Kilkenny’s most popular new cars revealed as motor sales turn a corner

Car sales in Kilkenny are showing promising signs of recovery as the country slowly emerges from the pandemic.

A total of 1,195 new car were registered in Kilkenny up until the end of May, according to figures published by the Society of the Ireland Motor Industry (SIMI) this week.

This is a significant 10.4% increase  on last year’s figure when just 1,082 new cars were registered over the same period.

Cars sales collapsed in April and May 2020, with just 30 cars registered in those two months. This year, 202 new cars were registered in Kilkenny during the same period.

Nationally, there were 5,955 new cars registrations for the month of May compared to 1,741 in May 2020. However, this is still a little behind the 6,320 registered in May 2019.

So far this year a total of 61,147 new cars have been registered, compared to 51,879 for the same period in 2020 (+17.9%) and 79,350 in 2019 (-23%).

The most popular car brand in Kilkenny so far this year is Hyundai (pictured) with 151 registrations, just one ahead of Volkswagen (150) and 15 ahead of Toyota (136).

The Hyundai Tuscon is the most popular model so far this year with 88 registrations. The Kia Sportage is next (50), followed by the Ford Focus and Toyota Corolla (48).

SIMI Director General Brian Cooke said: ” New vehicle registrations for May were encouraging, with strong growth in both the passenger and commercial vehicle sectors when compared to last year.

“However, new car sales year to date are still 23% behind pre-Covid 2019. The re-opening of car showrooms to customers and the expected boost to consumer spending has allowed for the completion of deals previously in the pipeline and sees retailers optimistic for both new and used vehicle sales for the balance of this year and into 2022,” Mr Cooke added.

PHOTO: Courtesy CompleteCar.ie