Hyundai has reaffirmed its commitment to its luxury brand, Genesis, despite tiny sales in comparison to its rivals.
Genesis has sold just 765 cars in the first six months of 2025, compared to BMW’s 13,712, Mercedes’ 11,146 and 7338 from Lexus. But recently-installed Hyundai Australia CEO, Don Romano, is confident that a new sales and business strategy will turn that around.
Romano formerly ran Hyundai and Genesis in Canada, where the brand sold a much more competitive 7040 vehicles in 2024, a record year. While still trailing behind the likes of BMW and Lexus, Romano believes Genesis Australia’s direct-to-consumer strategy simply didn’t work.
That’s why Genesis has pivoted to a new dealership model, partnering with experienced dealer groups to create more traditional showrooms rather than its previous CBD-based ‘Studio’ concept stores.
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Asked if Genesis was a distraction from Hyundai’s efforts to rebuild marketshare, especially as it launches its most expensive model ever, the $119,750 Hyundai Ioniq 9, Romano was quick to dismiss the suggestion.
“ No, I’ll tell you what the distraction is, it’s that we were selling direct,” Romano said. “ I don’t believe in selling direct, right? Because that’s not a core competency that any of us here [at Hyundai HQ] have. But we gave it a try, we set up showrooms, we put in Studios and you know, we’re meeting our goals that we set forth. But I think they’re pretty minimal goals if you ask me from a brand perspective.”
Instead, Romano believes that Genesis stands a better chance with experienced car salespeople pushing its product through a more conventional dealership experience.
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“I think if you put them in the hands of really good retailers, good organizations, that this is all they do for a living and you get the commitment from them to do it. This is exactly what we did in Canada and it has been a tremendous success, probably one of the most successful countries globally because we picked the right retailers, they put in the right facilities that bought into the right experience.”
Genesis had already begun to move away from its Studio strategy before Romano arrived, with new dealerships in Sydney, Melbourne and the Gold Coast. But the new boss believes there is more room to grow and expand with the right dealer partners.
He said: “I don’t believe we’ve achieved that, and so the next step will be to get this into the hands of the right dealers, to get them involved with the same type of training and the same type of focus that we put into Canada that we’re now putting into the US and we’ll take that into Australia.”
This expansion will most likely rely on existing Hyundai dealers to build companion, but separate Genesis showrooms, around Australia
“That’s how I plan to do it here,” Romano said. “We do have a few standalone Genesis in Canada. And we are looking at a few standalones here. But regardless, it will be operated by retailers with professional experience in handling customers, and then also agreeing to buy into what we call our standards.”
The shake-up comes as Hyundai globally invests significantly into the Genesis brand, to lift its performance after years of very slow growth. The launch of the Genesis Magma performance sub-brand and the Genesis Magma Racing World Endurance Championship program are seen as key to the brand’s global growth.
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