NISSAN Australia has set a target of 1500-1600 sales a month for its new Series III Navara and has a big job ahead as it strives to return its all-important one-tonne ute to at least third position in the high-volume segment behind the market-leading Toyota HiLux and Ford Ranger.

This expectation of a podium position is one that Nissan has shouldered for some time, and the new senior management team led by managing director Stephen Lester is banking on the latest series upgrade – among ongoing improvements and other product actions – to move the Navara up from sixth last year to third.

To reach this mark, Nissan will need to take Navara’s sales well beyond the 19,200 forecasted for this year (based on up to 1600 per month) to around 24,000 units – or 2000 per month – if not quite a bit more, presuming its major rivals will experience ongoing growth this year.

Last year, Navara, with 16,532 sales, trailed the Isuzu Ute D-Max (17,717), Holden Colorado (21,579) and Mitsubishi Triton (23,605), the latter finishing third behind the dominant Ranger (42,728) and segment-leading HiLux (47,093).

The other major players in the segment are the Mazda BT-50 (14,119) and Volkswagen Amarok (9282).

As with its competitors, the vast majority of Navara’s sales came in the fast-growing 4×4 sector, but the Nissan ute was the only one among the top six to experience a year-on-year downturn (-5.2%, 13,149) – as opposed to double-digit improvements in line with overall segment growth of 12.8 per cent.

Ranger 4×4 led the way (+19.6%, 36,932), followed by HiLux (+13.6%, 35,297), Triton (+14.2%, 20,513) and Colorado (+16.8%, 19,107), leaving Navara – despite the downturn – with its nose in front of D-Max (+13.0%, 12,795).

The BT-50 4×4 slipped last year (-6.2%, 8900), while Amarok surged forward (+16.3%, 8722).

Navara fared better in the lower-volume 4×2 class, its 3383 sales marking a solid 17.0 per cent increase over 2016, while the other leading contenders experienced mixed fortunes in this sector – perhaps as buyers increasingly migrate to 4×4 and, as a consequence, the segment contracts (-4.8% last year).

HiLux 4×2 was the standout (+7.0%, 11,796) as Ranger held second (-4.3%, 5796), followed by BT-50 (+4.1%, 5219) and D-Max (-2.3%, 4922). Navara finished ahead of Triton (-21.3%, 3092) and Colorado (+21.6%, 2472).

While the 4×2 result is welcome, Nissan’s focus is clearly on 4×4, from which the company expects to win 80 per cent of overall Navara volume.

Mr Lester would not offer other specific volume aspirations for Navara at the D23 Series III launch late last month, and the global head of Nissan’s light-commercial vehicles division, Ashwani Gupta, who is charged with achieving at least a 40 per cent increase in LCV sales volume worldwide by 2022, told GoAuto: “We know we had some challenges before, but now with this update we are pretty sure that we are going to grow significantly.”

If circa-20,000 is the immediate goal for the D23 Navara, returning to a peak of 26,045 achieved in 2012 with the previous combined D40/D22 generations – a result that placed it a strong second behind HiLux – will also figure in Nissan Australia’s calculations before pushing up with further growth from there.

The model changeover to D23/NP300 in 2015 saw Nissan manage to post only 13,897 sales that year (down from 16,080 in 2014 and 24,108 a year earlier), while a full range in 2016 brought an improvement to 16,755 units, before a 1.3 per cent slip last year to 16,532.

In January, Navara did indeed climb to third in segment with 1578 sales, inching ahead of Triton (1533) and Colorado (1390) as HiLux (3860) and Ranger (3260) continued on their merry way, while VFACTS figures released this week see it back in fourth position after two months of trading (3357). It sold 1779 units last month.

As HiLux (8286) and Ranger (6804) remain the dominant forces, Triton (3427) has pushed back up to third year-to-date, with Navara fourth ahead of a struggling Colorado (2429), a resurgent BT-50 (2237) and solid-performing D-Max (2205).

A study of the marketplace and D23 Navara’s sales performance last year has given Nissan Australia a clear idea of who to target going forward, and the variants to highlight across the comprehensive 35-variant range.

The overwhelming majority of buyers – 90 per cent – are expected to opt for the dual cab, compared to seven per cent for single cab and just three per cent for the king cab.

By the same token, 90 per cent of these will specify a pick-up rear end, leaving only 10 per cent choosing a cab chassis.

The model grade is skewed towards higher-spec vehicles, with 36 per cent for ST and 30 per cent for the flagship ST-X – the remainder seeing an even 16/17 per cent split between RX/SL respectively and a mere one per cent for the farm-oriented DX workhorse – while 70 per cent are expected to go for an automatic transmission.

The split between private buyers and ABN holders is 55/45 per cent respectively.

Asked by GoAuto at the Series III launch last week to specify what more would be done to boost Navara’s sales, Mr Lester offered no specifics but pointed to the potential of new model variants, ongoing specification changes and special editions.

He also said he was less focused on price reductions and a return to a sub-$25,000 or even sub-$20,000 entry point, which was lost early last year with the deletion of the 2.5-litre four-cylinder petrol engine.

According to Nissan executives at the time, the reason behind the decision was the cost involved in upgrading the powertrain to meet ever-tightening emissions regulations as the reason behind its decision.

Newly appointed directors Edward Butler (sales) and Geraldine Davys (marketing) and their teams, including the retail network, will now be targeting heavy and cut-through promotion of Series III and special offers in the marketplace.

Further down the track, they should be aided by more substantial model changes such as a higher-powered flagship sports variant – which is now on the table, as GoAuto reported from the launch – and new technology including advanced driver-assist safety features, as seen overseas.

The Navara nameplate has been on the local market since 1986, when the D21 series arrived with the shift from Datsun to Nissan product in Australia.

D21 achieved 49,430 sales between 1986 and 1998, while the D22 sold between 1997 and 2015 racked up 107,959 units. The D40 introduced in 2005 hauled in 128,304 sales over its decade-long run. New registrations of the D23 launched in June 2015 had reached 41,726 at the end of last year.

All up, and not including the Datsun 720 sold in the early 1980s, that’s more than 327,000 ute sales from the Japanese brand in Australia – a mark of Navara’s enduring popularity and reason enough for Nissan to pull it out of its current rut and take it to new heights.

By Terry Martin