Ford's fightback - Ranger holds off Hilux in November sales

Thursday, 3 December 2020

The Stuff Top Ute for 2020 is the Toyota Hilux.

Monthly registrations for November 2020 have come in lower than this time last year, as expected, but more interesting is the news that Ford’s Ranger still managed to take the top spot, despite the Toyota Hilux coming in with ultra-sharp pricing.

November's registrations came in at 14.2 per cent below November 2019 with 11,889 vehicles registered, down 1961 units on the same month last year.

“Year to date the market is down 22.5 per cent, which is a better result than anticipated back April when we were in the depths of the Covid-19 lockdown period,” said MIA chief executive, David Crawford.

The Ford Ranger has staved off Toyota’s Hilux-shaped assault – at least, for now.

The Ford Ranger was the best-selling vehicle for the month, notching up 1006 registrations, followed by the new Toyota Hilux (636 units) with the Toyota RAV4 in third place (511 units).

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Toyota still sold a good few Hiluxes over November but supply issues prevented it from taking the top spot.

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That Ranger figure was enough to give Ford nearly 30 per cent of the commercial vehicle market, while Toyota had 22 per cent with a total of 859 units moved, followed by Mitsubishi with nine per cent (369 units).

More than 40 per cent of Toyota’s sales in November were hybrids.

Specifically, the Ranger had 26 per cent of the commercial market, units) followed by the Toyota Hilux with 17 per cent share (636 units) and the Mitsubishi Triton in third place with nine per cent market share (300 units).

“November was a fantastic result and speaks volumes about Ford delivering what Ranger customers want through ongoing development of segment leading capability, value and features,” said Simon Rutherford, managing director of Ford New Zealand.

“For example, we’ve recently added FordPass connectivity on all models and kept the line up fresh and exciting with additions like the Wildtrak X.

“In 2021, we will continue to raise the bar with more options like the FX4 Max arriving in January, and making our Bi-Turbo engine with the 10 speed transmission available on the XLT.

“That powertrain has been a big factor in Ranger’s success as customers experience more power, improved fuel economy and lower Co2 than key mainstream competitor offerings.”

Neeraj Lala, CEO of Toyota NZ, told Stuff that on top of the 637 new Hiluxes that were delivered the company was hurt by supply and shipping delays, resulting in orders being taken for a further 800. Toyota is also fielding close to 4000 orders overall, with more than 40 per cent of its sales for November being hybrid models.

Meanwhile, Toyota remained the overall market leader with 19 per cent of the market (2311 vehicles sold), followed by Ford with 13 per cent (1524 units) and Mitsubishi with 11 per cent (1263 units).

In terms of SUV and passenger sales, Toyota regained the market leader position for passenger and SUV registrations with 18 per cent market share (1452 units) followed by Mitsubishi with 12 per cent (927 units) and then Kia with nine per cent market share (735 units).

There were 142 pure electric vehicles, 92 PHEV’s and 1,089 hybrid vehicles sold for the month. The MG ZS EV entered the market with 60 units registered for the month.

The top spot went to the SUV medium vehicles with 20 per cent share followed by SUV Compact also with 20 per cent market share and then the Pick Up/Chassis 4x4 segment with 14 per cent share.