The long-running slump in private new car sales continued in July, with no apparent end in sight to the current predicament according to the figures published this week by the Society of Motor Manufacturers and Traders (SMMT).
Officially, the industry is celebrating 24 consecutive months of growth in new car registrations, but that’s all thanks to post-recovery and growth in the fleet sector. For private new car sales, it’s a very different story. July was the ninth consecutive month of falling private new car sales year-on-year. Ten of the last 12 months, and 15 of the last 24 months, have also been down year-on-year.
Private sales were down 11% in July, fractionally ahead of the year-to-date average of 12%. That’s about 59,000 fewer cars registered to private owners in the first seven months of this year compared to last. In comparison, fleet registrations were up 13% in July, which is well short of the year-to-date total of 21% growth.
EV sales growing but political games abound
Electric vehicle registrations continue to outperform the overall market, despite another poor month for market-leader Tesla, increasing by 19% against overall market growth of 3%. The SMMT lamented that private EV sales fell in terms of market share, while also conceding that actual private new car registrations actually increased by 1% – which looks good compared to overall private new car sales falling by 11%. But the industry is doing its best to talk down EV growth as it tries to appeal for government grants, so this is nothing really new.
The UK’s ZEV (zero emissions vehicle) mandate means that car companies are each supposed to sell 22% electric vehicles from their overall totals, but the reality is that very few brands are currently achieving this, while others are heavily discounting to try and hit their targets. There are also loopholes that allow underachieving car companies to buy credits from overachieving companies, while plug-in hybrids also provide a smaller level of contribution to the overall targets.
Hybrid (+31%) and plug-in hybrid (+12%) sales were also well up in July, while petrol (-6%) and diesel (-22%) sales fell.
What the numbers show is that the transition away from pure petrol and diesel cars is starting to accelerate, although many buyers are preferring to take the smaller step of moving to a hybrid – with or without a plug – rather than jumping straight to a purely electric vehicle.
Good month, bad month
Despite the overall market being fairly flat, there are always brands that do better or worse than the rest. Here’s how they performed in July.
It was a good month for Abarth, BMW, BYD, Citroën, Cupra, Dacia, Genesis, Honda, Hyundai, Jeep, Land Rover, Mercedes-Benz, Nissan, Peugeot, Renault, SEAT, Smart, Subaru and Volvo. All of these brands outperformed the overall market by at least 10% (so had growth of at least 12.5% compared to the same month last year).
Meanwhile, results weren’t so cheerful for Alfa Romeo, Alpine, Audi, Bentley, DS Automobiles, Ford, GWM Ora, Ineos, Lexus, Maserati, Mazda, Polestar, Porsche, Skoda, Suzuki, Tesla, Toyota and Vauxhall. All of these brands underachieved against the overall market by at least 10% (so sales fell by at least 7.5% compared to last July)
That means that the following brands were more or less where you’d expect them to be: Fiat, Jaguar, KGM (nee SsangYong), Kia, MG, Mini and Volkswagen. All of these were within 10% better or worse than the overall market.
Volkswagen was comfortably the best-selling brand in July, ahead of BMW, Kia, Audi and Nissan. Of the volume brands, Volvo had a particularly strong month with registrations up more than 60%. Ford had another pretty awful month, with registrations down 31%.
Sportage stays on top
For the third month in a row, and the fourth time this year, the Kia Sportage was the UK’s best-selling new car. With five months to go, the Sportage is edging ever closer to the overall top spot, currently only 1,600 units behind the Ford Puma.
The Volvo XC40 was a surprise fourth place in the best-sellers list, while the Volkswagens Golf and Polo were the only two hatchback models in the top ten for July – everything else being an SUV/crossover vehicle. Volkswagen had three cars in the top ten: Golf in fifth, T-Roc in seventh and Polo in ninth.
We’ll have our usual analysis of the top ten in coming days.
