VFACTS 2021: Toyota HiLux reigns supreme

The Toyota HiLux has held onto its position as Australia’s top-selling new vehicle, holding off a strong-performing Ford Ranger in 2021 amid some of the toughest trading conditions on record caused by the ongoing coronavirus pandemic.

As Australians lined up en masse to buy new vehicles in the back half of 2021, spurred on by the relaxing of COVID restrictions, drastic supply shortages of new vehicles due to overseas production constraints – much of it caused by the global computer chip crisis – wreaked havoc among the major car companies.

Forcing many customers into long waiting queues, or even pushing them to other brands that had available stock, the dwindling supplies stymied the market’s recovery from 2020, when sales fell more than 13 per cent to their lowest point in almost two decades (916,968 units).

Figures released today show the total market improved 14.5 per cent last year over 2020 to return to more than one million annual sales (1.050 million), but still fell short of the pre-pandemic 2019 result (1.063m) as December sales slumped 18 per cent to cap off another difficult year.

The Toyota HiLux just managed to outmuscle the Ford Ranger with 52,801 sales compared to 50,279 for the Blue Oval brand’s Australian-developed ute, helping the Japanese auto giant to its 19th unbroken year as the market-leading brand in Australia with 223,642 sales overall.

Again, Toyota sold twice as many vehicles as any other brand – for the fourth year running – and its 21.3 per cent market share underlined its dominance.

So too did the fact that it had five of the top 10 best-selling models in Australia last year. Apart from HiLux, the Toyota RAV4 (35,751), Corolla (28,768) and LandCruiser (26,633) occupied positions three to five respectively, with Prado (21,299) in ninth.

The familiar rollcall of top-selling models also points to the segments which continue to dominate Australian buying patterns, with the top 10 including four utes (HiLux, Ranger, Isuzu D-MAX and Mitsubishi Triton), four SUVs (RAV4, ’Cruiser, Prado and Mazda CX-5) and two small hatchbacks (Corolla and Hyundai i30).

Overall, utes were the top-selling segment in Australia last year with 222,345 tray-back models delivered to customers, followed by mid-size SUVs (180,165) and small SUVs (144,270), the latter segment led by the Chinese-built MG ZS (18,423).

SUVs in total accounted for 531,700 sales – well over half a million and making up 50.6 per cent of the total market – while light commercial vehicles racked up 253,254 sales (for a 24.1% share) and traditional passenger cars finished at 221,556 units (21.1% share).

As Toyota posted more than 200,000 sales for the 10th year in a row and notched up 25 years of market leadership (the last 19 straight), and as Mazda occupied its familiar second position with 101,119 sales for the year, the minor placings among the leading brands were keenly fought.

Hyundai finished third with 72,872 sales, just edging out Ford (71,380), while Kia rounded out the top five with 67,964 – just 232 units clear of a fast-closing Mitsubishi (67,732).

Further down the table, Nissan held onto seventh (41,263), followed by Volkswagen (40,770), MG (39,025) and Subaru (37,015).

Isuzu UTE was just outside the top 10 on 35,735 sales, while Mercedes-Benz Cars was next best and the leading luxury car brand on 28,348 units – well clear of arch-rivals BMW (24,891) and Audi (16,003).

Honda was one of the few mainstream brands not to record an increase in 2021 over the COVID-struck previous year, owing to its shift to a new business regime with a smaller and more premium-focused model range. It finished with 17,562 sales, down 39.5 per cent on 2020.

Unofficial figures place Tesla as the clear market leader for electric vehicle sales, shifting more than twice as many examples of the Tesla Model 3 alone than every other EV on sale in Australia combined.

Of those other EVs, there were 5149 sales recorded across all brands – a 191 per cent increase on 2020 but still only representing 0.49 per cent of total new vehicle sales.

Perhaps more tellingly, there were 70,466 hybrid car sales in Australia last year – the vast majority of them Toyota models – which represents a 20.3 per cent uptick and well and truly cements regular non-plug-in hybrids as a popular mainstream vehicle choice.

In comparison, there were 3372 plug-in hybrid electric vehicle (PHEV) sales, 346,990 diesel-engined vehicle sales (not including heavy commercials) and 580,495 petrol-powered car sales.

Federal Chamber of Automotive Industries (FCAI) chief executive Tony Weber today described 2021 as “one of the most challenging years the Australian automotive sector has ever experienced”.

However, positive signs including strong buyer demand and improving health and economic conditions should enable sales growth to continue this year.

“It’s not practical to speculate on what the sales result could have been if we’d not experienced the severe interruptions to supply, however we remain confident the outlook for 2022 will be positive again,” said Weber.

“It’s very hard to predict what 2022 will bring, especially after what we’ve been through over the past two years, but there is hope and obviously we’re hearing good signs that Omicron will be only something that will be short-lived.

“If that is the case around the world, and we are over the worst of COVID, you’ll start to see factories open up, their supply chains opening up.

“You’re also having the issue of micro-processors; they were being addressed last year and they’re continuing to be addressed.

“So the blockages in the supply chain should start to unravel – all going well – in 2022, and hopefully that means that Australians don’t have to wait so long to have … their vehicles delivered.”

Toyota Australia is also forecasting an improvement in its sales this year, despite ongoing supply problems that see popular models such as the Toyota RAV4 lumped with a waiting time of 11-12 months.

Top 10 brands in 2021:

Top 10 vehicles in 2021:

Related: VFACTS November: Supply crisis wreaks havoc on auto sales