The company saw its domestic sales fall by 10 percent year on year in January 2014. It was the only car maker among the nation’s five major ones to suffer a negative growth during last month.
Even in 2013, Kia Motors suffered a setback in domestic sales, reporting a 5-percent decline from a year ago, in contrast to the marked growth of GM Korea, Renault Samsung, and Ssangyong Motor.
Kia Motors also suffered a negative growth in U.S. sales. Hyundai Motor posted a 2-percent growth but Kia Motors suffered a 4-percent decline, dragging down their overall sales by 0.6 percent.
Negatively affected by the unfavorable currency movements, Kia Motors suffered a 9.8-percent decline in operating profit last year, despite a 0.8-percent growth in sales.
Thus far, Kia Motors has been acclaimed as accomplishing design innovation with a differentiating product strategy which led to development of the K Series (K3, K5, K7 and K9). In recent days, however, consumers are turning away from Kia models as it repeatedly released similarly designed models.
