Japan January 2013: Toyota Crown shoots up to #8, a 4-year high

Toyota Crown ‘Royal’ Series

* See the Top 30 best-selling models and Top 13 All-brands by clicking on the title! *

Sales of Passenger Cars (ex-Kei cars) are down 13% year-on-year in Japan in January to 229,333 registrations. This is in fact not such a bad result, given January 2012 sales were massively and artificially boosted by government subsidies on fuel-efficient vehicles. The Toyota Aqua is now the Boss of them all Japanese cars, holding the pole position for the 4th consecutive month thanks to sales up 67% year-on-year to 22,466. Reversely the Toyota Prius is down a painful 39% to 17,733 and is now threatened by the Nissan Note, brilliantly maintaining itself onto the Japanese podium for the 5th time in a row at 14,529 sales. This is in fact the Note’s 6th time ever on the podium (add February 2005) and its third highest ever monthly volume below the 18,355 units from last September and 17,946 sales in March 2005.

Nissan Note

But the biggest event this month in Japan is the arrival in 8th position of the Toyota Crown with 5,327 sales, up 21 spots on last month and 94% year-on-year thanks to the arrival of the top-end ‘Royal’ Series variant. This is the Crown nameplate’s best ranking in Japan since April 2008 (#5). After a record month in December, both the Subaru Impreza and Forester fall down to more reasonable ground, respectively down 6 ranks to #11 at 4,392 sales (+54%) and down 4 to #15 and 3,012 units (+299%). The latter is still the Forester’s 2nd highest ever ranking in the country, equalling its November performance.

Previous post: Japan Full Year 2012: All-new Toyota Aqua tickles Prius

Previous month: Japan December 2012: Subaru Impreza and Forester break records

One year ago: Japan January 2012: Toyota Aqua starts with a splash!

Full January 2012 Top 30 models and Top 13 All-brands Ranking Tables below.