The latest figures showing how the tractor brands present in the UK are performing have been released by the Agricultural Engineers Association. These represent the tractor registered both under and over 50hp for the year of 2019. As always, due to competition rules the figures are only released one year in arrears.
While the figures published represent registrations and not sales, they are an indication of purchasing trends. Overall registrations were up by 120 units, representing a 0.9 per cent increase on 2018.
The top brands of 2018, John Deere, New Holland and Case IH all saw less registrations on the year, with top ranked Deere seeing a 5.9 per cent drop, equating to 240 less units, finishing the year on 3,800 registrations. Case IH had 296 less registrations, at 1,204 units, equating to a 19.7 per cent reduction, meaning it dropped from third to fourth place in the overall rankings. New Holland fared slightly better with a drop of 8.6 per cent, or 217 units, to level the year at 2,314 registrations and remain in second place.
John Deere’s market share dropped from nearly 32 per cent to just over 28 per cent, while CNH Industrials (Case IH and New Holland) went from 29.2 per cent to 26 per cent.
Several brands actually saw substantial growth. The biggest climber was Agco brand, Massey Ferguson. After dropping to fourth place in 2018, it bounced back up to third, with 317 more units registered on the previous year, representing a 23.5 per cent growth, totalling 1,665 units.
Sister brand Valtra also saw good growth with 749 registrations, an increase of 84, however, it slipped down to eighth place in the table. The remaining Agco brand, Fendt saw a slight loss, with three less units at 921. Its market share was relatively stagnant at 6.7 per cent compared to 6.8 per cent the previous year.
Kubota cemented sixth place in the rankings, with 141 more registrations at 887, an increase of 18.9 per cent on 2018. Market share also grew to 6.5 per cent.
The largest percentage growth was Claas with 47.3 per cent more registrations than the previous year, equating to 250 more units registered. Its total registrations for 2019 were 778, compared to the previous year of 528, growing its market share by nearly two per cent and climbing above Valtra to seventh place.
JCB saw a small decline with 23 less registrations at 278, while Same Deutz-Fahr saw an increase of 34 taking its total to 243 and rounding off the top 10.
Agri Argo brands of McCormick and Landini both saw modest growths of 17 and three units, respectively, taking their tallies to 103 and 48. Zetor has dropped off the official figures and joins the ‘others’ group, which saw a growth of 10.6 per cent, totalling 555 registrations.