All Companies Lost Car Sales In April, Except Hyundai
2021 had been a pleasant year for the automotive industry. Car sales were going up and up for all companies until April. Things started going South with the arrival of Ramadan. Demand for cars dropped, so did the car sales. As per the PAMA report, almost all auto companies have recorded depressing numbers in Apr’21. Here are the details.
To recap, car sales dropped to an all-time zero during the same month of last year. The federal and provincial governments imposed countrywide lockdowns in March-April 2020 due to the coronavirus outbreak. Public was terrified at the time, and everybody was trying to stay home and stay safe. Since there were absolutely no car sales in April 2020, we can’t make a year-on-year comparison.
Month-on-Month Car Sales in April 2021
As per the PAMA report, the Pakistani auto industry sold a total of 17,144 car units in April 2021. Compared to the figure for March 2021, month-on-month car sales dropped by 17%.
Pak Suzuki Motors reported a 15% decline in sales to 8,606 units in April 2021 against 10,161 units in March 2021.
Toyota Indus Motors sold 5,355 units in April 2021 against 6,695 units sold in March 2021, registering a loss of 20%.
Honda Atlas had the biggest fall of 27%, as the company managed to sell only 2,287 units in April 2021. Last month, the sales figure was at 3,153.
Kia Motors (non-member of PAMA) has posted a 16% drop in car sales on a month-on-month basis.
As a surprising turn of events, Hyundai Nishat sales increased by 24% to 896 units in the month of April, but how? One word: Elantra.
Passenger Car Sales
In the passenger cars segment, all of the cars lost their sales except Hyundai Elantra. Toyota sold 2,600 units of Yaris and 1,724 units of Corolla in April 2021. The numbers are 22% and 19% lower than March. Honda sold 2,053 units of City and Civic in April, 21% down from 2,603 units sold in March. Suzuki also lost sales of all its cars with 181 units of Swift, 1,312 units of Cultus, 747 units of Bolan, and 4,091 units of Alto sold in April. Surprisingly, Wagon R’s sales increased by 20%.
Hyundai came swinging with 280 units of Elantra sold in the second month of the car’s launch. Compared to 46 units sold in March, the sales have gone up by 509%.
SUVs and Jeeps
Among SUVs, Hyundai Tucson did lose its sales but still scored better than Toyota Fortuner with 503 sales in April 2021. The Fortuner sales number stood at 364, while Honda BR-V came last with only 234 units sold in April.
2/3-Wheelers
Overall, 149,368 two-wheelers and three-wheelers were sold in April 2021, against 170,350 units sold in March 2021. That means a drop of 12%.