Goodbye Jimny??

It will be interesting to see how the Jimny saga plays out.  Suzuki isn't active in the US, and is probably not large enough in Europe to be drawing a lot of profit there.  In India, the Jimny is seen as a pricey alternative to more popular local competition.  In Japan, Oz, South Africa, and Latin America it definitely has a solid following.

So what does that add up to?  Presumably Suzuki and Maruti would continue to take marginal profits since they have already invested in the tooling.  I don't think either company is hitting limits in production capacity for some other model for which they are struggling to meet demand.  But the minute they stop making money per unit, neither company really has the resources to just keep stamping them out for the sake of the brand.  

Bottom line, it seems to me the Gen4 has some room to run, but I don't think any of us should really be surprised if it doesn't last the decade.

Don't tip it over on that offroad weekend, you might not be able to replace it. 

My take on this is that there is a good chance of the Jimny going the (old) Defender 90 route if production stops, with demand from Jimny followers pushing the prices up to crazy levels as soon as new vehicle supply dries up. As a true 4x4 there is little at present to challenge it in this market segment, but the segment is small and becomming more niche by the year.

fordem wrote:

If my dealer was to be believed, Suzuki has the problem that every vehicle manufacturer dreams of having, they can't build them fast enough to meet the market demand.

Sometimes you have to read between the lines a bit though.

I no idea on Jimny sales numbers, as I couldn't find any numbers online apart from one article saying a record number of over 800 in a month sold in Oz recently. Which would look to be 10-12k units a year tops there if they monthly numbers are similar.

But just because there is low supply, does not mean high demand or high production numbers.

I recall speaking with Jeep UK many years ago, who proclaimed they'd pre-sold every Wrangler Rubicon coming into the UK for the next 12 months.... great. But I think it was either 6 or 10 vehicles only allocated to the UK. So 100% success on sales of next to nothing.

Same with Toyota, lots of noise in the press a couple of years back on how the GR86 "sold out" in less than 48hrs. But they were only importing something like a 100 vehicles into a country of 65 million people!

It gets more bonkers: Suzuki have imposed a registrations limit for each dealer to contain the non-EV fines.  Some dealers have just about hit the limit for Q4 and won't be able to sell any new cars in December.  A dealer I spoke to this morning has two left for 2024.

Presumably they are hoping the electric Vitara will save them, but they'll need to keep it under £40k including metallic paint, or the luxury rate of VED applies.  Hyundai are just managing that with the 64kWh Kona, but probably not for much longer.

It really is a sad time to be a car enthusiast. Everything is just little better than a white good like a fridge or a toaster there really isn't anything quirky or interesting this side of a hundred grand.

According to Auto Express, there won't be a Jimny EV because it would weigh too much and no longer be a Jimny.  Suzuki are pinning their hopes on biofuels to keep it going.

For perspective, the lightest new eVitara, which has a rather modest range, is half a ton heavier than the lightest petrol Vitara.  So that's pretty much what you'd need to add to a Jimny.