BMW Motorrad had a great sales year—sort of.

Although its total motorcycle sales numbers were down in 2020 when compared 2019, they didn’t drop very much. In fact, it was the company’s second-best sales year, ever.

Over 2020, BMW says it sold a total of 169,272 motorbikes and scooters. That’s a 3.4 percent drop from 2019, when BMW sold 175,162 bikes and scooters.

However, by the sound of BMW’s press release, the company is pretty happy with itself. Dr. Markus Schramm, the big boss at BeemerMotorrad, said “Following difficult months from March to June, the entire BMW Motorrad team was able to turn the tide by applying a high degree of pragmatic flexibility and great personal commitment. In addition to arguably the best BMW Motorrad product offering ever, it was this team effort, of which I am very proud, that made the second best sales result ever possible in 2020.”

He has a point. For any motorcycle manufacturer, to survive 2020 relatively unscathed is impressive, considering dealerships and production lines were shut down for weeks.

BMW’s results are even more impressive when you consider its sales actually improved in some markets. The company sold 27,516 units in Germany, an increase of 1,224 machines of 2019’s numbers. As a while, though, European sales dropped 5.3 percent. Sales were up 33 percent in China, from 8,818 bikes in 2019 to 11,788 bikes in 2020. Brazil, another targeted market, also saw growth.

What machines sold well? Despite BMW’s investment in the G310 series and its overhaul of the parallel-twin F900 line, the press release says BMW’s boxers were the best sales performers. All together, BMW sold around 80,000 boxers in 2020, about half the company’s sales.

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