Lower pricing "unlikely": Subaru MD

Subaru's local MD, Nick Senior, has poured cold water on the possibility of the importer reducing prices in January. From the new year, the federal government's imported passenger vehicle tariff will be reduced from 10 per cent to five per cent.

Senior, speaking during a Q&A session at the launch of the new Exiga (pictured) and Outback 2.0D, outlined to the media why the company is not passing on those lower landed costs to buyers.

"We've been working in an environment of extreme margin pressure for the last 12 to 18 months, and I think that's well acknowledged. Although we haven't finalised our strategy, it's unlikely that there'll be a change."

Senior explained that there had been "a whole lot of changes in equipment levels" over the previous year and a half and the company needed "to get back to some reasonable margins".

Using the recently released Liberty to illustrate his point in a subsequent conversation, Senior cited the new model's combination of pricing and equipment.

"We've reduced the price of the Liberty GT by five grand, with the new model, put a huge amount more specification in the car..."

"In the climate that we have been operating [in], with a complete adverse exchange rate, with a global financial crisis [and] prices, despite all that, being largely contained, there's a lot of other issues to be taken into account.

"To think that dropping a duty is going to lead to a price reduction is fairly simplistic."

While Senior didn't say as much, Subaru's much-vaunted resale values will undoubtedly be a significant factor in any decision to stick with current pricing.

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