Zero rated GST have benefited Proton cars in a big way. July 2018 sales grew by 31% over the previous month with 8,102 Proton cars finding buyers. This was up from about 6,000 units in the month of June and up from an average of 3,900 to 4,000 units monthly for the months of January to May 2018. With this, Proton expects its market share to be 11.7% of the Total Industry Volume.
Malaysian sales were driven by customers taking advantage of the zero rating for GST and should continue till the end of August 2018. 1st September 2018 shall see the SST or Sales Services Tax system back in place. Aside from that, the month of July 2018 also marked Proton's resumption of export activities with the first 517 units of cars shipped to the Middle East.
The Proton Saga and Persona are, as usual, the cash cows for Proton. The Saga did over 3,000 units in July making it the first time the model has done so this year. The Proton Persona sold 2,221 units and this was the first time the Persona sold over 2,000 units since May 2017. That is a long time ago actually.
The two models are the most popular models for Proton. Both are compact 4 door sedans in the A and B segment respectively. Proton is hopeful of carrying over this momentum even after SST has been introduced as they gear up for the launch of their first SUV, the Geely Boyue based vehicle, later in the year.
Of course, the numbers stated are impressive. But one must note that ALL manufacturers have actually broken all sorts of sales numbers ever since GST was zero rated. Whilst Proton basically made a 100% increase in sales numbers - slightly under 4,000 units prior to the zero rated GST to 8,000 over units, industry pundits state that Japanese car maker Toyota actually increased their sales numbers by 446% in the month of June 2018 from the previous month. Note that both Proton and Toyota were selling in the 4,000 unit region for the pre-zero GST period. So whilst Proton had an increase, nearly all the companies recorded a massive increase as even companies like Volvo Car Malaysia had basically cleared their SUV stocks in record time. Everyone is selling like hotcakes. Of course, I better state nearly everyone.
I also have to be proud of Proton to achieve this sales figure even though I mentioned other companies also profiting from this tax holiday period. It still shows that the Malaysian people buy Proton for their sedans and are super price sensitive when it comes to buying Proton. Give them a large enough discount or carrot dangling in front of them and they will go for a Proton. My opinion of Proton is that the cars are actually good value for money and the only reason people are not buying them in the numbers was down to its quality image due to its previously notorious aftersales reputation.
So it is because of this Proton cars are extremely price sensitive even though their current crop of models are quite good and are surprisingly economical - We even tried out in the Proton 1 Tank Adventure recently and managed over 640km on a single tank of fuel with over 9 liters of petrol to spare. These cars are on par in terms of fuel efficiency actually. If you had been following out Facebook page recently you would have seen out updates throughout the event held a few weeks ago. If time permits, a report will be written on it, but I think it will be combined into one article after the 1 Tank Adventure finals which I have to compete in. This is because we actually won the Proton Persona media challenge category (I was joined by Zachary Ho of Autoworld.com.my for the challenge). So take note folks.
Anyway, Proton has also announced that their Tabung Harapan Malaysia contribution by Proton amounts to RM81,020 for the month of July 2018 because of the increased sales. Proton had promised to contribute RM10 per vehicles sold during this period. So Malaysia the country will benefit from this zero GST sales period with this small gesture.
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