As we had warned a few days ago, the Japanese car market took a punishing hit in March. Sales of new cars, trucks and buses dropped 37 percent from a year earlier, the Japan Automobile Dealers Association reports. Separately reported minivehicles took a similar hit and dropped 31.6 percent, according to data by the Japan Mini Vehicles Association, published in The Nikkei [sub].
The Japanese market has been down for the seventh month in a row. It did not help the matter that the massive quake and tsunami shuttered car manufacturers for the second half of the month and left dealers without cars to sell.
The bloodletting goes across all brands. Amongst the majors, Toyota’s sales dropped 45.9 percent, Nissan lost 37.7 percent in sales, Honda’s sales fell 28.3 percent. Sales for all brands can be found here.
I am surprised sales didn`t fall more, since buying a new car wouldn`t have been priority 1 for me in March if I lived in Japan.
The earthquake was on Friday, the 11th. And it took a few days for reality to sink in. April most likely will be very bad.
But it will come back with a vengence. The system is going to be supply strained not sales bound for the forseeable future.
Has there been any estimate of the number of cars destroyed in the quake/tsunami?
Bertel: what’s the impact of Kobe earthquake on Japanese car sales? And for how long, three months, six months till the auto market reovered?