July was a watershed month for the New Zealand new-car market. Sales are the highest on record for both the month (15,053) and year-to-date 2021 (67,569).
But it was also the first month under the Government's Clean Car Discount scheme, which gives rebates of $8625 to buyers of new Battery Electric Vehicles (BEVs) and $5750 for Plug-in Hybrid Vehicles (PHEVs).
As expected, there was a huge boost in EV sales for July. The BEV total of 760 was over double that of the previous best month (343 in June). But the biggest percentage increase was in PHEVs; NZ buyers finally seem to be clicking to the concept with 431 sales in July, nearly three times that of the previous-best month (150 in March).
The top BEVs were the Tesla Model 3 (197), MG ZS EV (188) and Hyundai Kona Electric (151).
The top PHEVs were the Mitsubishi Eclipse Cross (156), Mitsubishi Outlander (99) and MG HS (63).
Even allowing for the exclusion of vehicles over the $80k price cap for rebates, the Government will be giving back about $8m to new-car buyers in EV rebates for the month. That's an official DRIVEN guesstimate, as the early numbers don't break down exactly which variants make up the sales of each model.
To view all BEVs listed on DRIVEN click here, or for PHEVs click here
And that figure doesn't include first NZ-registration used BEVs or used PHEVs of course.
But there's also a stampede of ute purchases. Ford NZ sold an incredible 1418 Rangers in July. Compared with its average sales of 855 per month for the first half of the year, that's an increase of nearly 70 per cent. Or to put it another way, Ford sold more Rangers in July than all the BEVs and PHEVs combined.
We can't even attribute that to feebate panic, as most of those July Rangers would have been ordered back in April/May. So there might be even bigger things to come for NZ's favourite ute.
The Toyota Hilux and Mitsubishi Triton have fallen well behind in the ute segment, with sales of 809 and 489 for the month respectively. Year-to-date Ranger still leads Hilux by 1000 units.Ford still led the commercial market overall for July, with 30 per cent share.
Mitsubishi was the market leader for passenger and SUV registrations with 14 per cent share (1435 units) followed by Toyota, also with 14 per cent (1357) and then Suzuki with 8 per cent (791).
The top selling passenger and SUV models for the month were the Mitsubishi ASX (737) followed by the Toyota RAV4 (553) and Mitsubishi Outlander (365 units).
The most popular segment for July 2021 was SUV Compact with 25 per cent share, followed by Pick Up/Chassis 4x4 with 16 per cent and then SUV Medium with 15 per cent.
NZ'S TOP SELLING CARS IN JULY
1. Ford Ranger (1418)
2. Toyota Hilux (806)
3. Mitsubishi ASX (707)
4. Toyota RAV4 (553)
5. Mitsubishi Triton (489)
6. Mitsubishi Outlander (365)
7. Mazda CX-5 (305)
8. Nissan Qashqai (293)
9. Suzuki Swift (275)
10=. MG ZS/Hyundai Kona (both 270)