The July truck industry sales figures announced by the Truck Industry Council made for interesting reading with sales slightly off last year’s record setting results, but overall not too far behind.
The year to date sales figures to the end of July saw 22083 trucks sold a drop of 1231 trucks or 5.2 per cent on the first seven months of 2018. The sales for the month of July were also off slightly, down around 4.5 per cent or 150 units on July 2018 while the individual tallies for each brand revealed some winners and loser for the month.
Market leader Isuzu is down 7.8 per cent or 435 trucks year to date and was down 166 units for the month compared to July last year. Rival Hino gained market share but was down 8 units for the month overall compared with July 2018, however its year to date result sees it up slightly and it has made a small market share gain on Isuzu.
This time last Year Isuzu had 23.8 per cent overall market share and Hino held 13.2 per cent. A year on and Isuzu has fallen to 23.2 and Hino has improved to hold 14.3 per cent up from 13.4 per cent year to date in 2018. The third Japanese brand Fuso had a big drop down 17.1 per cent on its results to July last year.
Along with Hino, Volvo, Mack, Scania, DAF, Freightliner, International, Hyundai and Dennis Eagle are all up to varying degrees on their 2018 YTD results, albeit some only slightly. On the other hand Isuzu, Fuso, Kenworth, Mercedes Benz, MAN, UD and Western Star were all down on the 2018 YTD sales figures.
In Heavy Duty, Kenworth was ahead of Volvo by 341 units at this time in 2018 but at the end of last month Volvo had closed to be just 47 units behind the Paccar brand for the first seven months and was only 9 truck behind Kenworth for the month in what is shaping as a major battle of the heavyweights. Volvo sales are up 8.2 per cent while Kenworth was down 13.5 per cent. Isuzu’s 886 HD sales in July put it down 13.1 per cent, while Scania’s 653 sales saw it up 26.1 per cent on its supply restricted 2018 results in the heavy sector and Mack was up 634 units, a rise of 3.8 per cent ion its 2018 result.
The heavy duty market there were 7457 sales YTD to the end of July a drop of 5.7 per cent while the July heavy duty tally was down 4.9 per cent to 1035 sales for the month compared with July last year when 1088 heavy trucks were sold.
In Medium duty Isuzu leads the tally YTD with 1750 sales so far, but that result is off 5.3 per cent on its 2018 total, while Hino is up 6.1 per cent with 1352 sales for the year and Fuso has dropped 621 units and is down 11.1 per cent YTD. UD, suffering from a lack of supply in the medium line up as its production is moved to its Thai plant, has sold just 157 medium duty units YTD, a drop of a 41.6 per cent on its 2018 result.
Overall in the medium-duty sector there were 4407 trucks YTD a drop of 6.4 per cent but the sector was up slightly up 1 per cent in July this year compared with the same month last year.
Down in the light-duty sector 6552 trucks were sold for rthe seven months representing a fall of 9.2 per cent and was off a massive 13.5 percent for the month compared with July 2018 with 1034 units sold.
Isuzu is down 7.5 percent selling 2486 light trucks YTD still clearly ahead of Hino with 1461 sales for the same period down 4. 1 per cent while Fuso is off a whopping 22.3 per cent with 1118 units so far this year. Iveco was down 17.8 per cent to 539 sales YTD, however Mercedes-Benz saw a rise of 12.6 per cent with 357 of its Sprinter based light trucks sold so far this year.
Meantime Benz is the clear leader in the buoyant light van market, with 1558 vans registered this year a rise of 8.5 per cent YTD in a light van market that is up 5.4 percent with 3667 vans sold so far in 2019. The van segment saw 493 vans registered in July a monthly rise of 13.3 per cent on last year.
While Mercedes leads the market, French rival Renault is second overall with 620 units YTD, a drop of 18.8 per cent and Ford has sold 545 Transits a rise of 5.2 per cent, and Volkswagen is up a massive 66.2 per cent with 482 vans sold contrasting with Fiat which is down 16 per cent with 247 van sales so far.
