Japan Car Sales By Brand : 2015

Lexus grew 9% in a falling market

Total registrations in Japan were down 10.3%, or nearly 500,000 units less. Despite that it is only the lowest since 2011. Tax on small kei cars was increased early in the year, causing this very popular segment to lose customers and a loss of total sales. The list is coded the following way: green = increase, blue decrease but less than the total sales and yellow loss of sales and share. We'll look at the locals brands, then the imports.

Local: If you look at the the rankings 1-8 below, you will notice they are all local brands. The only one not there is Lexus, back at 11th. I have records going back to 1970 and Toyota has been the top ranked all that time. It was down 5.4% in 2016, but still managed to increase its market share. Only Mazda and Lexus grew faster than total sales with most lost market share.

CEO of Mercedez-Benz Japan a happy man no doubt

Imports: Total import sales dropped 1.4% from 288,000 to 284,00 which was better than sales as a whole. The reason was mainly because imports do not sell in the kei car category and that is where much of the loss was sustained.

VW was hurt by the scandal. In Japan face is important and VW lost face here. In a few short months its sales tumbled and for the first time since at least 1968 (my records) it lost the prized place as largest import brand. Mercedes Benz now has that, and had a nice nice increase as well.

One interesting fact is that the Japanese will not buy Korean cars. Morgan equalled Hyundai and Maybach outsold Kia. How often does that happen? Another quirk is that MG Rover has not stopped selling cars since its demise over ten years ago. They must have had plenty of stock. The importer, it seems, has patiently sold them.

11	12	13	14	15	Make	2015	%	+/-
1	1	1	1	1	Toyota	1,271,663	30.2%	-5.4%
3	2	2	2	2	Honda	698,444	16.6%	-14.4%
4	5	4	3	3	Suzuki	504,152	12.0%	-20.5%
2	3	3	4	4	Nissan	484,357	11.5%	-14.9%
5	4	5	5	5	Daihatsu	468,141	11.1%	-14.5%
6	6	6	6	6	Mazda	221,834	5.3%	11.4%
8	7	7	7	7	Subaru	147,552	3.5%	-4.0%
7	8	8	8	8	Mitsubishi	86,954	2.1%	-15.4%
12	11	10	10	9	Mercedes	65,159	1.5%	7.1%
9	9	9	9	10	VW	54,765	1.3%	-18.8%
10	10	11	12	11	Lexus	48,231	1.1%	9.0%
11	12	12	11	12	BMW	46,538	1.1%	1.0%
13	13	13	13	13	Audi	29,414	0.7%	-6.4%
14	14	14	14	14	MINI	21,083	0.5%	19.8%
15	15	15	15	15	Volvo	13,510	0.3%	1.8%
18	16	16	16	16	Chrysler	7,849	0.2%	-6.7%
17	17	17	17	17	Fiat	7,504	0.2%	-1.8%
19	19	19	19	18	Porsche	6,690	0.2%	24.2%
16	18	18	18	19	Peugeot	5,906	0.1%	3.4%
21	23	21	20	20	Renault	5,082	0.1%	9.0%
22	22	20	21	21	Ford	4,856	0.1%	5.6%
27	25	22	22	22	Land Rover	2,979	0.1%	-4.7%
24	20	23	23	23	Alfa Romeo	2,321	0.1%	-12.8%
20	21	24	24	24	Citroën	1,978		-14.8%
30	29	29	26	25	Maserati	1,449		3.0%
23	24	25	25	26	GM US	1,422		-18.9%
26	27	27	28	27	Jaguar	1,349		25.7%
25	26	26	27	28	smart	1,012		-9.2%
-	-	-	36	29	DS	925		n/a
28	28	28	29	30	Ferrari	720		28.3%
32	31	31	31	31	Bentley	370		16.7%
33	32	33	32	32	Lamborghini	349		86.6%
29	30	30	30	33	Lotus	271		-15.6%
31	33	32	33	34	Aston Martin	164		-2.4%
35	35	34	34	35	Rolls Royce	156		1.3%
-	38	35	35	36	Mclaren	90		2.3%
36	36	37	37	37	MG Rover	54		10.2%
34	34	36	38	38	Lancia	33		-26.7%
39	40	38	39	39	Morgan	14		-33.3%
38	37	39	40	39	Hyundai	14		7.7%
42	42	43	42	41	Bugatti	5		150.0%
37	39	40	41	42	Saab	4		-20.0%
43	-	-	42	42	Opel	4		100.0%
40	41	41	44	44	Maybach	2		100.0%
41	43	42	-	45	Kia	1		n/a
					Others	519
					Total	4,215,889		-10.3%

Data source: JAMA & JAIA.

Mazda bucked the trend for a Japanese brand with an increase