Motor Industry Association Chief Executive David Crawford says that like some other sectors of the New Zealand economy, the new vehicle sector suffered from a case of Covid-19. Confirmed figures for December 2020 show registrations of 8,383 were 25% under December 2019, with the total for the 2020 year of 119,398 registrations coming in at 23% under 2019, down 35,081 units for the year.
“Although the 2020 market was down 23%, the result is a better than anticipated back April when we were in the depths of the Covid-19 lockdown period, where we thought the market could be down as much as 35% by year end.”
However, the market is still being affected by stock constraints for high volume models, which we expect to ease as the 2021 year progresses.
Key points
- Overall December 2020 registrations of 8383 vehicles were down 25% (2,777 units) on the same month in 2019.
- There were 197 pure electric vehicles, 55 PHEV’s and 738 hybrid vehicles sold for the month. For the 2020 year there were 1,519 pure electric vehicles, 756 PHEV’s and 8,664 Hybrids.
- Sales of hybrid vehicles for the 2020 year were up 2,789 units on the 2019 year, while pure electric vehicles were down 338 units and PHEVs down 170 units.
- The market overall to the end of December is down 23% (35,081 units).
- Registration of 5572 passenger and SUVs for December 2020 were down 32% (2,587 units) on Dec 2019, while commercial vehicle registrations of 2,811 were down 6% (190 units) compared to December 2019.
- The top three models for the month of December were the Ford Ranger (662 units), followed by the new model Toyota Hilux (443 units) with the Toyota RAV4 in third place (387 units).
- The top three models for the 2020 year were the Ford Ranger (7,975 units) followed by the Toyota Hilus (5,796 units) and the Toyota RAV4 (5,341 units).
Market leaders in December / 2020
Toyota remains the overall market leader with 19% market share (1,602 units), followed by Mitsubishi with 11% (945 units) and Ford in third spot also with 11% market share (911 units).
For the 2020 year the top three marques were Toyota with 17% market share (20,762 units) followed by Ford with 10% (12,334 units) and Mitisubishi8 with 9% share (10,306 units).
SUV and passenger vehicle sales December / 2020
Toyota regained the market leader position for passenger and SUV registrations with 18% market share (996 units) followed by Mitsubishi with 12% (694 units) and then Mazda with 11% market share (616 units).
For the 2020 year, the top three passenger and SUV marques were Toyota with 16% market share (12,777 units) followed by Kia with 10% share (7,971 units) and Mitsubishi with 8% market share (6,457 units).
The top selling passenger and SUV models for the month were the Toyota RAV4 (387 units) followed by the Mitsubishi ASX (327 units) and the Mazda CX-5 (326 units).
For the year the top three passenger and SUV models were the Toyota RAV4 (5,341 units) followed by the KIA Sportage (2,907 units) and the Kia Seltos (2,611 units).
Commercial vehicle sales December / 2020
Ford retained the market lead with 26% market share (719 units) followed by Toyota with 22% (606 units) and Mitsubishi third with 9% market share (251 units).
For the 2020 year the top three Commercial marque were Ford with 24% market share (9,112 units) followed by Toyota with 21% (7,985 units) and Mitsubishi with 10% market share (3,831 units).
The Ford Ranger retained the top spot for the month of December as the bestselling commercial model with 24% share (662 units) followed by the Toyota Hilux with 16% share (443 units) and the Nissan Navara in third place with 9% market share (242 units).
The top three commercial models for the 2020 year the ford Ranger (7,975 units) followed by the Toyota Hilux (5,796 units) and Mitsubishi Triton (3,687 units)
Segmentation Remains Steady
The top spot for 2020 went to the SUV medium vehicles with 20% share closely followed by SUV Compact also with 20% market share and then the Pick Up/Chassis 4x4 segment with 15% share.