Last Year, Mercedes-Benz Achieved Double-Digit Growth, While Toyota Plummeted by 40%

2019 Imported Car Sales Summary
Impact of Japanese Boycott Causes Mixed Results for Companies
Mercedes-Benz Achieves Record Annual Sales with 78,133 Units
Toyota Drops About 40% Year-on-Year... Volvo and Jeep Fill the Gap

[Asia Economy Reporter Suyeon Woo] Last year, the fortunes of Mercedes-Benz and Toyota sharply diverged in the imported car market. While Mercedes-Benz set a new all-time annual sales record with double-digit growth, Toyota, which had been riding a rising trend with its hybrid vehicles until the first half of the year, saw its sales plunge by about 40% due to the backlash from the Japanese boycott movement.

According to the Korea Automobile Importers & Distributors Association (KAIDA) on the 6th, Mercedes-Benz sold 78,133 units throughout the past year, setting a new annual sales record. This figure represents a 10.4% increase compared to the previous year. Its market share reached 31.9%, surpassing 30% for the first time since entering the domestic market. This means that 3 out of every 10 imported new cars sold in Korea last year were Mercedes-Benz.

BMW, Mercedes-Benz’s competitor, remained in second place in the industry due to sluggish sales in the first half of last year as it dealt with the aftermath of the 2018 fire incident. BMW sold 44,191 units in the domestic market last year, a 12.5% decrease from the previous year.

Mercedes-Benz E300

Thanks to the hybrid craze, Toyota rose to third place in the industry in 2018 and had been thriving until the first half of last year. However, due to the impact of the Japanese product boycott that began in July, Toyota’s sales plummeted 36.7% year-on-year to 10,611 units, dropping it to fifth place in the industry. Toyota’s luxury brand Lexus ranked third last year, buoyed by the popularity of the ES300h, but its sales volume was only 12,241 units, down 8.2% from the previous year. Other Japanese car brands, Infiniti (-6.1%) and Nissan (-39.7%), also saw their sales sharply shrink, but Honda, which implemented aggressive discount policies, actually increased its sales by 10%.

Toyota SUV RAV4

The gap left by Japanese car brands was filled by emerging strong players such as Volvo and Jeep. Both Volvo and Jeep entered the '10,000-unit club' for the first time last year, thanks to strong sales of sport utility vehicles (SUVs). Jeep, which has price competitiveness in the imported car market, sold 10,251 units, a 35% increase, while Volvo recorded sales of 10,570 units, a 24% surge.

Last year, the overall imported car market totaled 244,780 units, down 6.1% from the previous year. This is the first time in three years since 2016, when the domestic imported car market shrank due to difficulties caused by the Audi Volkswagen dieselgate scandal. By fuel type, gasoline vehicles accounted for more than half of total sales (57%) with 140,453 units sold, while diesel vehicles’ market share dropped 10 percentage points year-on-year to 30.3%.

This content was produced with the assistance of AI translation services.