BMW M car sales to grow 20 per cent in 2016

Speaking to CarAdvice today at the brand’s announcement to re-enter motorsports in Australia, BMW Australia boss, Marc Werner, said the BMW M2 will likely become the best-selling M car for the brand.

“It has really great potential to be our biggest selling model.” Werner said.

“At the moment, the M3, together with M4, is our best selling model, however with the M2 we are in a completely different price bracket which is below $100,000, so we see substantial volume opportunities in that price corridor.”

The brand is expecting the new entry-model BMW M2 in the second quarter of 2016, while niche models such as the M4 GTS will help keep the performance sub-brand on a growth trajectory.

Werner says the success of performance models in Australia is due to those types of cars “suiting the Australian lifestyle” as they provide a “sporty” and “ostentatious” option for buyers.

The upcoming BMW M4 GTS is also set to become the most expensive M car of its size, with the undoubtedly collectable model already attracting interest from buyers.

Only be 700 M4 GTS vehicles will be built worldwide, but the number heading to Australia still remains under negotiation. Werner admitted the price will be reasonably higher than the standard car.

“[We would like] as many as possible. The minute we communicated the car would be available in Australia we had a lot of enquiries. You can expect, given the exclusivity of the car, it will be a substantial premium. [It will be be a] collector's item like the M3 CSL, which we launched a few years ago and if you look at the resale of that car…”

The success of performance brands in Australia is nothing new, with arch-rival Mercedes-AMG racking up an ever impressive 3729 sales year to date (Jan-Nov) with the performance brand hoping to top 4000 sales for the first time.

Porsche Australia has also enjoyed its best year on record, with 3948 units sold so far in 2015, a 56 percent growth year on year.