Car sales figures are nowhere to be found in this site, but with the commemoration of the 9/11 attacks that changed the world and if he was still alive, former President Ferdinand Marcos could have celebrated his 95th birthday, let's go back to the year 2001 and know the vehicle preferences of the Filipinos before, thanks to this article in Top Gear Philippines, with percentage figures from Best Selling Cars Blog.
The total industry sold 76,668 units, which is very heartbreaking for the whole industry since during the 90s which had car sales above the 100,000 unit mark. Couple this with the reeling effects of the financial crisis that crippled our promising economy as well as the political instability brought about the removal of President Estrada in Malacanang. Enough of news items, Asian Utility Vehicles and family sedans are the popular choices of consumers back then, and in this list the last appearance of the Mitsubishi Lancer in the top 10.
In 2001, the Toyota Revo is still the king of the roads with 10,115 units despite a decrease of 14%, this figure was apparently the second to the lowest record in the nameplate's history (2004 had seen 9,413 Revos driving off Toyota dealers). Ten years later, the Innova sold more units than the Revo with 11,000 ones in 2011.
Thanks to a mid-cycle refresh, the Mitsubishi Adventure is up 13% with 7,711 sales in contrast to the Revo's falling sales, but still solid at number 2.
At third place, we see the Isuzu Crosswind and Hilander selling 6,891 units up 60%, but with this a combined sales of the two, I assume that majority of them are Crosswinds. With this alone, Isuzu bucked the industry trend.
After two years of the Honda Civic being the best selling passenger car in the country, the Toyota Corolla (counting the sales of the "Lovelife" and the Altis) wrestles back this title and up 1%, with 5,419 sales at 4th place. This time, they got Brad Pitt to endorse this new vehicle.
The Seventh Generation Honda Civic is number 5 on the sales charts with 4,917 units sold, down 10%. But with that in mind, the Honda Civic used to be the best selling passenger car in 1999 and 2000 despite nearing expiration date. We guess a lot of buyers didn't like the redesign and switched to the Altis.
Visiting again for the last time in the top 10 is the Mitsubishi Lancer, selling 2,595 units.
The Honda City is down 27% with 2,480 units, in contrast to the 8,000 ones sold in 2010.
The Nissan Frontier enters at number 9 with 2,252 units sold.
And rounding up the Top 10 is the Mitsubishi Pajero which sold 2,108 units alone. The Montero Sport did it better eight years later selling thrice more units.
How times changed, especially that the Filipino consumer has more choices and with the sales charts in the Philippines not exclusive to the Japanese only, with the Koreans and the Americans wanting to have a slice of the action. And in fact, 2001 saw three Mitsubishis in the list compared with 2 each for Toyota, Honda, and Nissan (they are no show recently in the top 10). Now, Toyota and Mitsubishi almost dominated the top 10 with either 3 to 4 vehicles on the list.
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