China July 2011: Toyota Corolla leads for the first time

Toyota Corolla

* See the Top 200 best-selling models by clicking on ‘Read more’ at end of post! *

The end of Toyota’s earthquake-induced supply problems mixed with the poor performance of most Chinese brands mean a completely reshuffled models ranking this month in China. Catching up on a backlog of orders, the Toyota Corolla jumps into pole position in July for the first time ever in the country with 18,902 sales, up 16 spots on June! It is #13 year-to-date.

Buick Excelle

The Buick Excelle is #2 at 18,383 units and takes advantage of the VW Lavida’s supply issues (down to #87 with only 3,591 sales!) to take the lead in the 2011 year-to-date ranking with 139,801 units, even though it hasn’t topped the Chinese monthly ranking since September 2010. Below the Lavida, the VW Jetta maintains itself on the yearly podium at #3 with 131,549 sales.

Other great performers atop the ranking include the VW Bora up 3 spots to #3, the Toyota Camry up 24 spots to #5, the new generation VW Passat breaking into the Top 10 at #7 and the VW Sagitar (an old gen Jetta) up 7 spots to #11. The best-selling 100% Chinese model is the Chery QQ but it is down to #27 this month while the BYD F3 ranks only 34th…

BYD S6

Chinese rankings are always fascinating to follow because there is constant flow of new models coming into the market and doing very well relatively rapidly. This month let’s notice the BYD S6 SUV, launched in April, up 41 spots on June to an excellent 62nd place with 5,068 sales.

Chery E5

Chery launched the E5 this month to replace the A5 and the model landed directly in 74th position with the pretty strong score of 4,280 sales.

Kia K2

China is the first country in the world where the all-new Kia K2 (aka new generation Rio) is already on sale: it goes from #199 in June to #78 in July with 4,050 sales for its first full month of activity. Also to be noted: the Linian S1 (low cost Honda City) is up again at #89 and 3,552 units and the Toyota E’Z Yizhi (aka Verso-S) arrives at #115.

Previous month: see the June 2011 China Top 200 best-selling models here.

Full July 2011 Top 200 Ranking Table below.