Photo: Renz Dimaandal

Tesla Model 3 became the third best-selling car in New Zealand in August, only slightly behind its polluting rivals. Model Y, which only started deliveries a few weeks ago, earned fourth place.

Just three weeks before the end of August, Tesla resumed production at Giga Shanghai after a major upgrade. The Model 3 and Model Y production lines were shut down alternately for about five weeks, but the result was excellent. The modernization made it possible to significantly increase production capacity and now, the global automotive markets have begun to be saturated again with Tesla cars, after a long pause.

Throughout August, Tesmanian reported on a large number of ships carrying Tesla vehicles to Australia. A lot of the cars were also delivered to New Zealand, where they set new records, creating strong competition for petrol cars and showing that electric vehicles are gaining more and more consumer interest.

Tesla Model 3, with 745 sales, became the third best-selling car in the country, relatively not far behind its competitors, according to Waka Kotahi. The car was only behind two pickup trucks: the Ford Ranger with 934 units and in first place, and the Toyota Hilux with 867 registrations, in second. Obviously, Tesla Model 3 was the best-selling mid-size car.

Even more remarkable, the newcomer, whose deliveries only started a few weeks ago, Tesla Model Y, achieved fourth place as the best-selling passenger car in New Zealand in August, with 581 sales. Closing out the top 5 was Mitsubishi Outlander with 486 units sold.

Electric vehicles continue to gain popularity and Tesla vehicles are in their own league. They are not just competing in the EV market, they are gradually but surely replacing gasoline cars, showing automakers that electric vehicles are the future. Last month, New Zealand’s electric vehicle sales performed strongly, with 2,560 new registrations. This is a significant increase from July, when only 550 electric vehicles were registered. Obviously, this result was made possible by Tesla's sales. While in July, its cars were not delivered to New Zealand, in August their number reached 1,326, or 52% of all EV registrations.

In addition, selling only two models in New Zealand brought Tesla another achievement. Tesla became the fourth best-selling car brand in the country with a 9% market share.

© 2022, Eva Fox | Tesmanian. All rights reserved.

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Article edited by @SmokeyShorts; follow him on Twitter

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