Toyota’s Corolla hatch and sedan aren’t nearly as popular in South Africa as they once were. Is the Corolla Cross now carrying this famous badge? Let’s examine the sales figures…
Globally, the Corolla badge has a long and storied history, with a legacy stretching all the way back to September 1966 and global sales well in excess of 50 million units. Here in South Africa, production of the Corolla commenced in May 1975 and has continued – in one form or another – ever since. Yes, just like the Hilux, the Corolla designation has been a household name locally for close to half a century.
But, owing largely to the steady decline of the traditional family hatchback and sedan segments, local sales of Corolla models began to fall a few years back. Toyota’s answer? To leverage the tremendous power and reach of the name by applying it to a crossover, the single body style in the passenger-vehicle segment that continues to experience robust sales growth.
Shrewdly positioned within the Toyota’s local line-up and aggressively priced from launch in November 2021, the Prospecton-produced Corolla Cross appeared to be the ideal answer to faltering Corolla sales in an increasingly crossover-crazy world. So, just how successful has it been? Let’s take a closer look at the figures.
Looking back at Auris, Corolla and Quest sales in SA
Before we dive into Corolla Cross sales, it’s worth examining the medium-term performance of the Auris (the current hatch’s predecessor), Corolla sedan and prolonged-lifecycle Corolla Quest in South Africa. We’ll look specifically at the years 2015 to 2019, ignoring 2020 and 2021 for now as sales in this latter period were noticeably affected by the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic.
We’ll start in 2015, since that was the original Quest’s first full year trading on the local market. Of course, we should also point out Toyota SA Motors reported combined monthly sales figures for the Auris hatchback, Corolla sedan and Quest back then, rather than listing these sales individually. Still, that year, 24 894 units were registered around South Africa, translating to a healthy monthly average of 2 074 units.
In 2016, the Corolla family total fell markedly to 17 499 units, before improving slightly to 19 264 units the following year. In 2018, the tally dipped again (to 17 239 units), before dropping further still to 15 796 units in 2019 (the year in which the current-generation hatchback replaced the Auris). The general downward trend in the sales performance of these models is plain to see in the graph above.
How did the sedan, hatch and Quest perform in 2022?
So, was 2022 another year of decline? It certainly was, with the Corolla sedan, Corolla hatch and Corolla Quest managing a total of just 6 185 units (or a monthly average of 515 units) between them. The Quest accounted for the bulk of that figure (4 674 units or 76%), while the sedan contributed 979 sales and the hatch just 532 units.
Of course, there are a few potential reasons for this latest nosedive in sales, besides the overall decline of the traditional C-segment (and the broader supply constraints that continue to plague the industry). For instance, the Japanese automaker opted to shift the hatchback and sedan upmarket in their latest generations, a decision that resulted in an increase in price and a concomitant drop in sales volume. For the record, the Auris kicked off at R223 700 and the Corolla sedan at R230 500 back in 2015; today, some 8 years later, the entry prices are more than double, with the Corolla hatch starting from R500 700 and the saloon from R512 700.
In addition, the company has shifted the focus of the Corolla hatchback and sedan line-ups to hybrid powertrains (incidentally, while quietly culling the pioneer of this technology, the Prius), further pushing up the cost. Moreover, it’s worth remembering the current Corolla sedan and hatch are imported into South Africa rather than produced at Prospecton, which likewise has a marked impact on their respective sticker prices.
Why is the locally built Quest – which was introduced in 2nd-generation guise in March 2020, around the same time the 12th-generation sedan touched down – still achieving fairly respectable figures? Well, it’s effectively covering space created by its more modern saloon sibling’s move upmarket. The prolonged-lifecycle model bears a far more affordable price-tag and thus still also appeals to rental fleet buyers (and, indeed, ride-hailing services). It currently starts at R307 400, compared with its forebear’s entry price of R183 900 in 2015.
Corolla Cross sales in its first full year on the market
Has the Corolla Cross managed to make up the sales dropped by its lower-riding brethren? The answer is a resounding “yes”. In fact, in its first full year on the market, the 6-strong Cross line-up – which offers the option of hybrid power and has pricing bookends of R371 200 and R480 200 – managed a whopping 15 855 registrations in South Africa. Add that to the sales of its 3 siblings and the Corolla family total comes to 22 040 units, a figure not seen for years.
The Corolla Cross drove this impressive growth – and in the process grabbed 4th place on the list of SA’s strongest-selling passenger vehicles – despite being hamstrung by the 3-month shuttering of Toyota’s Prospecton factory in mid-April 2022, which sustained major damage during the devastating KwaZulu-Natal floods. Take a glance at the graph below to see just how severe the impact was, with the model enduring a trio of consecutive sub-200-unit months.
Of course, the Corolla Cross has recovered smartly since then, with local production back at full capacity and the range expanded to include a GR-Sport derivative (with another derivative seemingly on the way). Indeed, January 2023 was another bumper month for the Cross, which with 2 042 registrations was outsold only by the venerable Hilux. In contrast, the Quest settled for 433 units, the Corolla sedan for 78 and the Corolla hatchback for a mere 50.
Though it’s early days in the year, the Corolla Cross is already positioning itself to graduate to the role of Toyota’s best-selling passenger vehicle in South Africa for 2023 (the new Urban Cruiser, for the record, will hit the market only in the 2nd quarter). In the process, there’s no doubt “Corolla” will remain one of the most recognised nameplates among local buyers some 48 years after the very first SA-built example rolled off the assembly line.
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