The redesigned Range Rover proves the adage that new <span/>product can invigorate the buyer base

Range Rover owners are an extremely loyal bunch - particularly when their favorite model's decade-long product cycle was extended by pandemic-related supply chain issues. But <span/>absence of new <span/>product did in fact make their hearts grow fonder.

The Land Rover Range Rover led all models with a 41.1% cumulative year-to-date model loyalty rate through April, for models with more than 350 return-to-market households, according to <span/>S&P Global Mobility analysis. That gave it a narrow edge over the Ford F-Series full-size pickup line at 41.0% and the Tesla Model Y at 40.0%. The industry average year-to-date model loyalty rate was 25.1% through April.

Since Range Rover is a <span/>relatively low-volume vehicle, metrics such as loyalty can swing more sharply than those of a huge seller like F-Series, said Tom Libby, associate director for loyalty solutions and industry analysis at S&P Global Mobility. Still, there are plenty of lower-volume vehicles that do not attract this sort of model-line loyalty when they are redesigned.

The Range Rover loyalty rate helped hoist parent Land Rover brand loyalty to 38.9% year-to-date - a 9.5 percentage-point increase year-over-year. For reference, Tesla led luxury brands with 68.0 percent loyalty.

The delayed-response explanation tracks data and company reports about Land Rover's difficulty getting <span/>needed computer chips as it was launching the new Range Rover. The redesigned fifth-generation Range Rover went on sale in the US in May 2022, but inventories have been tight. Range Rover available retail advertised inventory stayed under <span/>11 days for the past eight months, with a mere 6.2 days in April, according to S&P Global Mobility analysis.

Despite the inventory shortfall and the abbreviated selling period last year, the Range Rover nonetheless won the 2022 S&P Global Mobility Loyalty Award for the Luxury Full-Size <span/>SUV segment.

With the updated version, Land Rover is rolling out a broader Range Rover lineup that includes seven-seat versions to match luxury-utility competitors. The brand plans to release a Range Rover electric vehicle next year.

2023 S&P GLOBAL MOBILITY LOYALTY AWARDS

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This article was published by S&P Global Mobility and not by S&P Global Ratings, which is a separately managed division of S&P Global.