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NEWS
Nissan not after number one
New boss isn't interested in "the vanity of titles and scores"It's official. Nissan no longer targets being the number one selling car importer in Australia.
New company managing director and CEO Richard Emery officially buried the last vestiges of that kind of talk – first rolled out by former Nissan Australia boss Dan Thompson way back in 2009 along with a 100,000 sales per annum target – at this week's media launch of the Qashqai compact SUV.
"I am cutting that off, it is no longer a valid claim," Emery declared. "I am telling you today it is not part of our plan for Nissan in Australia.
"My priority for our customers, our dealers, our stakeholders and our brand is not the vanity of titles and scores … for us it is about maximising our opportunity with every individual model that we have to make sure we are taking full advantage of what the brand has to offer in Australia.
"So please understand that the claim of being number one importer is no longer valid or news for us and this is the last time you will hear about it from me."
It was a blunt message from Emery, who took over the top job at Nissan on April 1 after more than five years managing sales for Mercedes-Benz Australia/Pacific.
But it was a continuation of how he has started at Nissan and how – according to insiders – he intends to continue.
Among other things, Emery has admitted the organisation lacks confidence because of a disastrous sales plunge produced by an overly aggressive sales plan and has also labelled Nissan's local image as "vanilla".
The company played up to that last point with a sense of humour by serving vanilla slices to the journalists at the Qashqai launch.
Emery's Qashqai address was clearly intended to put to an end the stories of Nissan's over-ordering and pre-registration of cars and discontent among the dealer body. While not denying they were accurate, he says they are now out of date.
"We do not have 20,000 cars on grass, Nissan dealers are not way over-stocked and Nisan dealers are not carrying months of so-called pre-counted cars.
"Those are the facts. I am not interested in what has gone on in the past, or rumours … I am only interested in where we are today."
To back up his statement, Emery declared:
- The Nissan dealer network has around 38 days stock supply, which he is said is well below the industry benchmark of 50 to 60 days
- Nissan's own stock holding is also well under 60 days and should be under 10,000 cars by the end of July, or less than a month and a half's supply
- Dealer demonstrator numbers are trending down and are industry benchmark
- In quarter two of calendar 2014 Nissan exceeded its national sales targets, as did the "vast majority" of its dealers, without "invisible" large dealer incentives or programs
However, Emery did admit that the Patrol Y62 petrol V8 (pictured) and higher grade levels of the Pulsar hatch are still over-stocked. He expected to resolve those issues over the next 90 days.
Emery also revealed he had directly targeted internal staff and dealer confidence with a specific campaign.
"I have implemented an improvement program within Nissan Australia, it is called Nissan Now.
"In short, for us, we have hit the reset button as we felt we needed to do.
"This program is already building confidence within our staff and our dealers and for us it is already starting to translate into solid results."
That might seem questionable when you consider VFACTS figures show Nissan registrations down 24.8 per cent year-on year to the end of June. But that's actually a significant improvement over the comparison after four months, which showed a 34.8 per cent dip.
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Written byBruce Newton
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