Toyota predicts another new-car sales surge in Australia in 2023

Japanese giant Toyota – which accounts for one-in-five new cars sold in Australia – is forecasting the third year in a row of growth in the wake of the global pandemic.

Rising interest rates are yet to slam the brakes on new-car sales in Australia, says market leader Toyota.

The top-selling car company for the past 20 years – which accounts for one-in-five new cars sold in Australia – is forecasting the third year in a row of sales growth in the wake of the global pandemic.

New-car waiting times remain three to 12 months for popular models – and in some cases stretch to two years – but Toyota says it plans to ramp up production to cut wait times, and acknowledges its rivals are also getting better at resolving production bottlenecks.

Figures released earlier this month showed last year’s new-car sales tally was the eighth highest on record and the second year in a row of growth after the auto industry stalled in the middle of the global pandemic.

The 2022 new-car sales total in Australia – where 1,081,429 new motor vehicles were reported as sold – was an increase of 3.0 per cent compared the prior year.

However, it was 9.0 per cent less than the record of 1,189,116 set in 2017 and 5.8 per cent less than the five-year average prior to the pandemic.

Nevertheless, it was the 14th time in the past 16 years Australians purchased more than one million new cars in a calendar year.

Toyota – which posted its third-best annual sales tally in Australia – says there are no signs of a market slowdown, as the car industry as a whole continues to work overtime to fill orders placed last year.

“While it remains difficult to make predictions with evolving (parts supply) challenges, we can assure you that we will be working harder than ever to deliver more than 200,000 vehicles to our customers yet again in 2023,” Toyota Australia head of sales and marketing, Sean Hanley, told Drive.

“(The Australian new-car market) is still very volatile and quite difficult to predict, because the supply constraints that we’re currently experiencing – not only at Toyota but across the industry – will continue into 2023.”

The high-ranking Toyota executive said while demand was beginning to ease, orders were still coming in at a higher rate than last year.

“It would be remiss of us not to acknowledge the delayed effect of interest rates is starting to gain traction in the market right now,” Mr Hanley told Drive. 

“We’re seeing in our (customer) enquiry levels there’s some normalisation happening. And when we say normalisation, enquiries are almost back to pre-COVID levels, which was still stronger than the market was last year.”

The Toyota executive said in the last few months of 2022 “we’ve been watching inquiry rates normalise back to pre COVID levels” after a “very big order spike over the previous 12 months.” 

A handful of car companies are finally able to stockpile some vehicles; China’s Great Wall Motors (GWM) Haval has good supply of certain SUVs, China’s LDV has good supply of utes, and Mazda has stock of CX-5 SUVs – while the wait time on a Toyota RAV4 stretches up to two years.

“Our order bank is significant and healthy (but) essentially our sales at the moment are largely dependent on what we can deliver and what we can get in terms of production,” said Mr Hanley.

Toyota Japan has forecast global production of 10.6 million vehicles for 2023. If successful, it will be the highest number of vehicles ever produced by Toyota in a calendar year, and cement the manufacturer as the biggest in the auto industry by volume.

However, this does not necessarily mean wait times would come down, because Toyota is experiencing unprecedented demand.

“Everyone talks about stock shortages or production slowdowns,” said Mr Hanley. “No-one is talking about increased demand. We are producing more cars than ever before but we also have more orders than ever before.”

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