The Society of the Irish Motor Industry (SIMI) has today released its official new vehicle statistics for 2020 - and, unsurprisingly, the enormous upheaval of the Covid-19 crisis has had a significant negative effect on registrations for the year, as the figures were down a quarter on the 2019 returns.
Traditional cars down, electrics up
In total in 2020, new car registrations ended up at 88,324 - that's a 25 per cent fall from the equivalent 2019 stat of 117,109. It wasn't just passengers cars which felt the hit either, as new Light Commercial Vehicle (LCV) registrations in 2020 saw a decrease of 14.2 per cent (21,732 units, compared to 25,336 in 2019) and also Heavy Commercial Vehicle (HGV) fell 22.3 per cent (2,066 units, compared to 2,659 in 2019).
The far more stringent NOx tax also seemed to have the desired effect, knocking a whopping 29.8 per cent off the 2019 figure of 113,926 imported used cars registered as only 79,969 registrations in this category were recorded in 2020. There was some good news for electric cars, as 4,013 were registered in 2020, compared to 3,444 in 2019 (a 16.5 per cent increase).
Other stats showed how the car-sales marketplace changed in 2020. Diesel (43.29 per cent) remains the most popular fuel type, surprisingly, but all of hybrid (11.86 per cent), electric (4.54 per cent) and plug-in hybrid (2.78 per cent) gained market share in 2020, leaving petrol cars to hoover up the remaining 36.91 per cent of sales. This demonstrates Irish drivers are, albeit slowly, making the move towards electrified vehicles. Elsewhere, the manual gearbox continues to outsell the automatic (59.8 per cent versus 40.09 per cent), but the latter is gaining in popularity all the time, while our preferred shape of car body in 2020 was the... nope, not crossover, SUV nor saloon, but instead the humble hatchback. The top-selling car colour, as it has been for the past five years, was grey.
'Sales at recession levels'
Brian Cooke, SIMI's director general, said: "Like many other sectors, 2020 proved to be a very difficult year for the Irish motor industry. New-car sales, already hampered in recent years due to Brexit, were down a further 25 per cent due to the Covid-19 pandemic, and are now at recession levels.
"Looking to January, the key month for new car sales, the dramatic deterioration in the public health situation over the last few weeks and the implementation of Level 5 restrictions will make it another difficult period for the sector. Dealerships remain open for service, repair and testing, which are essential services, and the industry will continue to play an important role in assisting emergency and essential services.
"Car sales will operate on a click-and-collect service, with retailers increasing investment in their digital platforms to facilitate customers. In the current challenged business environment, it is vital that the current restrictions succeed in driving down the incidence of Covid so business and society can return to some level of normality."