Opinion: Glass’s new and used light commercial vehicle market update

By Andy Picton, chief commercial vehicle editor at Glass’s

The new light commercial vehicle (LCV) market improved for the 12th consecutive month in a row, registering 29,701 new vehicles in December. This was a 36.1% increase on December 2022.

Registrations for the calendar year totalled 341,455 units, up 21.0% on 2022.

Diesel registrations made up 91.6% of all new vehicles on the road in 2023, down 0.3% on 2022.

In a strong month, December recorded increases in every sector.

The pickup sector recorded a huge 136.6% increase, whilst vans below 2.0 tonne and vans between 2.0 and 2.5 tonnes GVW rose by 85.7% and 101.4% respectively.

Vans with gross vehicle weights between 2.5t and 3.5t saw registrations rise by 10.2% and represented 60.8% of all units registered in the month.

Year-to-date, this sector accounted for nearly 67% of all registrations in the UK market.

Finishing the year strongly, Ford dominated registrations again in December, with the Transit Custom (1st), Transit (3rd) and the Ranger pickup (4th) all featuring in the top five positions.

The Vauxhall Vivaro, Peugeot Boxer (1,185 units) and Citroen Berlingo (1,166 units) from the Stellantis Group finished in second, seventh and eighth respectively, whilst the Renault Trafic finished in fifth.

The Volkswagen Transporter claimed sixth (1,319 units), the Mercedes-Benz Sprinter finished ninth (1,084 units) and the Toyota Hilux tenth with 1,076 units.

Top five LCV registrations

YTD 2023		December 2023		December 2022
Ford Transit Custom	40,865	Ford Transit Custom	3,298	Ford Transit Custom	2,729
Ford Transit	28,280	Vauxhall Vivaro	2,237	Ford Transit	2,471
Vauxhall Vivaro	20,477	Ford Transit	2,227	Mercedes-Benz Sprinter	1,957
Ford Ranger	18,679	Ford Ranger	1,704	Volkswagen Transporter	1,516
Volkswagen Transporter	17,487	Renault Trafic	1,483	Ford Ranger	1,234

 

Electric van registrations

Battery electric vehicle (BEV) registrations also finished the year strongly, with 2,964 new vehicles hitting the road in December.

This was a 73.8% increase on twelve months ago and gave the BEV market a 10.0% market share, the second highest ever.

Registrations for the year totalled 20,253 units, up 21% on 2022, but with an overall market share that remained static at 5.9%. The UK is now the third largest BEV market in Europe by volume.

December saw Maxus lead the way registering 998 BEVs (33.4% market share). Stellantis were second with 713 units (23.9% market share), with Vauxhall registering 591 of these.

Nissan were third having registered 307 units (10.3% market share), Toyota were fourth with 267 units (8.9%) and Volkswagen were fifth with 241 units (8.1%).

The Maxus T90EV Pickup was the best-selling model accounting for 965 units, over 32% of the whole electric van market for the month.

The best-selling BEV in the UK in 2023 was the Vauxhall Vivaro Electric. Their 5,383 units accounted for over 26.5% of all BEV registrations.

The Ford E-Transit was second with 1,585 units (7.8%), the Volkswagen ID Buzz Cargo was third with 1,286 (6.3%), the Maxus T90EV Pickup fourth with 1,261 (6.2%) and Mercedes-Benz e-Vito fifth with 1,105 new electric vans (5.4%).

Summary

Increased demand for LCVs, including a record number of electric vans registered in 2023 has placed the new market in a healthy position.

This positivity needs to be tempered somewhat by the low bar set in 2022 and that registrations for 2023 were still over 6.5% behind 2019 pre-pandemic levels.

With the ZEV Mandate now in force, 2024 is likely to be a complex year with manufacturers not only needing to ensure that LCV demand matches supply, but at least 10% of production is 100% electric.

Understandably, there is still plenty to do to move fleets away from diesel, with barriers including perceived range, payload and towing limitations, insufficient van-suitable chargers and a lack of long-term commitment to the plug-in-van-grant.

Thankfully, the Rules of Origin (RoO) requirements that were due to come into force from 1st January 2024, received a much-needed 11th hour reprieve.

An extension to the 31st December 2026 has been agreed, providing much needed relief and further preparation time. No further extensions will be permitted after this time, with new rules coming into force from the 1st January 2027.

Used LCV market overview

In an improving marketplace that continues to demand newer and therefore cleaner stock, nearly 75% of all sales at auction were Euro 6 models, with an average age of nearly 56 months.  

Average mileage was just over 74,500 miles and the average selling price was just under £10,000.

Just under 25% of all stock sold was Euro 5 or older, with an average age of 144 months, average mileage of nearly 109,750 miles and an average sale price of just over £3,000.

Used electric vans made up less than 1.25% of all sales at auction with average mileage at 25,800 miles and an average sales price of nearly £6,200.

December in detail

The volume of sales dropped by a third during December and the quieter Christmas period.

Average sales prices also decreased, falling 5.75% over the month and now sit nearly 11.5% behind the same point last year.

The average age of all vehicles sold remained static at 78.1 months, up only 0.2 months on November but 2.6 months down on twelve months ago.

The average monthly mileage increased by nearly 3% to 82,715 miles. This was 0.06% higher than December 2022.

More medium vans were sold at auction than any other vehicle type, accounting for nearly 33% of all auction sales. Large vans accounted for 27.3% and small vans 25.6%.

Volumes of 4x4 stock sold accounted for only 14.1% of all sales, but attracted the strongest average sales prices of £13,036, down £353 on November.

Large vans covered more distance than any other type of stock at an average of 95,777 miles. This was over 7,100 miles more than November, but over 3,350 miles less than December 2022.

First-time conversion rates for December increased by 0.5% to 76.3% overall and sat 0.3% higher compared to the same point 12 months ago.

Broken down, the best conversion rates were seen in the large panel van sector at 78.2% (up 2% on November), whilst a conversion rate of 69.7% (up 3.1%) in the 4x4 pickup sector returned the lowest.

Used vehicles observed for sale in the wholesale market last month dropped 1.75% to just over 41,750 units. 45.0% of all vehicles on sale were valued at £20,000 or more, while 37% were on sale for between £20,000 and £10,000.

At the lower end of the market, those vehicles on sale in the £10,000 to £5,000 price bracket remained static at 14.1% of the overall market, whilst 3.9% were on sale for less than £5,000.