VFACTS: Toyota dominates August sales

THE Australian new-car industry has continued to flourish in 2021 despite the ongoing New South Wales, Victorian and ACT lockdowns, with August’s sales figures up 33.1 per cent nationally on the corresponding month last year.

Aussies registered 81,199 new vehicles last month – compared to the 60,986 delivered in August 2020 – taking the national total to 732,828 units this year to date.

Queensland, Western Australia and the Northern Territory all chalked up more than 30 per cent improvements, but none of them were close to matching the 153.6 per cent uptick recorded by Victoria, even with its now four-week long lockdown that is looking likely to extend until the end of September.

By comparison, New South Wales and the ACT both went backwards, by 28.3 and seven per cent respectively.

In addition to the lockdowns, the Federal Chamber of Automotive Industries (FCAI) identified the microprocessor shortages as another ongoing hurdle both manufacturers and consumers were having to overcome, meaning OEMs had to become increasingly agile in their customer engagement.

“The bounce of 33 per cent on last year’s figure demonstrates the resolve of car manufacturers to engage with customers and drive-up new vehicle ownership,” said FCAI chief executive Tony Weber.   

“With access to showrooms limited, vehicle makers are working to engage customers in their homes and other places of isolation.”

Limited access to showrooms and supply did not seem to hinder Toyota’s dominance as the Japanese giant recorded 19,959 sales – more than double that of any other brand and enough to net it a 24.6 per cent share of the market.

Mazda was the best of the rest with 7645 sales (9.4 per cent share), followed distantly by Kia (5065/6.2 per cent) in third, just seven units clear of Ford (5058/6.2 per cent) in fourth place.

Breathing down Ford’s neck some 42 units further back was Hyundai (5016) which also netted a 6.2 per cent market share.

Mitsubishi was next with 4802 sales (5.9 per cent share) in sixth, followed by Volkswagen (3793/4.7 per cent) in seventh and Subaru (3232/4.0 per cent) in eighth.

Isuzu Ute Australia managed to hold onto a top-10 position with 3099 sales (3.8 per cent) while MG rounded out the top performers with 3011 deliveries (3.7 per cent).

Given Toyota’s total market dominance last month, the brand unsurprisingly occupied four of the five best-selling models in August consisting of the HiLux (4470), Corolla (3563), RAV4 (3169) and Prado (2731) in first, third, fourth and fifth respectively.

Only the Ford Ranger was able to buck the trend, finishing in second spot with 3959 deliveries.

Mazda’s CX-5 was the sixth-most popular model with 2239 units being shifted, followed by the Hyundai i30 (2047) that was the only traditional passenger car to crack the top-10 – all the rest were either pick-ups or SUVs.

The Isuzu D-Max (1941) put in another good showing to finish eighth, while the MG ZS (1700) and Mitsubishi Outlander (1638) scrapped it out for ninth and tenth respectively, effectively switching places compared with their July results.

Given the 33.1 per cent market growth, sales across all key vehicle classes were up, including the passenger market that saw a 17.5 per cent improvement on August 2020, although it was the light commercials that experienced the biggest jump, of 71.2 per cent.

Neither of these two could hold a candle to the popularity of SUVs though; the class saw a year-on-year improvement of 33.4 per cent and accounted for 50.2 per cent of all new car sales last month (40,981).

Year-to-date, SUVs now account for 51.2 per cent of the entire new-car market (375,443), followed by light commercials (173,737/23.7 per cent), passenger cars (155,745/21.2 per cent) and heavy commercials (27,903/3.8 per cent).

The popularity of electrified vehicles, especially fully-electric ones, is also continuing to grow with BEV (370) and plug-in hybrid (293) sales more than doubling year-on year while hybrids have remained largely steady, with sales only improving 0.9 per cent.

Top 10 Brands August 2021

Top 10 Models August 2021