Strong growth was experienced in light commercial vehicles, especially 4X4 utilities, despite a weaker April sales outcome across Australia, the motor industry’s statistical service VFACTS reports.
Although total vehicle sales for April were at 83,135 compared with 87,571 in April 2016, light commercials were up by 3.1%, with 4X4 utilities up 11.1%.
Two light commercials, the Toyota Hilux and the Ford Ranger, were first and second respectively in national sales during April.
On a year-to-date basis, sales of both light commercial vehicles (LCVs) and sport utility vehicles (SUVs) are tracking ahead of last year, with LCVs up by 1.8% and SUVs by 1.7%.
All the states and territories were affected by April’s sales decline, although the two volume selling states – Victoria and New South Wales – were least affected, both markets down by 2.8%.
The notable market growth across the segments was in medium SUVs, which grew by 10% in April compared with the same month in 2016.
Among the passenger cars, the medium segment was the best-performed, down just 0.2% on April last year. The sale of micro, light and small cars were all adversely affected by the monthly decline.
Business sales, particularly in the light commercial utility segment, were reasonably healthy during April, as were sales to rental fleets. Sales to business were up by 1.7%, although private sales declined 13% and sales to government by 14.8%.
Market activity during April was affected by the impact of the Easter long weekend break, Anzac Day and national school holidays – with two less selling days compared with April last year, Federal Chamber of Automotive Industries chief executive Tony Weber says.
The Toyota Hilux topped the market with 3430 sales.
That’s followed by the Ford Ranger with 3120 sales.
In third place was the Toyota Corolla with 2555 sales, followed by the Mazda3 (2313 sales) and the Mazda CX-5, which posted 2166 sales and rounded out the top five.
The rest, in order, are the Hyundai i30 (1979), Toyota Camry (1885), Holden Colorado (1824), Toyota Land Cruiser (1629) and the Hyundai Tucson (1530).
Toyota dominated the April market with a 19.4% share, followed by Mazda with 10.4%, Hyundai with 8.2%, Holden (5804) and Ford (5802) both with a 7% share of the total market.
