AutoBeta(AutoBeta.net)10/23 Report--

The 300th vehicle of the WEY brand was officially off the line at the Great Wall Automobile Xushui Factory a few days ago. It means that Great Wall WEY has become the first independent luxury brand to achieve the production of 300000 vehicles, and it is not easy for it to break the 300, 000 threshold despite the overall slowdown in China's auto market.

WEY, a high-end market brand under Great Wall Motors, was founded in 2016. Its products are mainly SUV models, including compact, medium and new energy models. At present, there are a total of five models on sale, namely, the VV5 positioning compact SUV, VV6; positioning medium SUV VV7 and sedan VV7 GT, and plug-in hybrid P8 models. In just three years, it has set a new record for Chinese luxury brands to reach their sales target of 300000.

In recent years, more and more self-branded car companies have begun to set up high-end brands, including the WEY brand of Great Wall, the Lock brand of Geely and the Starway brand of Chery, many Chinese brands have launched a new round of impact on the middle and high-end market.

The first person to create the high-end market of its own brand was not Great Wall WEY, but Chery's Qoros, but later experienced high-level turmoil, equity transfer and other storms, and did not launch a new car for a long time. Sales have plummeted, with Qoros sales of 7343 vehicles in the first half of this year, down 75.94 per cent from a year earlier.

Compared with Qoros, sales of Great Wall WEY are much better. In the first half of this year, the WEY brand sold a total of 46900 new cars, but due to the market environment, it fell 39.62% from the same period last year. Lecker, a subsidiary of Geely, which was founded in 2016, performed slightly well in the first half of this year. In the first half of this year, the total sales of the Lecker brand reached 55900 vehicles, an increase of 20.81% over the same period last year. It is the independent high-end car brand that breaks through the 200000 sales mark as soon as possible.

This is also due to the fact that there are already more WEY models than Lectra, and from the perspective of the Chinese market, the SUV market is more popular than the car market, and WEY also captures more domestic consumers with more space, while Lecker feels like a young minority.

Of course, it is inseparable from the image of Harvard as the "SUV leader". With Harvard H6 ranking first in the domestic SUV market all the year round, it also brings brand trust to WEY.

Compared with previous achievements, WEY's sales this year are still in double digits compared with the same period last year, with cumulative sales of 13125 vehicles from January to September this year, down more than 70 per cent from the same period last year. At present, the cumulative sales of WEY's flagship model VV7 in September are 1568, down nearly 50% from January to September compared with the same period last year. Sales from January to September are also down more than 70%. Only VV6 has become the backbone of WEY brand sales with monthly sales of nearly 5, 000.

The poor overall situation of the car market this year is also one of the reasons, but not the main reason. As the Harvard F-Series is aimed at the purchase needs of young people, it has redesigned or adjusted a new car line in terms of design, configuration and chassis adjustment, and quickly gained market recognition after its launch.

For example, the Great Wall Harvard F7 and VV5 have become the reasons for many consumers to choose. The former has more space, while the latter is of higher quality. In order to maintain the high-end image of WEY, the Great Wall offers few discounts, and F7 also grabs more market share of WEY.

Overall, it is a milestone for a WEY brand that has only been established for three years and whose actual sales are only two years old. Today, with the successful launch of the 300,000 vehicle, WEY has become the first and fastest Chinese luxury brand to achieve this achievement, leading Chinese brands upward with a pioneering attitude.

Welcome to subscribe to the WeChat public account "Automotive Industry Focus" to get the first-hand insider information on the automotive industry and talk about things in the automotive circle. Welcome to break the news! WeChat ID autoWechat