Encouraging 3% growth in motorcycle registrations for February

“February 2020 has delivered a strong 3% increase in motorcycle sales compared to last year, improving a typically quiet month,” said Stephen Latham, Head of the National Motorcycle Dealers Association (NMDA) which represents motorcycle retailers across the UK.

4,607 new motorcycles were registered in February, up from 4,473 in February 2019. In terms of year-to-date, the market has grown 2.9%, from 10,449 in 2019 to 10,753 in 2020 so far.

Growth in terms of engine bands was seen across the board, with the biggest coming from 651-1000cc at 27.7%, and over 1000cc at 7.3%. Only the 126-650cc band saw a decline, from 1,078 in February 2019 to 955 in February 2020.

Naked motorcycles again showed encouraging growth with an increase of 14.4% to 1,389 units. Sport/tour bikes saw a big 88.2% change from 51 last year to 96 this year, with adventure sport and customs also growing. Drops were seen in the motorcycle scooter category, falling by -6.3%, alongside touring and trail/enduro.

The Honda PCX 125 was again the most registered model with 190 units, followed by the Honda Z 125 MA with 85, and the Lexmoto LXR 125 SY 125-10 in third with 51 sales.

Lexmoto retained its position as the third best-selling brand of February 2020, with Honda remaining at the top with 1,124 registrations, and Yamaha a distant second with 591. After a strong January, Royal Enfield dropped out of the top 10, with SYM entering at number 10 for the first time in many months. February is a month that often distorts the normal market trends and so it was with brands like Suzuki and Ducati were not amongst the top-ten brands in registration volumes.

Latham continued: “Although motorcycle dealers have felt optimistic about market demand for this year, the recent negative effects of the coronavirus pandemic are bound to supress market confidence for March.

“We hope that the March plate change and orders in January and February being registered in March will be able to combat the potential impact of coronavirus on the market.”

Results taken from the Motorcycle Industry Association Press Statistics February 2020 – New Motorcycle registrations.