Korea Premium Sales : 2015-2023

While mainstream cars are all but nonexistent on Korea, the desirability of premium marques allows them to fare far better. I'm not sure this goes down too well.

Genesis is the leading premium marque and by some distance. It started in 2003 but became a stand alone brand in late 2015. However, it was in 2020 that it took the lead with gusto. 

In 2023 registrations added up to 126,600 units with the G80 being the best selling model (43,200).

BMW has been advancing steadily and pipped MB in 2023, with 77,400 sales. The 5-Series/i5 was by far the top model for the marque with 21,400 finding new owners.

Mercedes-Benz has been the second strongest marque for a few years now but a slight fall to 76,700 sales in 2023 put it back into third. Its big hitter is the E-Class with 23,600 sold. 

After that, the gap to the other players is not inconsiderable. Audi used to be much stronger but it was punished as a result of Dieselgate and sales all but stopped in 2017. Then a slow rebuild of sales. 

They have come back to some degree but have not fully recovered. In total 17,900 cars were delivered by the Audi importer with the A6 accounting from 7,600 of those. 

The chart below repeats the lower part of the main chart as it expands the lesser marque's sales so we can see things in more detail.

Volvo has been growing and nearly reached Audi with 17,000 cars registered. Volvo is well ahead of Audi in 2024 so another good year for the brand. 5,860 XC60 models were delivered. 

Tesla is a late arrival, gaining momentum quickly but then leveling off. 16,800 were sold with the Model Y doing the heavy lifting. 

Lexus delivered 13,600 cars, led by the ES model. It has a settled Toyota look to volume. Porsche sold 11,350 cars, the Cayenne being the leading model. The marque had a good over the past few years.

Land Rover is now alone with Jaguar pulled from the market in 2022. 5,000 Land Rovers were sold in 2023 with the Range Rover by far the biggest selling model.

Finally an unusual combination of Lincoln and Cadillac under the USA label. They are not big in numbers with 5,000 sales between them in 2018 the best result. So I combined them. 

I didn't include Infiniti as there are enough brands there already and the fact sales were low, not exceeding 3,200 (in 2016). It was also pulled from the market in 2020. 

Summary: Much more activity going on here than with mainstream cars. There are also many luxury marques plying their wares but their data is scarce.