Chrysler’s implosion continued unchecked in October, with sales down 30% from October 2008. Here are some of the details: Sebring: -32%; 300: -15%; PT Cruiser: -96%; Aspen: -95%; Chrysler brand Total: -36%.
Jeep fared only slightly less badly: Compass: -62%; Patriot: -65%; Wrangler: -16%; Liberty: -30%; Grand Cherokee: -42%; Commander: -47%; Jeep Brand Total: -37%
The (non Ram)Dodge was the bright spot: Caliber: -87%; Avenger: +13%; Charger: -22%; Challenger: -20%; Journey: -16%; Caravan: +8%; Nitro: -42%; Durango: -95%; Dodge Brand Total: -22%
And the (un Dodge) Rams: Dakota: -46%; Ram P/U: -30%; Sprinter: -52%; Total Ram: -32%
Total year-to-date sales for all Chrysler vehicles: -39% And the beat goes on.
Continuing its recession-defying act, Subaru posted a 41% climb in October sales over last year. That makes it the fifth straight month of sales increases, and a stellar 13% increase year-to-date. AWD traction for the win! Subaru does tend to do well well with the highly educated demographic, which has been proportionately less impacted in the recession.
Automotive News [AN, sub] reckons it’s got the inside line on Toyota’s “new U.S. plan.” They’re so chuffed with the scoop that their article presents the bulleted battle plan in both the body text and a little gray box. And here it is: “Review and possibly trim the lineup of full-frame trucks; Skip midcycle vehicle enhancements to focus on bigger launches; Introduce more hybrids to North America; Give U.S. engineers a bigger voice in r&d.” AN reckons the headline is the potential truck trimming and hybrid adding bit. Which is certainly important news for a company with a “tattered image” (Toyota, apparently, not the American zombies clinging to profits via pickups, who’ve yet to produce a single large-volume hybrid vehicle). But what of ToMoCo leaving existing vehicles as is for longer?
At RM’s London classic car auction this was the “standard” fare of painstakingly restored Aston Martins, Ferraris and Mercedes Gullwings . The hall glistened and gleamed with well polished beauties. The star of the show, however, turned out to be a rusted, dilapidated and altogether disheveled former statesman. A 1969 Mercedes–Benz 600 Pullman Landaulet, chariot of popes and princes, had been transported from a surrey barn and shoved into the far corner of the auction hall. With withered red leather interior and an engine that could barely stay in the chassis, much less start, the Pullman could hardly compete for the interest of the crowds with 250 GTOs and DB5 convertibles. That is, until bidding got underway.
It is unfortunate that Edmunds.com has had nothing but negative things to say about a wildly successful program that sold nearly 250,000 cars in its first four days alone. There can be no doubt that CARS drummed up more business for car dealers at a time when they needed help the most.
The Department of Transportation’s Bill Adams lays into recent Edmunds.com analysis showing Cash For Clunkers could have cost as much as $24,000 per vehicle sale [via CNN]. But one man’s negativity is another man’s constructive criticism. After all, Adams doesn’t touch the heart of the matter: the program’s cost per vehicle, and Edmund’s analysis (like all analysis) was educated guesswork. Luckily, CNN was able to shed a little more light on how Edmunds came up with their numbers.
The Detroit News reports that GM is delaying the launch of the Chevrolet Cruze. The nationalized automaker’s next big—I mean small thing will now hit U.S. showrooms in the third quarter of 2010. In theory. GM’s explanation for the delayed denouement: it wants to ensure “a flawless launch.” Given GM’s on-again, of-again product planning chaos, and their failure to get enough Buick LaCrosses on the ground, you’ve got to wonder why they would set themselves up for failure with talk of perfection. Oh right; the automotive media has the memory of a goldfish. Meanwhile, the company’s camp followers can take heart in New GM’s new determination to get things right—while those of us who’ve heard it all before sigh, shake our heads and say “Flawless. Yeah right.” No matter how you slice it, the Cruze’s failure to set sail by the advertising for-sale date isn’t news to gladden investors’ hearts. After all, the ur-Cruze (the Korean Lacetti) debuted on October 30, 2008. The EU-Cruze has been plying European roadways since February. The delay means the Cruze will not arrive before GM’s kinda maybe sorta I know we said we would but tempus fugit mid-2010 IPO. Between now and then, stand back! GM’s predicting a sales spurt!
It’s your classic case of schlechte/gute Nachrichten. Post-Chrysler Daimler is predicting positive earnings in the fourth financial quarter—before interest and tax. After that, after the federal money’s gone, things will go from worse to worserer. “Global demand for cars should fall this year by only around 10 percent thanks to state incentives . . . Negative effects on demand can be expected when the state support programs are phased out in the following years, particularly in the volume segments of more mature markets.” Reuters’ numbers tell the tale. Sales at Daimler’s high margin division, Mercedes-Benz Cars, fell by 15.7 percent in the first three quarters of the year to 825,600 vehicles. Remember: that’s compared with last year, which was no sales bonanza, Hoss. Without a buoyant Chinese market uh, buoying Mercedes, the numbers would be even bleakerer. Meanwhile, Automotive News reports that Honda has revised and tripled its profit forecast—and sounded the same alarm. “Honda, the world’s seventh-biggest carmaker, attributed the bulk of the revision to state-backed measures to stimulate sales and warned a real recovery in demand was still some time off.”
Out of 200 Ford Motor Credit cars at the auction yesterday I bought 10. Seven that I designated for retail, three for wholesale. I was second to last bidder on appoximately 30 more. Which means from a sellers perspective, I was crucial to him driving his overall prices up. The truck in question is an ’04 F150 4×4 reg cab with 60k on it. Terrible paint, needs a solid grand spent on a strip down and repaint. But it was cheap, I mean silly cheap. I gave $5,000 for this little pearl, and ready to go it’s worth 9-10 grand. The why is simple. It’s a 4×4 with under 80k miles in a recent body style. That’s the why on the value part. The why on, how did I get it for 5,000 is not as simple.
Mickey Kaus and TheBigMoney’s Matthew DeBord joined in the recent kerfluffle over GM’s market share predictions, Kaus on the side of TTAC’s pessimism, and DeBord on the audacity of hope against hope side. DeBord grabs his spade and starts digging, and it only takes a paragraph before he strikes a vast reserve of bubbling… excuses.
declining market share has been a GM reality for decades—the company at one time had so much share that it really had nowhere to go but down or into anti-trust prosecution. The Old GM was so preoccupied with holding share that it neglected what was obviously more important, profits. New GM has a reasonable opportunity to take its smaller portfolio of brands, several relatively successful new products, and given a recovery in the truck market in 2010, book some profits ahead of an anticipated pre-midterm-elections IPO.
Still, there are plenty of critics who have it in for GM, notably The Truth About Cars, which has been heralding GM’s demise since gas was 30 cents a gallon and Sinatra was headlining the Sands. (And yet … GM lives! This has to be something like being Cuba, grimly eyeing the United States across that brief expanse of ocean, waiting decade after decade for the imperial giant to finally fall.)
So grab a Pina Colada and pull up a chaise lounge, comrades… the glorious revolution waits just behind the jump! Read More >
Our friends over at wreckedexotics.com have hooked-up with realcartips.com (be careful when driving your exotic?). This week’s alert: luxury hybrids are a drug on the market. Hybrid Escalades are going for ten grand under sticker. Lexus dealers have been instructed to sell their remaining stock of 2009 Lexus 600h Ls for $10k off sticker. And, we might add, the rest. After all, the second you drive that $106k-and-up top-of-the-line hybrid off the lot, you’ll lose a LOT more than $10k. Still, the discount could take some of the heat out of torching 10 Grovers—and drive down the the price of pre-loved examples. A 30k LS 600h L is yours for around $75k. And the rest, now. At any price, the 600h L is one of the world’s best luxury cars— that’s destined to remain the deep-pocketed eccentric’s choice. Or, as was the case with the VW Phaeton, not.
The public plan is 19 percent and change. That is what everything is being based on
GM board member Steven Girsky repeats Fritz Henderson’s assumption that GM’s market share will be stable and predictable . Of course, if that’s the case, someone’s got some ‘splainin to do about the last 30 years. Luckily though, we’ve got some good news for Messrs Girsky and Henderson. According to Autoobserver:
Edmunds.com, the premier online resource for automotive information, has preliminarily forecast General Motors (GM) retail market share for October to rise to 22.4 percent from the third-quarter retail average of 19.1 percent
Wait, Edmunds’ forecast is based on unique pageviews for GM models at Edmunds.com? Never mind then. Let’s go instead to TTAC’s unique sales forecasting and analysis department and see if GM will hit 22.4 percent market share in October. Forecasters? Shakes vigorously. What’s that? “Signs point to no?” Aw, too bad.
Enterprise Rent-A-Car CEO must have some German politician in him somewhere (not literally, of course). Speaking with Bloomberg, Andrew Taylor’s message comes through loud and clear: Ve must have order! How can you dumkopfs expect our nationalized manufacturers to build cars that save the planet without high gas prices! And so the reporter asks the obvious question (it’s what reporters do best): should we raise the gas tax? Check out Taylor’s eyebrow work at 1:23, and his subsequent journey into the bowels of Wiggles World. The CEO didn’t see that one coming? It gets better. When asked if American cars are any good (2:18), Taylor lauds Ford, Chrysler and “even” GM. With friends like that . . . Or is it a good thing that Enterprise fancies itself Detroit’s “petri dish,” looking to put the Volt into immediate rental service? We report, you deride.
It’s important to keep GM’s claims about market share and production volume in their proper context. Over the very long term, the graph above reveals the dynamic that should come first in GM’s calculations: a long-term decline in consumer trust and market share. This decline shows no signs of stopping, meaning GM’s 2009 market share of just under 20 percent is hardly a given going forward into 2010.
Spats between automakers and the Detroit press are a rare thing. But spats between GM and the Detroit Free Press? Let’s just say few things last longer in this world than lapdogs that nip. So GM is going after the Freep with a spray bottle for daring to suggest that a 2.8m unit production plan for 2010 might be reminiscent of old, bad GM. Apparently the Freep only got it wrong on one point: unfounded optimism, self-sabotage and disfunctional communication are still very much part of New GM. Oh yeah, and CAPS LOCK is along for the ride. Mike DiGiovanni, GM’s Executive Director of Corporate Planning and Alliances reponds at Fastlane
GM had indicated in a media call that it could produce upwards of 2.8 million units in North America — this is a number we COULD do…it’s not the number we necessarily WILL do. We only plan and report production estimates by quarter to reflect the current economic climate.
Speaking of GM’s “May the Best Car Win,” Renault is telling its dealers exactly how to convince potential customers that competitors’ products suck. Our French-speaking friends are invited to offer translations of Cardesiac‘s article below. Mais moi? Non. For pure entertainment value (a TTAC hallmark j’espere) I prefer Yahoo’s babel fish. To wit: “And for this reason, nothing is worth tacler a little the competitors with some arguments felt well to underline their defects, to start with the most sharpened of them: Ford Focus RS. And Renault is not tender: design close to the universe of the tuning, completions to be perfected, alarming consumption and tax CO2 (weight), disappointing motricity (nose gear sometimes floating in acceleration, resources limited under 2.000 tr/min,…), imperfect guidance of box, diameter of too large steering (12,2 m), height adjustment of the seats before tiresome, not of more radical choice of suspensions in option and little choice of personalization.” Tacler? The mind boggles. Anyway, Renault misunderstands a sales basic: a new product’s greatest competitor is the customer’s existing product. The easiest thing for a car owner to do is to keep doing what they’re already doing. Instructions on how to tell buyers thir current car is crap; now that I’d like to see.
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