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The C-segment did not have a great July, especially compared to July 2009’s Cash-for-Clunker-inspired clamor for compact cars. The three exceptions were the Hyundai Elantra, Kia Forte and Mitsubishi Lancer, which all handily beat their July 2009 numbers. If you’re getting sick of the “Hyundai momentum” storyline, look elsewhere. On the other hand, with production of 2012s underway, the lame-duck Focus has settled into a 15k-month routine (actually averaging about 14,500 over the last 12 months), and Cobalt is falling away as Lordstown tools up for the Cruze. And with a new Elantra due by the end of this year, real competition in this segment is only just beginning.
44 Comments on “Chart Of The Day: Compact Cars (C-Segment)...”
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I still can’t believe how many people buy Corollas. Besides milage, I fail to see anything redeeming about them.
Here’s hoping the new Focus is a (recall free) success.
They don’t break. No, really, despite the harping on about Toyota quality, the Corolla is the most reliable appliance in a segment that’s all about car-as-appliance.
I bought a Corolla, 8 years ago. Not a single problem, and 35 mpg combined mileage.
You have a problem with that?
Corollas I can understand. BUT COBALTS??????
True enough. The Corolla is reliable, so there’s that too.
However, this current generation seems like Toyota just didn’t care. Cheap plastics, a terrible design, nothing about it seems noteworthy. The last generation Corolla was much nicer inside and out. It was still dull, but at least it didn’t feel cheap.
I will agree with you there. The current Corolla reminds me some of the 1998 model: not much of an improvement, and in some ways a step back.
The Sienna is similar, and this, more than pedalgate, makes me concerned for Toyota.
The Corolla is also often sold very, very, cheap. I’m not sure if Toyota uses it as a loss leader to get people back to more expensive vehicles later on, but somehow the local Toyota dealer can regularly undercut our pricing on Foci with Corollas. The Edmunds incentive charts don’t show it, and Toyotas posted rebates don’t show it, so either Toyota has a huge markup invoice to MSRP on the Corolla, or Toyota is heavily incentivizing sales directly to the dealer.
Like with Accord, it appears many Civic buyers are switching to Hyundai, in this case the Elantra. Wait til the new Elantra hits, going to really tear up the market.
The civic’s drop is mostly likely affected by the Cash for clunkers program last year and that the current model is getting long in the tooth and is due for replacement soon.
There is no evidence here that shows former Civic/Honda buyers are switching to the elantra.
@rockit: I don’t know. Accord sales went in reverse last month, also.
I think the Civic and Accord may be victims of bloat that their respective segments won’t tolerate.
The problem is how both Toyota and Honda have subcompacts than squeeze their own compacts from below. Fit is great, no doubt about that. Yaris is not so great but it’s cheap and reliable like the Corolla of old. No wonder Civic is so bloated now.
The civic’s drop is mostly likely affected by the Cash for clunkers program last year and that the current model is getting long in the tooth and is due for replacement soon.
There is no evidence here that shows former Civic/Honda buyers are switching to the elantra.
The denial continues. Do yourself a favour and don’t Google “2011 Elantra”.
How can Civic sales be affected by a car that is not on the market yet?
The great majority of customers – at least 95 percent – do not frequent sites such as this, or even read one of the buff books. They do not know that a new Elantra is coming soon. They are going to judge Hyundai by what is in the showroom today.
why are Mitsubishi lancer sales so bad? It seems like a decent car can’t be any worse than the cobalt or caliber. The same goes for the Kia forte and Impreza, It would seem that the Impreza’s AWD would be popular among people in the snow-belt. I wonder how the Cruze will change this chart, when it is released, it would be nice to see a non Toyota/Honda product top the chart. The new Jetta might go up, if the price point attracts new buyers, but it might also go down, if it alienates old buyers with it’s de-contenting.
Poor suspension (in the lower end models dx/ex), poor mileage (for their class), poor interior, poor dealer network. Mitsubishi has a halo car in the Evo but nothing else to really recommend them. I’d be surprised to see them still selling in the US 5 years from now.
Quick answer: the non-EVO Lancer isn’t very good.
Based on the low numbers, it’s entirely possible that a huge chunk of Lancer sales are niche-market EVOs.
Almost hard to believe that as many Sentras are sold as Mazda3s. I see so many Mazda3s on the road and hardly ever a Sentra – or maybe they are just invisible?
I noticed that as well. It’s easy to forget that Nissan still sells the Sentra for all I see on the road. I tend to see quite a bit more Mazda 3’s as well.
Chrysler has huge future potential in this segment when the new Fiat derived c-class Dodge and Chrysler’s are introduced in a couple of years.
2 years is a long time from now. In that time, Chrysler would be competing against next-gen Cruze, probably next-gen Civic & Corolla, and possibly next-gen Impreza & Mazda3. That’s a tough market.
I don’t think Chrysler has to worry about the next generation Cruze, we probably won’t see that until 2015 model year. They haven’t even introduced the first one here yet. I think the new Focus and new Elantra are going to be the real players. The Japanese seem to be way off track with styling lately. Mazda3 needs to dump smiley face.
Mazda needs to drop that stupid looking smiley face styling(?) from everything they have grafted it onto.
Unless it’s stellar, the new, redesigned Focus is going to have a tough go of it, and the reason is easy – the smaller Fiesta took over the Focus’ former lower price range.
Now, the New Focus will have to be priced above the Fiesta, but below the Fusion. Consumers are used to cheap Focuses and a new, much more expensive version (even if it’s worth the money) might put them off.
Toyota seems to be able to make the Yaris/Corolla/Camry hierarchy work and Honda has the Fit/Civic/Accord. It just remains to be seen if Ford can pull it off with Fiesta/Focus/Fusion.
rudiger
you’re spot on. ford will be in big trouble.
gm & chrysler will be very competitive with their new offerings.
and we can assume the 3 japs will come out with refreshed products.
and hyundai’s bringing the new elantra.
i’m betting that the easy money ford got till now will dry up.
the aura of the only non-bailed out domestic mfg is fading real fast and ford has got the most debt. hard times coming.
letting go of mazda and especially volvo will prove in the end as the death knell for ford. with volvo/mazda, ford could have had more competitors in the “bread and butter” segments. they dont have them anymore. it’s just ford products.
and whatever lincoln offers wont do. will ford spend alot of money to make lincoln a global brand? maybe they will try, but surely they will fail. so lincoln will be only viable in the US. but there, the prior mercury owners wont consider any lincoln products as they will be turned off by lincoln price tags. and real luxury buyers wont buy into lincolns, well simply coz lincolns arent true luxury at all. so the 90k lincoln sales from the previous year will drop n drop.
oh well…
but back to ford. now that only ford is in the game, combined with the huge debt they have and the coming recession-doubledip
(maybe in a year or two, remember! there is no economic recovery till you decrease unemployment), it really takes a miss or two to bring ford to its deathbed. i think many will be surprised when ford becomes the first “domestic” to bite the dust.
Ford took the best from Volvo – strong platforms like the D3/D4, and the safety tech, but Volvo as a company lost money consistently for Ford. We’ll have to see what Geely can do with it, but dumping Volvo was a good move.
Ford never owned Mazda, it was just the largest shareholder for a while. Mazda sales were never enough to really effect the bottom line, what Mazda brought to the table were quality 4 cylinder engine designs, and platforms that had a bit of sporting intent, and were better than what Ford was working with at the time. Now that the One Ford policy is really spreading, Ford has much less of a need for Mazda. Ford of Europe has a lot of experience designing high quality 4 cylinder engines, as well as platforms that make for sporty handling and excellent use of space. Anything Mazda can do for Ford, Ford of Europe can do better.
The upcoming Focus is going to be an interesting player in the field. It will certainly be the most premium of the non-luxury compacts, and will probably be priced accordingly. Fiesta sales have been trending towards the higher end models, at least in my experience, and a lot of people are willing to pay more for a Fiesta than for a similarly equipped Focus. Gas prices are already creeping back up, and we may see more people looking to downsize to compact and subcompact vehicles. The new Focus will offer those coming from midsize and larger sedans all of the comforts they are used to, but with improved mileage.
It’s hard to tell where things will go for sure, but the Fiesta is starting off well in sales with no incentives, and the Taurus is doing well with very low incentives, and most sales are of the higher end SEL, Limited, and SHO trims. People are willing to pay more for a high quality car.
As far as the economy goes, it’s well on it’s way to recovery. Home prices in South Florida have hit rock bottom and have been climbing back up for months. Investors are snapping up foreclosures knowing the market is going to turn in a timely manner. Fleet sales are up, which means businesses must be making some sort of money if they are able to afford new vehicles. Yes, unemployment is still high in some areas, but in almost any area of this country if you want a job, and are willing to work hard, you can get a job that will pay well enough to cover your bills and help you build back.
I agree about Mazda. That horrific front end keeps me from even thinking about buying or recommending most current Mazdas. All things considered, Mazda is headed the way of Isuzu and Mitsubishi in the US. There are many strong contenders in the US market, and Mazda is in that no man’s land of second tier Japanese nameplates.
european seems to be taking a page from Z71_Silvy’s book. I bet you will be surprised when you end up being completely wrong about Ford.
The Focus will be a superb car (it can only be better than the Euro Mk2 and that car is still near the top of its class), but it’s likely to be a bit pricey.
The new Elantra should be at Toyota and Honda sales volume…Americans will not like the engines in the new Cruze…Cruze sales will suffer.
The base engine is too weak (for the US tastes), but what’s not to like about the 1.4L Ecotec Turbo? This is by far the best powerplant available in today’s non-luxury compacts. The Elantra’s GDI may be a competitor, but the GDI is _always_ noisy and, with a rudimentary sound insulation of a budget car, it may turn off prospective buyers.
The Caliber outsold the Lancer?
Now I’m slightly depressed…well, at least they’re trending in different directions.
Why do so many people buy Cobalts? Its almost like they are dead set on buying a chevy compact and that was what chevy offered in that segment. Seriously there should be more Mazda’s, Impreza’s and Lancers. Those Calibers are ugly and they are huge for a compact.
Keep in mind that the chart shows Colbat + HHR, which are two completely different products, and probably shouldn’t be lumped together.
Cobalts go into the rental fleets en masse. That, plus big discounts and a huge dealer network in the heartland where there is still a strong buy American sentiment probably explains Cobalt sales levels. It certainly isn’t the competitive strength of the product.
Here in Canada the Mazda 3 is one of the top sellers in this segnment. Aren’t looks subjective? I like the looks and it’s actually a great car. Available in a hatch , nice interior, great handling, better than average power. In my city they are everywhere and they are only in the first model year. You just don’t see many Sentras around at all.
Canada is “different”, about half-way between the US and Europe in the way we buy cars: we buy smaller and we have historically lower psychological barriers to imports.** Given that American compact cars sucked for the better part of a quarter-century you can see why the imports have more traction.
Mazda’s relative strength is an example of that, so is Hyundai and Kia’s lack of a 10-year warranty, or the sales of things like the Focus hatch and wagon (much higher than in the US) and how we got the Echo hatch, Smart and Mercedes B-Class earlier.
** case in point, yours truly bought a Lada Niva in the early 1990s from a Lada dealer in Whitby, Ontario. You’d get lynched driving, never mind selling, a Lada in the US.
LOL – Psarjinian, I can’t imagine your giant frame squeezed into a Niva! I’m 6’1″ 220lbs and I felt claustrophobic and cramped in the front seat of a friends Niva.
We are a far different market; we spent the August long weekend travelling to Wisconsin to pick up a dog, and I can’t remember seeing a single Mazda5, yet in Winnipeg they’re all over the place.
Now I understand why we agree on so many things psar. Its a good thing you didn’t own that Lada next door in Oshawa, as you might have ACTUALLY been lynched for not driving a GM product.
I feel sorry for companies like Mazda though, and a bit angry at the giant US car market for ruining our fun.
Mazda brought the Protege 5 and Mazda 3 HB? We bought it in droves.
Mazda 6 Wagon & HB, V6 + Manual? You bet, we bought plenty of those too.
Mazda 5? They are freakin’ everywhere!
Its easy to get confused about Mazda up here, because I keep thinking…why did they get rid of that? I see them all over. Then I remember…US.
Oddly enough, we rebel. The new 6 offers no such unique packaging, and we pretty much have left them alone (sales wise).
I see almost equal amounts of Passat wagons and sedans, not to mention the tonnes and tonnes of diesel VWs chortling around.
To echo NulloModo, perhaps the Matrix and Corolla shouldn’t be lumped together, either. I wouldn’t be surprised if the Civic was outselling the Toyota Corolla, if taken in that light.
Interesting that Jetta/Golf outsell the Mazda3 by so much. Shame, gotta be that stupid grill! Otherwise, Mazda has great exterior/interior design.
Looks like Fiesta is sucking sales from the Focus.
It seems to me that the potential buyers in this segment is expanding. Back in the 90’s and for most of the 2000’s you didn’t see many 35+ year-old professionals buying Civics, Corollas, Escorts/Foci etc. These tended to be the typical first new car for the guy or gal just starting their adult work career. As a car guy- I notice what people drive– I can tell you what car every person I know drives. I’ve noticed that many 35-40 year old male professionals who in the past would be driving an Accord or a semi luxury sedan, driving around in C-segment cars. Most of their wives drive the mommy-mobile SUV or Minivan so there really is no need to have a 2nd “big car” just for dad to commute in.
+1 to dcdriver. We have a Freestyle for the “mommy car” and a Focus ST as our commuter car. The Focus is a blast to drive and makes the commute go by faster while still delivering good fuel economy. The Freestyle does everything we need for a family car including bringing home stuff we need for making home renos including an amazing amount of laminate flooring. I think we got the best of both worlds. When our vehicles wear out (no time soon) we will be looking at the Fiesta and the new Exporer.
I remember before the recession there was a family of 4 in my old neighborhood who had an Excursion as the family hauler and an Explorer as the “small car” for dad to commute in. Oh and they also had an f-150 whose bed never carried anything more than a few bags of mulch. It’s purpose was for the dad to drive around town and look cool on the weekeends. Times have changed.