As pointed out by the data of the California New Car Dealers Association (CNCDA), the Model 3 of Tesla became the champion in the new car sales ranking during the first quarter of 2020, which is the first time that an electric vehicle has been crowned in sales, and the sales volume had even surpassed the ever-victorious Honda Civic and Toyota Corolla in the market.
Honda Civic has been a long time sales champion in California, where Toyota Corolla is the best-selling model in the world (Altis is a part of the Corolla series), and the fact that Model 3 is able to surpass these two popular models is just fascinating.
There were a total of 18,856 new license plates for Model 3 in California during the first quarter, which is an achievement over large sedans of Honda Accord and Toyota Camry of the same level.
Tesla has had a YoY growth of 9.3% in this quarter, and the simultaneous reduction of 4.3% in the automotive sales in the entire California has resulted in the increase of Tesla’s market share to 4.6% among automotive brands.
Tesla’s Model 3 has been the killer in large luxury cars since its debut as the model manages to surpass the 3 Series of BMW, C Class of Mercedes Benz, and Audi A4 in sales from the same periods.
Located in California, Tesla managed to construct the company’s headquarters at where thousands of its workers live, which naturally enhances the elevation in sales. In addition, as a long-term indicative area in anti-air pollution, especially with the wildfire and smog issues in recent years, California has a relatively higher purchase willingness in electric vehicles compared to other states.
Looking at the 2019 sales in the US, 180K units of Model 3 were sold, though 300K respective units of Civic and Corolla had also been sold, which remains to be a huge difference. As the COVID-19 pandemic drastically impacts the willingness in purchasing automobiles, it is expected that the sales in the California region may decrease by 24% in the first 4 months this year, and Tesla’s unconventional sales method may help with boosting the company’s sales under a reduction of total sales volume.
As Model Y became available to the public in the first quarter, the focus for the year lies on whether the model will create just as big of an impact to the large sedan market as Model 3 did, and if the model will transform the ecology of SUVs and light commercial vehicles. In addition, the sales of Model 3 had exceeded the sales of “plug-in hybrid electric vehicle” from all automotive manufacturers during this period, which means that the market for the plug-in hybrid electric vehicles that are ambiguously positioned will sustain severe compression between fossil fuel vehicles and electric vehicles as the oil prices have hit record low. If this trend persists, automotive manufacturers must accelerate on the implementation of electrification, instead of wishing to pass through this phase with mere plug-in hybrid vehicles.
(Cover photo source: Tesla)