25% of South Africa's vehicle sales are made up of bakkies, and our love affair with these tough machines grows stronger and stronger each and every year. The industry body, NAAMSA, released its January 2014 figures of the best selling bakkies in South Africa, which supplemented the release of figures for passenger cars.

Bakkies for January 2014

Toyota Hilux – 2772

Ford Ranger – 1656
Chevrolet Utility – 1332
Isuzu KB – 1271
Nissan NP200 – 1171

The above list also makes the other half of the total new vehicle sales in January.

For many years, the Toyota Hilux has been the leader of this pack, and there is nothing to indicate a change at the top, and with Toyota committing over R1-billion in investments at its Durban-based plant, there's no doubt that the capacity to produce their cars, most especially the Hilux, which is their number motor vehicle, will continue.

Second on the list is the Ford Ranger. This is by far the big daddy of all of Ford's offerings in South Africa. The half-tonner is very popular down here, and if there is success for the new aluminium body of the Ford F-150, we wouldn't be delusional to think the same elements will be incorporated in the Ranger as well.

GM South Africa was really undecided what to call this when it first rolled out the assembly, but since 2010, the once Opel Corsa Utility is the Chevrolet Utility. This has certainly worked in the favour of the Chevy brand in the country, which was always down there with the unknowns among our people. That, coupled with Ford's discontinuation of the Bantam helped the Chevy Utility fill the gap for compact bakkies.

General Motors is slowly divesting itself from Isuzu South Africa, which will be news worth following in the next few months as Isuzu emerges as a stand-alone car maker without the muscle of GMSA.

Nissan closes off the top 5 best selling bakkies in January 2014.

What's also worth noting are the numbers for Volkswagen's might Amarok. The Wolf has had an incredibly dismal performance in SA since its launch. Only 345 units of the Amarok where sold in the first month of this year. This is miniscule compared to both the Toyota Hilux and Ford Ranger, it's biggest rivals.