New statistics from Motorcheck.ie show that the new car industry has suffered an 18.5% drop in new car sales year on year.

The disappointing result comes despite some last minute registrations on the 31st of January (16% of the month's total). This brings the total number of new cars registered this year to 17,299.

Volkswagen maintain the top spot with 12.5% of sales, followed closely by Toyota with 10.7% and Ford at 10.6%.

The Ford Focus remains the most popular car in January with 4.8% of the market. The Volkswagen Golf came hot on its heels with 4.7% and Nissan Qashqai sales remain strong with 3.8% of the total sales.

HGV's (Heavy Goods Vehicles) were down by 7.3%, while LCV's (Light Commercial Vehicles) were down 9.3% over the same period.

Alan Nolan, Director General SIMI said: "There has been a slower start to the year than we would have hoped, given that there appear to be some positive signs on consumer confidence, but our sector has not yet seen any positive impact from this. It is, however, early days yet to judge how the year will pan out based on just one month’s figures, so we will all be following next month’s progress very closely.
The new number plate system was always going to be a slow start, with the change only announced in December, but we would expect to see increased interest as these cars are seen out on the road. Dealers have been reporting that some customers believe the new number plate is only for this year, so it’s worth underlining that the new number plate system is here to stay, with 141 being the number for January next year.

Although new car business has seen a slower start than last year, dealers are reporting that used cars are selling strongly which means continued demand for trade-ins and trade-in values holding up."