Community
19 November, 2023
One million-plus car sales
AUSSIE new car buyers have bought more than one million vehicles as 2023 continues to break all-time sales records.
Federal Chamber of Automotive Industries chief executive Tony Weber said there was unwavering demand for a wide array of vehicles across various price brackets.
“The Australian market has demonstrated incredible strength and vitality throughout 2023, culminating in Australia reaching one million sales in October for the first time, he said.
“After some challenging years through COVID, this milestone speaks to the range of vehicles available to consumers, affirming Australia’s position as one of the world’s most dynamic and competitive markets. It also reflects vastly improved supply chains.
“In the past six months, five have broken all-time sales records compared with previous years and in October 106,809 new vehicles were delivered to Australian customers.”
The FCAI’s figures showed Australians purchased 1.006 million vehicles in the year to October – more than 100,000 vehicles or 22.3 per cent more than the previous year.
In October, 38.3 per cent of sales were either in light commercial utes, large, or upper large SUVs vehicle categories.
But buyers were turning off electric vehicles, Mr Weber said, representing 5.7 per cent of the market, from a high of eight per cent in April.
Electric cars also failed to make the top 10 most popular vehicles.
Sales across every state and territory increased this month compared with October 2022.
Sales in the Australian Capital Territory were 18.9 per cent (1552), New South Wales 22.8 per cent (33,001), Queensland 16.4 per cent (21,937), South Australia 20 per cent (6677), Tasmania 20.8 per cent (1996), Victoria 32 per cent (30,740), Western Australia 12.3 per cent (10,166) and Northern Territory 1.9 per cent (740).
Toyota was the highest selling marque with 20,298 sales. Mazda followed with 9316 then Ford (8605), Hyundai (6620) and Mitsubishi (6395).
The Ford Ranger was the top selling vehicle recording 6215 sales. It was followed by Toyota HiLux (5766), Isuzu Ute D-Max (3198) Toyota RAV4 (2598) and Toyota LandCruiser (2561).
The rest of the top 10 vehicle models were large SUVs from Toyota, Mazda, Mitsubishi and Ford.
Despite growing popularity in 2023, no electric car ranked among the top 10 vehicles during October and their overall sales fell to 6057 vehicles or five per cent of the market.
However, the figure still represented an increase of 200 per cent from 2022, and hybrid vehicle sales rose by 19 per cent to reach 9187.
