TTAC’s monthly sales coverage rolls on with a look at Chrysler, which saw sales rise 22 percent last month. The volume increase, driven by the Jeep, Dodge and Ram brands, was the second bit of good news Chrysler announced this week, following up its water-into-wine 2010 financial results. Like Ford, Chrysler Group’s problems remain with its “luxury” brand, Chrysler. The eponymous brand fell 7%, although a 45% increase in T%C volume helped mask deeper drops in other models like 300 (1,329 units), PT Cruiser (342 units) and 200/Sebring (1,482 units). Though 200 and 300 sales should increase due to their current production changeovers, Chrysler still has a lot of work to do to make the Chrysler brand relevant again. Jeep, on the other hand, is rolling, with sales up 47%. Grand Cherokee led the way again, up 130% to 7,612 units, Wrangler and Liberty added over 30% each, and Patriot was up 75%. Dodge saw Caliber, Avenger, Journey and Charger lose volume last month, but big increases in Caravan, Durango and Challenger helped bring the brand up 22%. On the truck side, Ram was up 22%, while Dakota dropped to 823 units.
3200 Chrysler-brand cars TOTAL (excluding minivans)? That’s less than Buick LaCrosse alone!
I’m not quite sure (due to Ford’s alphabet soup naming), but I think that Chrysler sold 110 more cars than Lincoln.
I wonder whether Lincoln or Chrysler has more fleet sales.
Seriously? 300s, Sebrings and PT Cruisers fill many rental car lots. Haven’t seen a 200 there yet, but I’m sure it’s only a matter of time. For all its other problems, at least Lincoln doesn’t sell a lot of fleet, outside of the Town Cars.
Retail customers buying Chrysler-branded are few and far between. And that’ll be a tall order to fix, even for Marchionne.
I dunno. Lincoln starts with 868+ Town Cars in the hole, so they’re roughly 30% fleet right there.
Good point …
I wouldn’t be too shocked. Unless you’re clueless (may not be a bad assumption here….) you know that if you are thinking of a 300 or Sebring/200, you are waiting to get your hands on one of the drastically improved models.
Love that the JGC is doing well. Amazing what happens when you make a good car/truck….sales go way up. Hell, even I kinda want one of these things, and I normally wouldn’t get caught dead in anything from Auburn Hills.
Hope they hold up.
Like GM, channel stuffing is a likely suspect in some of these numbers. The lots of the CJDR dealers around Detroit are bursting at the seams with cars. Even ignoring the sizable inventory of ’10s still looking for homes, there is an awful lot of stock on the ground for this time of year.
Of course, the expectation is that the Govt will endorse a massive flood of credit via Ally to juice sales and clear the lots, especially if gas stays too inexpensive to sell the pricey new small cars that are the result of the coming CAFE rules.
I wonder if Fiat really thinks that they can drive the level of sales they’ve predicted in the 5 year plan with the current lineup at Chrysler–there doesn’t seem to be a clear home run in the lineup. Improved–yes. But ‘take a number’ sales? Not from here.
Looking at these numbers, it would be grotesquely stupid to nix either the T&C or Caravan anytime soon. They’re Chrysler and Dodge’s top sellers, fer pete’s sake!
And WHO is still buying PT Cruisers? Stop it at once!!!
Neither Chrysler nor Dodge has a single car with more than 30K in annual sales? That’s simply not sustainable. I think Fiat has probably done the best it could with what it had, but there just isn’t anything left to save outside of Jeep and the minivans.
They can’t do much worse with their compact and midsized offerings — it’s all up from here. The big test will be the Dodge compact that arrives this time next year and the new midsizers in 2013. Both based off Fiat platforms. If they can’t reestablish themselves with those then it’s trouble but probably not fatal because the costs will have been shared with Fiat.
Chrysler Group’s problems remain with its “luxury” brand, Chrysler
this is too funny. If Chrysler is your manufacture’s luxury brand you really are not aiming high…
Once upon a time, Chrysler wasn’t a rental queen or minivan. Of course, those days are long past.
Much better cars, so its a better deal, subjectively speaking a 3 series, C class, Geneis, and even Azera offer more in certain ways. What can Chrysler do better? Chassis tuning and reliability?
Interesting that Challenger numbers increased 50% when Mustang and Camaro sales fell. That is a bright spot for them.
It was reported that only one brand will sell a minivan. If it isn`t Chrysler then they don`t have much left – 200 and 300.
It’s hard to sell a lot of cars when you have so few models. The PT Cruiser is out of production, and the Town and Country was just a gussied up replacement for the Plymouth Grand Voyager to mollify Chrysler dealers after Plymouth was shut down. The 300 and Sebring/200 are the only other models. In the old days, there was the Imperial, Windsor, Newport and New Yorker, with additional LeBaron, Fifth Avenue and Southampton trims that were virtually separate models.
With so few models, the Chrysler nameplate looks like it’s not long for this world, unless the line gets expanded. A compact, RWD LeBaron sport sedan would at least look like a competitor for the entry level BMW, and a bread and butter midsize Windsor is badly needed. Keep the 300 as a full size performance sedan, but a full size Newport and lux-level New Yorker (all RWD) would give Chrysler a fighting chance. Somehow, I don’t think Sergio has any of that in mind. He’s going to go for Dodge compact and midsize volume sellers first.
There’s a Full-Size FWD coming for Chrysler.
It’s no wonder so many here don’t know what the heck to do with Chrysler– we are given none of this and painted a dreary picture because of it.
There were precious few 2011 model Chrysler and Dodge CARS on the dealer lots in January. For most of the 2011 models, production didn’t get started until after the Christmas holidays and is still ramping up. Since they were mainly selling spotty inventories of 2010 models, I think they did pretty well keeping the sales decline under 30%.
As with all pronouncements from Auburn Hills, you need hip boots to wade through the BS. Percentages, percentages, percentages. Always used when the actual numbers are frightening.
Chrysler’s self proclaimed annual break even of 1.1 million (which was low since they just about reached that number in 2010 and still lost more than half a BILLION) is a monthly break even of 91,666. January 2010 – 70,118
Sebring-Avenger-200: Total sales of 3,800 units. Someone explain how they are cost justifying an entire plant and an extra shift at SHAP
Minivans – Windsor Assembly, a 3 shift, 1500 vehicle output per day plant, sold less than half their output again. Even with international sales included, the plant continues to sell at about 60% capacity.
Brampton – sales of 5,800 units. Even with international sales, another plant with major over capacity.
And on and on it goes.
But not to worry, the master illusionist says sales this year will increase 25%. That’s right 25%. And where did he get that number? Just pulled it out of thin air. So let’s look at the numbers. A 25% increase in sales would be 1.375 million and a monthly sales number of just about 115,000. So just remember that number as the year goes along. Sales of 115,000 each an every month. And they have to make up the 45,000 they were short in January.
Marchionne has pulled off a remarkable feat. He sits here in February 2010 in charge of an American car company using taxpayer money to refit plants to potentially build Fiats. He has an adoring media that fawns over his prognostications like children looking up at their hero. He even gets a Fiat dealership network built and paid for by Chrysler dealers. . And all with no skin in the game.
He even complains about the interest costs on the money the taxpayers put up to save them in the first place, but finds $25,000,000 in bonus money for employees who are owed nothing. That must make all those secured bond holders and creditors who got nothing in bankruptcy court feel all warm and fuzzy inside.
That’s the problem with knights. Sometimes the horse isn’t so white.
Chrysler isn’t out of the woods by a long shot. And if they fall again, Sergio has the table set for himself and Fiat.
@Johngalt:
Great post.
Don’t worry, Sergio will make his sales number, even if he needs push the fleet percentage to 80%.
@johngalt
Spot on. And just wait what will happen with the Jeep and Truck sales figures once the gas prices will go up again.
As with all pronouncements from Auburn Hills, you need hip boots to wade through the BS. Percentages, percentages, percentages. Always used when the actual numbers are frightening.
Sales bank?