Japanese New Car Sales Plummet 51 Percent In April
May 2nd, 2011 3:11 PM
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As predicted a month ago, the full brunt of the March 11 earthquake and tsunami hit Japan’s auto industry in April. Sales of new cars, trucks and buses crashed 51 percent from April a year earlier. Most of Japan’s auto industry was closed in the first half of April and operated at reduced capacity in the second half of the month.
According to data by the Japan Automobile Dealers Association (JADA), April sales dropped to 108,824 vehicles in April (excluding minivehicles and trucks), from 222,095 units in April 2010.
AprilPrev YearChangeDaihatsu47546-91.4%Hino1,1661,643-29.0%Honda18,92336,710-48.5%Isuzu1,7092,603-34.3%Lexus1,6562,996-44.7%Mazda6,59810,784-38.8%Mitsubishi3,5154,398-20.1%Mitsu-Fusou1,2811,475-13.2%Nissan17,41327,728-37.2%Subaru3,8063,36413.1%Suzuki4,2884,752-9.8%Toyota35,557113,644-68.7%UD Trucks291695-58.1%Others12,57410,75716.9%Total108,824 222,095 -51.0%We will publish data on the impact on Japanese production when the data become available.
Published May 2nd, 2011 3:08 PM
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It is interesting how Subaru manages to grow when everybody else goes down. Same was happening during the worst periods of recession over here.
Look Japan Automotive manufacturers and suppliers, now is a good time to correct some quality control issues that for the last few years has now embarrassed a few automotive brands from Japan. In other words, stop worry about sales and correct the problem.
Will the disaster result in even more production moving out of Japan into "developing" Asian countries? I recall reading something about that trend already happening in the last few years.
I wonder how many built but unshipped units were destroyed? Where will that show in the numbers?