SCHAUMBURG, Ill. -

One Japanese brand, after battling numerous recalls and natural disasters the past few years, still remains a favorite among its loyal fans.

It was revealed Wednesday that Toyota Motor Sales,USA ranked highest in corporate loyalty for the second quarter of 2012, according to the Experian Automotive Loyalty and Market Trend analysis.

Experian said the OEM saw its corporate loyalty increase from 41.6 percent in Q2 2011 to 47.3 percent, “enabling it to pass both General Motors and Ford Motor Co.”

 “Toyota has historically had high loyalty (generally among the leaders with GM and Ford).  They had loyalty drop due to supply impact of Tsunami, but are rebounding. This, combined with GM and Ford loyalty dropping slightly, Toyota now finds themselves on top in corporate loyalty for Q2," Jeffrey Anderson, director of consulting and analytics for Experian Automotive, explained to Auto Remarketing.

Moreover, this increase marks the first time Toyota has achieved the top spot in corporate loyalty since Q3 2009. (Experian Automotive defines corporate loyalty as measuring whether a new vehicle purchase matches a prior vehicle owned at the corporate level.)
 
 “Toyota has done an outstanding job of regaining customer trust and getting repeat customers into showrooms,” said Anderson.

 “To restore normal operations and regain customer trust in such a short time following the earthquake and tsunami is a truly remarkable comeback,” he continued.

Next up, two domestic brands scored high in corporate loyalty, as well; General Motors came in at No. 2 with 46.2 percent, and Ford followed with 46.0 percent.
 
Hyundai Motor Group (45.3 percent) and Honda Motor Co. (43.1 percent), rounded out the top five.

And of the 3.6 million new registrations for Q2 of this year, Toyota also posted the largest unit sales gain with 145,000 additional registrations, followed by Chrysler with more than 83,000 new registrations.

“Total vehicle purchases were up by more than 370,000 units, going from 3.2 million registrations in Q2 2011 to 3.6 million in Q2 2012. This metric has been steadily increasing since the economic downturn, when vehicle purchases dropped to 2.5 million in Q2 2009,” Experian explained.
   
And what are some models pushing the high Chrysler registrations?

Anderson noted that the Chrysler 200 registrations increased by 17,400 year-over-year during the second quarter.  

Next up, Ram trucks saw 14,300 more registrations than Q2 2011, and the Dodge Avenger saw a rise of 11,400.

Rounding out the top five Chrysler units that seemed to be catching consumers eyes this second quarter were the Chrysler 300 (up 10,900 over Q2 2011) and the Jeep Wrangler (up 9,400 over Q2 2011).

Domestic Vehicles Dominate Brand Loyalty

As far as which brands and units succeeded in keeping customer’s attention this past quarter, Experian found that domestic vehicles dominated the list.
 
“In regards to Brand Loyalty, the Chevrolet Sonic was the top model, which means that 60.1 percent of Sonic owners who returned to the market bought another Chevrolet vehicle,” Experian explained.

The Blue Oval knocked out the rest of the top five with the Ford Fusion (59.9 percent), Ford Flex (55.0 percent), Ford Edge (54.0 percent) and Ford Five Hundred (52.0 percent) owners being the most loyal to the brand.

The Market Share Pie

Notching another No. 1 spot in Experian’s report, Toyota  had the biggest market share gain in Q2 with 2.8 percent.

On the other hand, GM had the steepest Q2 decline in market share, falling by 1.5 percent.

“Toyota’s resurgence has had impact on GM’s market share, as well as many other manufacturers including Ford and Hyundai.  While year-to-date figures show that GM is down versus 2011, they are trending upwards when compared to their share in Q1 2012. Ford has lost market share for last two quarters,” Anderson further explained.

That said, OEMs may see sales rising, as the age of vehicles on the road continues to rise.

The average age of vehicle has increased from 10.6 years in Q2 2011 to 10.8 years in Q2 2012, according to Experian.

 “Owners replacing their older vehicles will return to market and purchase new and used vehicles. The new-vehicle sales decline in 2009 is having an impact in used-vehicle inventory, so folks that may have been interested in a late-model used vehicle may turn to a new vehicle instead,” Anderson concluded.

The company also noted that complete findings from the Q2 2012 Experian Automotive industry Loyalty and Market Trend report will be presented in a Webinar today at 2 p.m. EST.

Go here to register. 

Experian Automotive also provided the following infographic to illustrate its findings: