Strong sales pave way for new Mazda3
April 7, 2009 by David Twomey
The first three months of this year have been a big success for Mazda Australia, which celebrates the arrival of its all-new Mazda3 with record market share.
CarAdvice is attending the launch of the new Mazda3 and we will have a First Steer for you on Wednesday.
According to March VFACTS figures Mazda has achieved a year-to-date market share of 8.9 per cent. This new benchmark is up 0.7 per cent on the previous record set in the same month last year.
Mazda has reinforced its position as the country’s top-selling full-line vehicle importer and has retailed 19,024 new cars so far this year.
The first shipment of New Generation Mazda3s bound for Australian dealerships comes in the same week sales figures confirm Mazda sold 2801 of the last remaining current-generation Mazda3s in Australia last month.
The New Generation Mazda3 sedan and hatch range officially goes on sale this week.
Mazda sold a total of 6116 new vehicles in March securing the company the number four spot on the sales chart.
Year-to-date the first-generation Mazda3 is the country’s best-selling small car, with 8914 sales, up 1.5 percent year-on-year. The stylish Mazda6 is the number one medium import, with 2138.
Mazda Australia Managing Director Doug Dickson said the company is confident the New Generation Mazda3 will reap the same sales success the first-generation model has enjoyed over the past five years.
“It’s pleasing to see the outgoing Mazda3 selling so strongly in its last month on sale. March has paved the way for the arrival of the New Generation Mazda3 that takes the perennially popular first-generation model to a whole new level.
“The New Generation Mazda3 comes at a time where Australians are turning to smaller, more practical vehicles that offer high levels of luxury in an affordable and economical package.
“The New Generation Mazda offers just that, and sets new benchmarks in style, refinement and dynamics and we’re confident it will hit the sweet spot with Australian new car buyers.”
Print it: 
Looks like a happy car!!! =D
Does indeed Chinese. Not nice in white though, too much of a colour differential between dark and light. I’d buy a darker colour paintwork.
good on Mazda, slowly getting there, least their cars ain’t boring like numero uno’s!!!
I think the 2nd to last para says it all when considering the previous CA article concerning government cars being sorced from no Aussie made stuff.
It was not that long ago Ford saved Mazda from destruction. Maybe Ford should have taken some small car advice from Mazda? A great success for Mazda and well deserved too. I bet Toyota don’t like loosing Corolla ground to the Mazda. It’s just a better looking car.
I have been waiting to buy a car of this segment (medium small) since several months and I have waited this long just to see how this Mazda3 is. My budget is 25000 max (including everything). As I need an automatic – it seems that this car is going to be beyond that. Unless Mazda has some special deal (and why would they since the sale is expected a strong one).
Looking at the Mazda web site I find nothing much exciting (compared to other cars) apart from slightly sleeker design. However, the happy grill is appalling. I saw this car in melbourne Motor Show and it is utterly foolish looking. Really stupid design, IMO. I will do a test drive anyway. Good that the base model has ESP, but not enough airbags and NO cruise-control and that is what will put me off Mazda 3. Mazda has missed the point here: Base model should include all safety and essential feature and they should add more luxury feature for higher ones. That is a way to get 5 star ANCAP and good reviews. I think it will manage to get 4 stars again.
I doubt the success will be like for the previous Mazda 3. Better competitor out there including Lancer and i30 – for cheaper price.
Its a good car, although recently was small car shopping for the missus and Mazda 3 are not as “cheap” as I originally thought.
But nonetheless they do have more features than the base Corolla, on par with the Civic but with a crappier interior… (all base specs).
The new one looks to be the goods too, but no doubt word of mouth and hype has helped it along.
The new one should dominate small car sales for the next year, unfortunately compared to other years it wont be anything special due to this crisis.
Should light a fire under Toyota’s butt and force Honda to stop over charging for Civics.
That is one nice looking car. They had one at the Melbourne Motor Show. Can’t wait to read the bfirst drive report tomorrow.
looking forward to test driving the MPS…if its good….me get one ;)
Has this new Mazda3 been wacked with the ugly stick or what. It has one huge face…
That is not very nice Mike. I think the toothless grin gives it charm.
Salesman, why would Ford need to take small car advice from Mazda? The Focus is a great car, and arguably dynamically superior to the Mazda as well. Its only failing is the rear styling is a little bland and its got a Ford badge on it, which in this country means its a petrol-guzzling barge taxi like my ol’ pa’s EA Falcon. Ford just really need to scream from the hill tops ‘We’re not the Ford Falcon company!’. Ford has a marketing problem, not a car problem.
On topic, I don’t really like the new face (too big and stupid looking) but if it gets more people out of Corolla’s then thats a good thing.
Tom,
I think you just answered your own question. Style, product perception, marketing. All important aspects when attracting traffic into the showroom. I don’t think one product is better than the other. But the public obviously do.
I agree with Tom about the front looking too big and stupid.
lol the front looks like a happy peugeot!
I like it!
The only problem with the current gen Mazda3 is that others notably the Focus and Lancer are starting to flog this for kit and price.
All the mazda needs to do is top up the kit, and away it will sail again.
Airbags???? not even the well kitted Lancer gets a fully complimented kit of them in the base model.
Just to note the new Focus comes out next month
Im surprised you havent already had a drive of one of these C/A.
The new focus is out ‘next month’. I didnt know, but all in all it will be good for a smart company. Mazda deserves this and they should definetly do well.
This new model will be priced a bit higher but aparrently have a lot more features than the outgoing model (bluetooth, satnav standard on maxx sport, sp25 models) and is dynamically superior to corolla so deserves to be number 1 in its class.
Seen a blue hatch driving down the hwy the other day (think it was a maxx sport), looked really good.
with a big price up on the runout model they may have just priced themselfs out of the market as they did with the mazda 6! price going up sales going down! good looking car but at what price?
that grill looks childish,like something out of the movie cars. it gives the impression that the designers ran out of ideas and just thought “i dunno lets just give it a smiley face”
Blitzkrieg, the “smiley face” is a product of Mazda’s nagare design philosophy, and not merely because they were watching too many children’s movies.
It’s been mentioned often that in person, it’s harder to notice the grin. For one thing, people aren’t generally 1 m tall, where that last picture would dominate your vision. At eye level, it’s less noticeable. I plan to view the car in person before supplying judgement; I would hardly wish to reject such a competitively priced and specced car because it was smiling at me in a photo taken using a cricket bat as a camera stand.
$21990-$32950 is hardly pricing themselves out of the market considering honda has just released a 40k civic.
Oh and can’t wait to read tomorrows first drive CA. Specs make these car look very promosing
the price increase happened before the model changeover
‘09 plate stock went up $2K before this model arrived.
There was only one production month this year of the last model.
Everyones prices of imported cars is going up.
Mitsubishi has also increased their prices to name another one.
Falcadore,
True this model has more specs, but it needs it.
Satnav on the Maxx???
thats not bad then…..
An interesting decent looking smiley faced non-Peugeot car at last.
I just sold my 08 mazda 2 and i really want one of these in black but the price is a little high for the base neo Auto… This is one pricy car when you can buy an I30 drive away for $19990 man and $21990 auto… :( cry