naamsa, the automotive industry business council, reported on Monday that Suzuki Auto South Africa was the third best-selling vehicle manufacturer in January, behind Toyota and Volkswagen.

This is on a par with the highest rank ever achieved by Suzuki and the highest overall sales – 3 232 vehicles – for the company. Equally impressive, notes the naamsa statistics, is that the dealer network sold 2 551 of these units, their highest sales figure ever.

“A couple of new dealers joined the Suzuki family in January. This grew our network to 78 dealers,” says Henno Havenga, Manager of Auto Dealer Sales at Suzuki Auto South Africa.

“And what a fitting welcome to our new dealers to see their peers outperform all previous sales records. In fact, our top five dealers sold a combined 530 new Suzuki models in January and 20 dealers, from Klerksdorp to Gqeberha, each sold more than 50 units in the month.”

While Suzuki’s dealer network deserves a lot of the credit for helping to push the brand’s sales into previously unheard-of territory, the corporate and fleet sales team also outperformed all expectations. In January, this division sold 681 vehicles to corporate, fleet and government customers.

In its review of the national sales figures, naamsa notes that the industry is gradually recovering from its COVID-19-related slump and that domestic sales grew by 19.5% compared to January 2021. In contrast, Suzuki jumped by more than 73% when compared to January 2021.

A total of 1 069 Suzuki Swift and Swift Sport models were sold in January, while six other models, including the S-Presso, Jimny, Super Carry, Dzire and Baleno, recorded triple digit sales.