WELLINGTON: The Toyota Corolla has again been crowned New Zealand’s top-selling car, in a record-breaking year for new vehicle sales.
Sales figures from the Motor Industry Association show the Corolla was on top in 2014 with 6472 vehicles sold, narrowly ahead of the Ford Ranger, which topped the commercial models with 6330 sold.
In doing so the Ford Ranger ended a 32-year run at the top by the Toyota Hilux, which came second in the category and third overall with 5774 sold.
Toyota comfortably retained its lead as the most popular carmaker in New Zealand with 24,692 vehicles sold (19 per cent market share), well ahead of Ford (14,033) and Holden (13,422).
A total of 127,179 new vehicles were registered in 2014, more than for any previous year and up 12 per cent (14,062) on 2013.
MIA chief executive David Crawford described the result as “astounding” and said it reflected the strong New Zealand economy, competitive pricing helped by the strong New Zealand dollar and a wide range of new models introduced during the year.
“The previous highest year for new vehicles sales was 30 years ago in 1984 where 123,247 new vehicles were registered for that year.”
Commercial vehicle sales also hit a record, with 36,662 vehicles sold, shattering the previous record set in 2013 by 19 per cent.
However, the 90517 new passenger car registrations was short of the record of 97,346 set in 1973.
The Toyota Corolla was the runaway winner in the rental car category with more than 3000 sold during the year, more than triple the next biggest seller, the Toyota Yaris which sold just over 900 vehicles.
Toyota dominated the rental car market with the top four models and 50 per cent market share of the top 15 models sold as rentals.
In the luxury passenger market, BMW remains the market leader for the third year in a row with 2,126 units sold during 2014, followed by Audi with 2,075 units and Mercedes with 1,811 units sold during the year.
Sports utility vehicles continue to be the strongest selling segment with 29 per cent of all vehicles sales in December (29 per cent for the year), followed by pick-ups/chassis-cabs with 22 per cent (20 per cent for the year) and small passenger cars at 17 per cent (18 per cent for the year).
“The outlook for 2015 is for another strong year, but the MIA does not anticipate significant growth over 2014 volumes, more likely a small to modest increase anticipating sales of new vehicles to be around 127,000 to 128,000,” Crawford said. “Continued strong sales in the light commercial sector is anticipated.”
