The Spring Festival was originally the traditional off-season for automobile sales, but during the Spring Festival in the Year of the Tiger, the domestic automobile market showed a trend of "off-season is not weak". What is the reason for reversing the decline of the Spring Festival car market? Which models are more popular with consumers? What new changes will be made in the Year of the Tiger car market? In this regard, the reporter conducted field research.
Pan Yue Cartography
The low season is not light and the flow of passengers is continuous
"During the holidays, many customers come to the store every day to see the car, and there are many customers who have made an appointment to come to test drive." Bao Yiyue, sales expert of the Jihu brand center store under BAIC Group, introduced. In the past, the Spring Festival holiday was the off-season for automobile sales, but this year's Spring Festival holiday, although the weather is still cold, the car market is "anti-seasonal" hot.
At the Jihu experience store near the Jingguang Bridge in Beijing's East Third Ring Road, a silver-white SUV model, the Jihu αT and a black sedan model, the Jihu αS, were placed in the most prominent positions in the store. The beautiful appearance, exquisite workmanship, and highly technological intelligent configuration make every customer who enters the store can't help but watch and experience carefully.
"Just now, a few customers have made an appointment to come to test drive." Bao Yiyue introduced that as a high-end new energy vehicle brand under BAIC Group, Jihu has attracted more and more attention from the market, and its sales volume has shown a rapid growth trend every month.
Not only this one store, but also geely, Great Wall, Chang'an, BYD and other brands in Beijing's stores during the Spring Festival holiday is also a continuous flow of customers, showing a lively scene.
Not only in Beijing, but also in the spring festival across the country, automobile consumption has shown a good trend, and "going to see the car during the Spring Festival" has become a specific project during the Spring Festival holiday of the Year of the Tiger. According to data from the Department of Commerce of Zhejiang Province, during the Spring Festival Golden Week, automobile sales in Zhejiang Province increased by 21.78% year-on-year, an increase of 22.29% over the same period in 2019 before the epidemic.
According to the National Passenger Car Market Information Association, in the first week of January 2022, the retail sales volume of the narrow passenger car market was 58,000 units per day, an increase of 6% year-on-year and a 27% increase from the first week of December 2021. Retail sales rebounded significantly in January 2022 and continued to strengthen compared to the same period in 2021. Entering February, especially in the Spring Festival, retail is still a strong trend.
New energy vehicles have become the main force in the market
In the Spring Festival car market, new energy vehicles have become the focus of people's consumption.
Mr. Lu, a customer who came to the Jihu Automobile Experience Store to see the car, said that he had always wanted to buy a new energy vehicle and had seen many brands of new energy vehicle products. Listening to a friend's introduction, the electric vehicle of the Jihu brand is good in terms of quality and intelligence, and the endurance is more than 700 kilometers, so I will take advantage of the holiday to come and see.
"Many of our customers are old owners of BAIC new energy vehicles." Bao Yiyue said that these old car owners, on the basis of being satisfied with the use of BAIC new energy vehicles, knew that BAIC had launched a replacement of Jihu brand high-end new energy vehicle products, and they came to "upgrade". "Many customers have said that Jihu products have been greatly improved in terms of appearance, performance, intelligence, etc., reflecting the quality and image that a high-end brand should have."
According to data from the China Association of Automobile Manufacturers, automobile production and sales in 2021 reached 26.082 million units and 26.275 million units, up 3.4% and 3.8% year-on-year, respectively, ending three consecutive years of decline since 2018. The total production and sales of automobiles in mainland China have also ranked first in the world for 13 consecutive years. Among them, new energy vehicles have become the biggest highlight. According to the data, in 2021, the cumulative sales of new energy vehicles in 2021 were 3.521 million units, and the market penetration rate reached 13.4%, an increase of 1.6 times year-on-year, ranking first in the world for 7 consecutive years, creating the fastest growth rate since 2016, of which private consumption accounted for nearly 80%, and the sustainable development ability was further improved. These further illustrate that the new energy vehicle market has shifted from policy-driven to market-driven.
At the same time, various localities have increased their support for the consumption of new energy vehicles. For example, Jiaxing, Taizhou and other places in Zhejiang province have held automobile carnivals and other consumption promotion activities, through the distribution of automobile consumption coupons, promotional subsidies and other ways to encourage automobile consumption. During the Spring Festival, the consumption of new energy vehicles in many places ushered in a "small climax", and the sales of some brands even increased by more than 100% year-on-year.
Jihu brand experience store located near Jingguang Bridge, East Third Ring Road, Beijing. Photo by reporter Li Zhiyong
"Double carbon" promotes consumption upgrading
With the promotion of policies such as "double carbon", new energy vehicles play an increasingly important role in the market, showing huge market potential.
At the Ongoing Beijing Winter Olympics, new energy vehicles represented by hydrogen fuel cell buses and pure electric vehicles have become the most important force to undertake transportation travel. The proportion of new energy vehicles used is the highest in the previous Winter Olympics. As the main enterprise of transportation support for the Winter Olympic Games, BEIJING Automotive Group has 212 hydrogen fuel cell buses and 330 electric vehicles participating in the service.
"Overall, the mainland's new energy vehicles have entered a new stage of accelerated development, and the leading role in the electrification transformation of the global automotive industry has been further enhanced." Guo Shougang, deputy director of the First Department of Equipment Industry of the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology, said a few days ago.
In addition to sales, mainland new energy vehicles have also developed rapidly in battery technology and intelligence, and their sustainable development capabilities have been further enhanced. Among them, the energy density of the power battery unit is close to 300 Watt Hours / kg, the system energy density is more than 200 Watt Hours / kg, the intelligent networked vehicle on-board basic computing platform realizes the loading application, and the computing power of the artificial intelligence chip has reached the international advanced level.
At the same time, the supporting environment for the development of the domestic new energy automobile industry will be further optimized in 2021. By the end of 2021, the mainland has built a total of 75,000 charging stations, 2.617 million charging piles, 1,298 replacement power stations, and more than 10,000 power battery recycling service outlets in 31 provinces, autonomous regions and municipalities across the country. All these have laid the foundation for the future development of new energy vehicles.
According to the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology and other departments, the next step is to formulate policies and measures to support the accelerated development of new energy vehicles, and organize the preparation of a green and low-carbon development roadmap for the automobile industry
Fu Bingfeng, executive vice president and secretary general of the China Association of Automobile Manufacturers, said that as an important pillar industry of the national economy, the automobile industry is in a critical stage of transformation and upgrading, and in 2021, under the background of the overall stable and sustained recovery of domestic macroeconomic operation, the resilience of the automotive industry will continue to be maintained.
The China Association of Automobile Manufacturers expects total mainland vehicle sales to reach 27.5 million units in 2022, up about 5% year-on-year. Among them, new energy vehicles will reach 5 million, an increase of 42% year-on-year, and the market share is expected to exceed 18%. The National Passenger Vehicle Market Information Association also expects that the sales of new energy passenger vehicles are expected to reach more than 5.5 million units in 2022, with a penetration rate of about 25%.