2023 is a good year for Lexus, with a total of 824,000 new vehicles sold worldwide, a 32% year-on-year increase, with North America being the largest market with 355,000 units sold, up 24% year-on-year, 94,000 units sold in Japan, up 129% year-on-year, and Europe and the Middle East selling 69,000 and 46,000 units, respectively, up 46% and 60%, respectively.
However, in the Chinese market, Lexus sold 181,000 units in 2023, a year-on-year increase of only 3%, and the Chinese market's share of Lexus's global share fell from 28% to 22%. In addition, judging from the amount of insurance provided by "Sang Zhiwei", Lexus will deliver 180,000 new cars in China in 2023, a year-on-year decrease of 1.3%, becoming the only market for Lexus to decline in 2023. And you must know that in 2022, Lexus has fallen by 16.7% year-on-year, so it can be said that it has begun to fall endlessly.
At the same time, you must know that these 180,000 units are still Lexus through "price for volume" in exchange, in the past, ES generally had to increase the price by at least 20,000 or 30,000 yuan, and in the second half of 2023, the ES 200 low configuration is only more than 240,000, from a price increase of 30,000 to a discount of 40,000 or 50,000, you can imagine how fast Lexus will fall in China.
So why are Chinese consumers suddenly not loving Lexus?
原因一:主力车型 ES 迟迟没换代
Lexus sold 180,000 units in China in 2023, of which 110,000 units were sold for the ES alone, accounting for 61%.
The Lexus ES currently on sale is the seventh generation of the product, and its official debut at the Beijing Auto Show in April 2018 is enough to show the importance attached to the Chinese market.
The life cycle of the general generation of Lexus ES series models is 7 years, and the current generation of ES has come to the last two years of its life cycle. At the same time, ES's direct competitors, the Mercedes-Benz C-Class and BMW 3 Series, have undergone a generational change, with the latter clearly being a little more appealing.
Lexus's sales in overseas markets are relatively scattered, and the IS, RX, NX, GX, and even LX series models are also selling well, and the NX and RX have just undergone a replacement in the past two years, and their overseas sales are naturally considerable.
Reason 2: Fraud, car doors cannot be opened, and the brand image collapses
Lexus has always been a special existence in China, a very important reason is its "pure import" identity, in the past long time everyone has been brainwashed by the so-called craftsman spirit in Japan, in the eyes of many people, pure import of Lexus than the German top three Mercedes-Benz BMW Audi is a higher level.
However, in recent years, various frauds of Japanese companies have been exposed, and then the leaders bowed and apologized, many of which are also related to the automobile industry, such as Kobe Steel fraud, Mitsubishi Electric fraud, Takata airbag fraud, and Toyota's 3 diesel engine fraud that occurred not long ago, Toyota's president Tsuneji Sato and chairman Akio Toyoda have carried out "traditional projects" and bowed and apologized.
The frequent counterfeiting incidents have made everyone less interested in the so-called "original imports" and "craftsman spirit".
However, an accident of the Lexus LM on the highway completely broke the brand halo of Lexus, in July 2022, a Lexus LM 300h luxury MPV had a serious car accident in a section of Guigang, Guangxi, the front of the car that hit the isolation pier was seriously damaged, and it began to smoke, and the front airbag and side head curtain in the car had exploded, and 3 people were trapped in the car.
The most critical point is that the car door could not be opened after the accident, and a passing vehicle came down to rescue but tried all kinds of methods to open the door, and finally 3 people in the car were killed and injured.
You must know that the price of Lexus LM in China is as high as 1.19-1.55 million yuan, and the price of picking up the car at the peak is 800,000 yuan, that is, consumers spend 2 million to buy an MPV, but they can't even do the most basic safety, which is unacceptable to Lexus potential customers.
Reason 3: The transformation of new energy vehicles is slow and cannot meet consumer demand
According to the China Passenger Car Association, the penetration rate of new energy vehicles in the Chinese market reached 35.7% in 2023, which means that one out of every three cars sold is new energy.
In 2023, Lexus's domestic sales of new energy vehicles will only be 5,700 units, accounting for only 3.1% of total sales, which can be basically ignored.
Looking carefully, Lexus's new energy vehicles in China can be said to be unattractive, for example, Lexus's first pure electric model in China, UX300e, is completely a "oil-to-electric" product, with a maximum horsepower of only 204 horsepower and a pure electric range of only 400km, but its price has come to 362,000, which is more expensive than Tesla.
Now Lexus has 3 new energy vehicles in China, namely Lexus RZ, NX PHEV and RX PHEV, although compared with the UX300e has improved, but compared with the same price of domestic new energy vehicles, such as the ideal L9, NIO ES6, Wenjie M9, etc., it is not attractive.
With the further increase in the penetration rate of new energy vehicles in China, it is currently expected that the penetration rate of new energy vehicles in China will reach 45% in 2024, that is, nearly half of the market will be lost to Lexus.
There is no doubt that Lexus will have a more difficult time in China in 2024, because the "price for volume" move has already been used once in 2023, and it is impossible to hit the price of ES 200 to 200,000 this year.