China Car Times

The 8th Gen Honda Accord pulled out from behind the Toyota Camry in the past few months to claim top spot in the mid sized car market place, outselling it by almost double. The new Nissan Teana also gained a high place despite only being on the market for a matter of weeks. The Passat continues to sell well, with Volkswagen pretty much having a car in each top sales list, (note - the VW Magotan is mistakenly written as VW Sagitar in the above table).

No domestic maker has any product in the top 10, with this segment of the market being controlled by the foreign marques, although all of the above cars are domestically made via joint venture partnerships with local manufacturers.

It seems that even Roewe and MG did not get enough sales to knock the Audi A4 off even the tenth spot, we hope that can be rectified over the coming months with sales of Roewe 550 and the upcoming MG version.

In July 2008, the Buick GL8 rules the roost again, 8 years after it was launched in China. The GL8 was refined in 2005, and continues to sell very well, carving its own niche in the premium business MPV market. Poor sales from the Dongfeng-Citroen Picasso are quite shocking, the same for the Kia Carnival.

MPV’s with more than 5 seats are not overly popular for family use, as Chinese families are usually a nuclear family. Most 7 seater and up MPV’s are used for business use. Recently VW and Ford introduced 5 seater versions of their MPV’s, to encourage uptake, as cars with more than 5 seats have to pay double road tax.

Chinese car sales arent slowing down, its just that they arent meeting the breakneck predictions that everyone earlier claimed:

BEIJING, July 8 — China’s passenger car sales rose 14.2 percent in the first half of this year, lower than an earlier expectation of 20 percent, as more stringent macroeconomic control policies and record high oil prices curbed purchases.

    Domestic car makers sold a combined 3.3 million passenger vehicles including sedans, multi-purpose vehicles, sport utility vehicles and mini buses from January to June, the China Passenger Car Association said yesterday. Production rose 16.9 percent to 3.6 million vehicles during the same period.

    Though sales in June grew 13 percent year on year to 517,469 units, it was the third consecutive month the rise in sales has reversed, triggering market speculation of a slowdown in the overall market for this year.

    Rao Da, secretary general of CPCA, the semi-official automotive body, blamed the reversal on floods in south China that halted production of some car makers and the suspension in vehicle shipments.

    Buying put off

    China raised the prices of gasoline and diesel by 17 percent at the end of June. Expecting further price rises, many auto buyers postponed their purchase plans, he added.

    ”The impact of higher fuel prices on car sales in China will be temporary,” said Rao, “But it will boost the sales of vehicles powered by small engines.”

    Other analysts also believed that the bearish stock market, which plunged 50 percent since the beginning of this year, was also part of the reason behind the weak market demand.

    Half-year sales of sedans rose 13 percent to 2.39 million units in China while SUVs posted a 41.7- percent sales jump to 211,885 units. Sales of MPVs added 2.4 percent to 106,297 units.

    Of the top 10 best selling car makers in June, Shanghai VW ranked first with retail sales of 40,124 units in China. Next came FAW-VW and Shanghai GM, which sold 38,908 units and 35,189 vehicles respectively.

    The China Association of Automobile Manufacturers is due to release official figures later this year.

    (Source: Shanghai Daily)

Chinese consumers were well aware of the impending gasoline price rises, but continued to buy SUV’s in their thousands.

• Dongfeng Honda CRV: 31,840
• GreatWall Hover: 23,766
• Beijing Hyundai Tuscon: 21,692
• Chery Tiggo: 18,537
• Kia Sportage: 11,661

Out of the above list, the Chery Tiggo is the cheapest and the Dongfeng Honda CRV is the most expensive. The Hover remains popular due to its fashionable design and cheap price, the Tiggo probably remains popular in the market place due to its size (suitable for inner city tight spots) and reasonably good quality. The Kia Sportage could be popular with consumers due to its size, and price which starts at a mere 140,000rmb for the 2.0l manual.