Ken Gratton•23 Oct 2012
NEWS
Patrol can land a blow on LandCruiser: Nissan
Nissan chief is confident buyers will take Y62 Patrol seriouslyNissan Australia CEO Bill Peffer harbours no doubt the new generation of Patrol offroader can make an impact in the local market when it arrives here in February. That's despite the lack of a turbo-diesel engine for the new model – to counter the diesel V8 available in the case of archrival Toyota's 200 Series LandCruiser.
It's a story motoring.com.au has been following for quite some time now, and in the past Nissan has refuted that the Y62 might actively erode sales of the Y61, without adding enough sales incrementally. At the Australian International Motor Show in Sydney last week Mr Peffer reiterated that, with a precedent to support his argument.
"It's something that we're going to look and see how the Y62 goes," he said. "We've been wildly successful with the two-Navara strategy, with D22 and D40. If you look at where this [large SUV] segment is today, it's in diesel, but it's still 20/30 per cent petrol. Diesel variants cost more money, so when you look at the total cost of ownership, and you start to arbitrate between the price of diesel and the price of [petrol], it's 5.5 years or 110,000 kilometres before someone gets the return on the diesel engine that they paid more money for.
"Those people in that segment... although fuel is probably a consideration for them, it's not the primary one when they're spending $100,000 on a truck. They're also looking at 'is the vehicle capable?', 'Does it tow?', 'What's the horsepower?'... We think, with this 5.6-litre petrol engine, we've hit the mark..."
So Mr Peffer is suggesting pricing elasticity makes a diesel variant redundant? The further upmarket the diesel engine price premium takes the Patrol, hypothetically, buyers are the less likely are to choose it?
"We're always looking at powertrains and new variants," he countered. "[But] We need to get this Patrol off the ground. If someone wants the diesel we'll offer the Y61 as long as it continues to sell. We still sell 200 or 300 of those a month, but we think this is where we have an advantage over anything else in its segment.
"This vehicle, the Patrol, will compete with the likes of Mercedes, Ranger Rover – this is going to be the first $100,000 vehicle that's available for sale in every Nissan showroom across Australia.
"We do have select dealers who sell GT-R, but this is a new type of customer... it's a flagship, not a core model. We'll see how we go."
Queried about a sales forecast for the Y62 Patrol, Mr Peffer said: "We're not going to give sales projections for it."
Mr Peffer then challenged the motoring.com.au correspondent over the assertion that the Y62 Patrol will make up the average monthly sales difference of over 600 units between the Y61 Patrol and the 200 Series LandCruiser – not without a diesel variant in the new model range.
"You don't think so?" he asked. "We'll see."
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Written byKen Gratton
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