Canadian Black Book, the company that publishes the Canadian automotive industry’s used car value “bible”, announced their fifth annual retained value awards yesterday. These awards recognize the 2006 vehicles in 17 categories that experienced the lowest average depreciation in the first four years of ownership. Black Book indicates in their press release that past performance is not a guarantee of future results, but I think we can all agree that its better than not winning.

Not suprisingly, Japanese brands dominated these awards with 13 of the 23 winners (including ties). Despite their recent troubles, Toyota took home the most awards of any brand with 6. Honda was second with 3 winners.

German nameplates had the second large block of winners with 8 of the 23 winners (including ties). BMW, Mercedes-Benz, and Volkswagen each had two winners.

The only American company on the list was Chrysler, with the Dodge Sprinter. I’m afraid I can’t really call this vehicle American since it is built by Mercedes-Benz and is a left over from the failed marriage of Daimler-Chrysler.

The Mini Cooper seems to stand out as the only vehicle from a brand that isn’t Japanese or German. That said, BMW owns the Mini brand and the new Mini’s have significant BMW engineering influences. Although final assembly is still done in the UK, I’m calling this one a German car too.

So that’s 13 wins for Japan, 10 wins for Germany, and 0 wins for every other country. Very interesting.

Here are the winners by category…

Sub-compact

  • Toyota Yaris

Compact

  • Mazda Mazda5

Mid-size car (three way tie)

  • Honda Accord
  • Subaru Outback
  • Volkswagen Passat

Full-size car

  • Toyota Avalon

Entry luxury car

  • Lexus IS Series

Luxury car (two-way tie)

  • Audi A6
  • BMW 5 Series

Premium luxury car (two-way tie)

  • BMW 6 Series
  • Mercedes-Benz CLS-Class

Sports car (two-way tie)

  • Mini Cooper
  • Volkswagen GTI

Premium sports car

  • Porsche 911

Compact SUV

  • Toyota RAV4

Mid-size SUV

  • Honda Pilot

Full-size SUV (two-way tie)

  • Nissan Armada
  • Toyota Sequoia

Luxury SUV

  • Mercedes-Benz G-Class

Minivan

  • Honda Odyssey

Large van

  • Dodge Sprinter

Small pick-up

  • Toyota Tacoma

Large pick-up

  • Toyota Tundra

[Source: Canadian Black Book]