September success reverses trend for used truck classifieds

Age doesn’t tend to be so much of an issue for heavy goods vehicles as it is for passenger cars, so the September plate change didn’t have a huge impact on a stable used truck market.

Last month, I ended this look back at the commercialmotor.com classified figures with a prediction. I presumed the plate change in September would help reverse some negative numbers of interest in the Scania P-Series that had previously crashed to a 34% drop in views, which I’d put down to availability and a lack of units for sale in the market.

Well, I’m pleased to say that I was right, in that views of P-series listings have indeed rebounded, and were up 9.9% during the month of September. However, I won’t be buying a lottery ticket just yet. Drunk on the success of three consecutive months of growth, I’d expected a bumper month in September.

While the commercial vehicle industry is less fixated on plates than the passenger car market, there is still an impact on a new registration month. The inevitable passing of time downgrades us all, but heavy goods vehicles, in particular, are resilient (almost immune) to the label of being ‘old’. While a nearly new low-mileage model is often the holy grail of the used truck market – especially when advertised in the open market – it’s less about the age than it is about the condition and kilometres.

As good examples of such trucks are hard still to come by – but getting easier – we’re experiencing a continued increase in web traffic to the classifieds, with September seeing yet another month of search growth. Traffic to the classifieds increased by 2.4% from August to September. Normally that would be a poor result, as August is traditionally a slow period, but as all of the summer months have seen increases, a cooling in September isn’t a surprise.

The question remains over whether we will have a warm run-up to Christmas, or if the classifieds will cool off. Looking at the rest of September, there are some very positive overall figures. Tractor unit searches were up 14%, while rigid searches were up 10%. Trailers searches fell slightly by 1.3% and vans enjoyed 5.5% more traffic than the previous month.

The most in-demand manufacturer was Scania, with 9.8% more views of listings for the brand in September than August, followed closely by Volvo, which nearly managed to take the top spot (a rare feat) thanks to a 14.8% increase. Predictably, DAF took third space, up 13.7%, followed by MAN (+5.5%) and Mercedes-Benz (+11.9%), but it was Iveco that stole a march as the most improved this time around. Its 17.3% increase even put it ahead of Renault Trucks in the overall rankings.

enault Trucks in the overall rankings. Volvo did manage to secure first position for its FH in the searches for individual vehicle models. A 10.6% increase enabled the FH to comfortably beat the MercedesBenz Actros (-10%) into second, which held onto its position by the narrowest of margins over the Scania S-series (+23.5%).

There were also strong gains for the DAF XF (+24.6%), Mercedes Axor (+23.8%) and MAN TGL (+27.1%), but the high-fliers this month were the Scania G-series with a 51.7% increase, Renault Range T with a 32.1% gain, and a surprise entry for any listing within the category of ‘Classic Truck’, up 30.5%. More on that in a moment.

There were several fallers, but nothing too dramatic. Stability seems to be setting in, so the 9.7% dip for the MAN TGX and a 2.7% drop in Scania P-series listing views are about as bad as it got inside the top 25 most-viewed listings.

Now, to the business of the golden boy (or girl) of this month. The star listing was a Scania G-series, helping considerably with the 51.7% increase in traffic views. Were it not for this individual listing, the Scania G-series would have finished the month with a much more modest 15% increase in views. The listing in question also appears to be nothing special – a 16-plate G450 with 802,000km on the clock. To say the classifieds are a mysterious place is an understatement. 

Which brings us back to the ‘Classic Truck’ boost, where a Foden Alpha tipper from 2001 with a modest 91,000km on the clock has been exciting classified browsers. Whether or not a Foden Alpha counts as a ‘classic’ is debatable, but its sale by Protruck Auctions earlier in the month proved there was still a modest amount of interest in something that is now a little out of the ordinary.

- This article was previoulsy published in Commercial Motor, to subscribe see the latest Commercial Motor subscription offer