New car sales fell by nine per cent in March, bringing sales for the first quarter down by 4.3 per cent to 45,898, a drop of 2,068 on the same period last year.
Admittedly sales at the start of last year were boosted by the Government Scrappage Scheme, which ended last June.
According to Alan Nolan of the Society of the Irish Motor Industry (SIMI): “While we have seen the numbers hold up reasonably well in the absence of scrappage, this really has to be seen in context. The industry had pre-ordered its cars for 2012 as early as last summer, and in March we have seen brands pushing to get these cars registered through fleet deals and hire-drives etc, on the basis that if registrations are not achieved in the first quarter then they just may not get their cars registered.”
He continued: “Despite the reasonably good numbers, retail consumer sales remain very weak, with franchise dealers reporting very poor consumer footfall and low levels of forward orders in the pipeline. On the basis of the current level of activity we would still predict a market in the region of 76,000 new car sales for 2012.”
Toyota remains the best-selling brand with a 12.8 per cent share of the new car market, holding off a significant challenge from Volkswagen on 12.3 per cent. Ford is in third place with 11 per cent.
Many of the mainstream brands recorded significant falls in sales during the first quarter. Toyota and Opel are both down 15 per cent, Renault is down 24 per cent, BMW is down 14.5 per cent while Mazda fell 29 per cent. One of the biggest success stories is Hyundai, up 36 per cent
The best-selling car so far this year is the Ford Focus, followed by the Nissan Qashqai, which has done unexpectedly well given that it’s the same model that has been on sale for some time now.
The diesel share of the market continues to rise, representing 73.3 per cent of new cars sold in the first quarter. Once more the electric dream is failing to capture the publics attention. Of the 45,898 sold in the first three months of the year, just 24 electric cars carry a 2012 registration.