The floods last year saw an almost complete cessation of Honda’s manufacturing ability in Thailand. Heart-rending photographs of submerged Hondas, all lined up on their way to the crusher, were in every newspaper. There were those who even suggested that Honda would never recover from the disaster.
Well, the doomsayers have certainly been proved wrong. The latest statistics would show that Honda has done more than bounced back, it is now Number 2 in Thailand’s car market after perennial leader Toyota. For those who like reading the numbers, Honda has sold almost 104,000 vehicles in the past six months. This represents a 15 percent market share.
Honda Brio
In the eco-car ranks, the Honda Brio is the outstanding model for my money. The Mitsubishi Mirage and the Nissan March, quite frankly, look the same, while the Brio has a fresh snappy look to it.
In the six months of this year, Honda is now offering nine models, six assembled here, three imports from Japan and a choice of three fuel types in some models (E85, Hybrid and CNG).
One measurement of a model’s popularity is the waiting list. The new Civic had 25,000 reservations in the first five months of it becoming available, the Honda City CNG 18,000 reservations in three months and the new CRV enjoying 8,000 reservations in one month.
