead of the Suzuki Swift.
Sales of hybrid vehicles were up 2789 overall on 2019, thanks mostly to Toyota’s model range (nearly 60 per cent of the brand’s sales are now hybrid).
However, pure-electric vehicles were down 338 units and plug-in hybrids down 170.
Toyota achieved 17 per cent market share (20,762) for the year, ahead of Ford at 10 per cent (12,334) and Mitsubishi with 9 per cent (10,306).
Crawford says one of the big challenges for mainstream brands as 2021 kicks off will be stock constraints, although the situation is expected to ease as the year goes on.
Toyota is a case in point. While NZ’s number one brand was down
31 per cent on 2019, largely due to Covid-19’s impact on the rental market, its share of the private market increased and it has entered
2021 with 5700 customer orders waiting to be filled.