Mini will continue to roll out ICE vehicles

Mini dealers have their hopes set on slightly improved – if still scarce – new-vehicle supply in 2023.

Mini told dealers at their make meeting Saturday that inventory will be more consistent in the coming months, now that the parts supply shortages and logistics challenges the brand dealt with last year are smoothing out.

Mike Peyton, vice president of Mini of the Americas, told Automotive News outside the meeting that Mini is starting the year in “probably one of the best inventory positions we've seen in the last two years.”

Still, by historical standards, inventory will remain “very lean,” Peyton said.

Peyton said Mini didn’t talk about new products in the make meeting. He said the marque recently had a meeting with dealers in which it “painted a picture out through 2023” on what products it will have, what they'll have available to dealers and how Mini is moving to be an all-electric brand.

But before that happens, Mini will continue rolling out more internal combustion engine models, Peyton said. It also sees opportunity in its JCW products.

“While we'll change over and enhance our internal combustion product next year, we'll also start to introduce some new electric product, ” Peyton said. “Early 2030s is that transition point we'll have where all [of] our portfolio will be electrified," Peyton said.

Preparing for new EV products, attractive leasing, retaining customers in fixed-operations drives and profitability are all issues on Mini dealers’ minds, National Mini Dealer Council chairman Jason Willis told Automotive News in December.