The pickup truck market is expected to become a new blue ocean in the domestic automobile industry.
The "Opinions on Further Releasing Consumption Potential and Promoting the Sustained Recovery of Consumption" and the "Package of Policies and Measures to Solidly Stabilize the Economy" issued by the State Council also mentioned that refined management of pickup trucks entering the city will be implemented and research will be conducted to further relax restrictions on pickup trucks entering the city. The general direction of lifting the ban on pickup trucks has once again been clarified at the national level, bringing new opportunities for development to the pickup truck industry.
1 Pickup trucks are expected to be fully lifted
"The good demand resilience of the pickup truck market is mainly due to the background of the lifting of the ban on pickup trucks in recent years. The lifting of the ban on pickup trucks kicked off in 2016. As of the end of 2021, it has received positive responses from nearly a hundred cities across the country. "In an interview with a reporter from China Automobile News, Gu Guoquan, editor-in-chief of China Pickup Network, said that since the first "pickup truck into the city" pilot was proposed in 2016, more and more cities have joined the ranks of lifting the ban on pickup trucks. Nowadays, pickup trucks have become a powerful force that cannot be ignored in the automobile market.
At present, more than ten provinces, cities and autonomous regions, including Tianjin, Guangdong, Liaoning, Hebei, Sichuan, Anhui, Jilin, Guizhou, Xinjiang, Gansu, Hubei, Henan, and Inner Mongolia, have proposed studying and implementing the lifting of the ban on pickup trucks without restricting the areas where pickup trucks can travel. Market share increased from 20% to 40%. As domestic provinces gradually relax restrictions on pickup trucks entering cities, China's pickup truck market will gradually develop from a "niche market" to a well-known "mass market."
"In recent years, the pickup truck market has performed significantly better than the overall market. Driven by policy liberalization, consumption upgrades, and demand upgrades, it has shown the potential for scale growth and is considered a new growth point for the domestic auto market." Gu Guoquan He said that the pickup truck model is not only widely recognized in the domestic market, but also has achieved good results in overseas exports. Data shows that Chinese brand pickup trucks have been exported to more than 100 countries and regions around the world, covering Europe, Central and South America, Asia, Africa and Oceania, and have become popular local models.
Li Shaohua, deputy secretary-general of the China Association of Automobile Manufacturers , also believes that the pickup truck market has great potential. From the three dimensions of product strength, consumer groups, and market potential, pickup trucks are expected to become another model after SUVs and new energy vehicles. tuyere. The
pickup truck has the characteristics of a wide body and rich functions. It combines the comfort of a car, the off-road properties of an SUV, the leisure properties of a station wagon and the characteristics of a light truck. From the perspective of alleviating traffic congestion and controlling exhaust pollution, a multi-purpose pickup truck can effectively avoid users’ repeated purchases of vehicles.
2 The development is good, but the penetration rate of and is still less than 2%
Although my country's pickup truck market has made great progress, there is still a big gap compared with the international market.
"Judging from the development in recent years, my country's pickup truck market still only has a sales volume of 500,000 units per year, which is far from reflecting the value of pickup trucks." Zhang Haobao, CEO of Great Wall Motor's pickup brand, said that from Globally, pickup trucks are the most popular and largest-selling automobile product type, and are also one of the most dynamic vehicles for automobile consumption. However, they have always been "sluggish" in the Chinese market.
Zhang Haobao further said that the total annual global pickup truck sales remain at around 6 million units. Among them, in the United States, pickup truck sales accounted for 16%; in Australia, pickup truck sales accounted for 20% of the total sales of the entire automobile market; in Thailand, pickup truck sales accounted for 46%, making it the largest category in the automobile market; In China, pickup sales account for less than 2%.
"For a long time, pickup trucks have been labeled as trucks in China, so they have been subject to many restrictions, and their penetration rate is far lower than the global average of 7%. Under multiple pressures, pickup trucks have become a niche and well-prepared vehicle in China. "Suppressed" models, said Li Weili, head of the preparatory group of the Pickup Truck Branch of the China Association of Automobile Manufacturers.
Recalling the "past and present life" of pickup trucks, Xie Guoping, deputy director of the Department of Information and Industrial Development of the National Information Center, said that in 1994, the State Council promulgated the "Automobile Industry Industrial Policy", giving pickup trucks the status of "truck".At that time, China was transitioning from a planned economy to a market economy. Cars had not yet entered people's homes. Sales of pickup trucks were very small. They were mainly used for cargo transportation and were a marginal category in the automobile industry.
Since 2000, due to the pressure of environmental protection and traffic congestion, large and medium-sized cities have begun to implement truck traffic restriction policies, and pickup trucks have gradually been "restricted" road rights by major cities, causing pickup trucks to encounter a cold winter in the Chinese market.
Until 2016, with the four provinces of Yunnan, Liaoning, Hebei, and Henan conducting pilot projects to lift the ban on pickup trucks entering cities, the lifting of the ban on pickup trucks began in China. Since then, the ban on pickup trucks has been relaxed in various places. At the same time, the central level has successively issued policies and documents to relax the management of pickup trucks and restrictions on entering cities. Coupled with the help of related measures to encourage automobile consumption, the long-dormant pickup truck market has begun to flourish. New life.
In the past two years, thanks to the successive introduction of "relaxation" policies, the domestic pickup truck market has developed rapidly. The official implementation of the "General Technical Conditions for Multi-Purpose Trucks" has taken an important step in the identity transformation of pickup trucks, and also made it possible to fully lift the ban on pickup trucks.
It is understood that Chongqing has recently completely lifted restrictions on pickup trucks entering the city, and Hebei Province has also made it clear that pickup trucks and passenger cars have the same right of passage. In addition, Xi'an has also formulated refined management measures for pickup trucks. It is foreseeable that as more and more cities issue supporting policies, the wave of comprehensive lifting of the ban on pickup trucks is coming.
3 The pickup truck market has the potential to expand to millions
"The policy of lifting the ban on pickup trucks has released a large amount of consumer demand, and at the same time, two significant trends have emerged: First, the passenger demand of tool trucks and users is gradually stimulated; Second, the proportion of consumption centered on passenger and off-road vehicles is gradually increasing. "Zhang Haobao said that from the perspective of the development cycle of the automobile industry, the Chinese automobile market is gradually entering the stock era, and diversified consumption has become the main trend of automobile consumption. Since pickup trucks can provide scenario-based functional experiences such as off-roading and leisure travel, they will become an important support for the diversified development of China's automobile industry in the future.
Yuan Weichao, senior analyst of the commercial vehicle market at the Economic Consulting Center of the National Information Center, said that since the beginning of this year, the pickup market has performed significantly better than all commercial vehicle segments. At the same time, with the help of favorable policies, a new round of lifting the ban on pickup trucks is about to come.
"Since the lifting of the ban on pickup trucks in 2016, more than 100 cities in China have successively released the right of way for pickup trucks, and the demand for pickup trucks in the provinces where the ban has been lifted has been significantly better than that in non-lifted provinces. It is foreseeable that with the implementation of policies to lift the ban on pickup trucks in various places , the domestic pickup truck market demand is expected to reach more than one million units," Zhang Haobao said.
"Promoted by many favorable factors, the domestic pickup truck market will usher in spring. It is estimated that by 2030, China's pickup truck demand potential will be close to 3 million units." Xie Guoping said.
4 The lifting of the ban policy urgently needs to be fully implemented. Although the market potential of
pickup truck is huge, it still needs policy support.
"The lifting of the ban on pickup trucks not only relaxes the conditions for pickup trucks to enter the city, but also includes the simultaneous adjustment of various supporting policies such as rights of way, rights of way, vehicle management, etc." Gu Guoquan said that at present, the pickup industry still has problems such as "incomplete lifting of the ban" and "high-speed Highway rights-of-way are inconsistent across regions," "reflective stickers have been cancelled, and spray-painting has not been popularized across the country," as well as mandatory scrapping and annual inspections and many other issues that need to be resolved. Especially after years of technology accumulation, the technical level of pickup trucks has been greatly improved, and has reached the level of passenger cars in terms of safety, energy saving, environmental protection, comfort, and power. The shift towards high-end and passenger use has allowed many pickup trucks to break away from the category of tool trucks and redefine this type of vehicle with configurations and performance comparable to SUVs. Therefore, in the face of the above problems, relevant departments should treat pickup trucks as the same as passenger cars. "treatment".
"Currently, there are inconsistencies and discontinuities in the implementation of policies to lift the ban on pickup trucks in various places. At the same time, local public security and traffic control departments still have some concerns about lifting the ban on pickup trucks." Li Weili said that because urban traffic restrictions on pickup truck rights of way are not clear definition, and it is difficult to distinguish them from general light commercial vehicles, resulting in the inability to formulate targeted measures for pickup trucks in urban traffic management.
In this regard, Zhang Haobao put forward four suggestions: First, manage multi-purpose trucks such as pickup trucks independently, cancel the 15-year mandatory scrapping and annual inspection regulations, and enjoy the benefits of free highway travel during holidays.
Second, further standardize the pickup truck market and guide the healthy and orderly development of the industry. Now that the "General Technical Conditions for Multi-Purpose Trucks" has been officially implemented, pickup trucks have taken a key step in changing their identity. More provinces will need to adopt the new standards in the future to clearly distinguish them from mini trucks and light trucks at the implementation level.
Thirdly, at present, many consumers’ understanding of pickup trucks is still at the level of tool trucks, and they do not have a deep understanding of its multi-purpose vehicle usage scenarios. Therefore, it is necessary to further cultivate China's pickup truck culture and let more users realize that pickup trucks are not just tool models, but also a manifestation of lifestyle.
Fourth, actively encourage Chinese pickup truck companies to “go global” and explore overseas markets. Compared with other models, pickup trucks have greater potential to serve as a breakthrough for Chinese automobile brands to go global.
"I hope that the policy of lifting the ban on pickup trucks will continue to be implemented and implemented nationwide, so that our country's pickup truck market will release more demand and potential." Li Weili finally said.
Text: Yao Huifa Editor: Sun Weichuan Layout: Zhao Fangting
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