Toyota Tundra Sales Pass GMC Sierra 1500

by Andrew Rush

Published: August 3rd, 2007

toyota tundra sales pass gmc sierra 1500

According to Mike Levine at Pickuptruck.com, the all-new Toyota Tundra has surpassed the new(ish) GMT900 GMC Sierra 1500 in year-to-date sales. Officially, GM claims to have sold 115,185 Sierras. However, there's a bit of cloak and dagger math here. This figure includes 2006 models, and 'Sierra Classics', both built on the GMT800 platform, as well as heavy duty models. After peeling back these layers of confusion and misdirection, Mr. Levine reckons GM has sold only 76,700 brand new(ish) GMT900 Sierras. Toyota on the other hand has sold 97,290 (not quite fully) box(ed) fresh Tundras. This puts the Tundra at number four in full sized truck sales, and marks the first time a foreign automaker has sold more trucks than a domestic— in the history of the world, ever. If current sales trends continue, the Tundra will pass the Sierra in gross sales (i.e. with GM's gorilla math) by October. Currently GM gives up to $2000 in rebates to its new Sierra customers and Toyota offers up to $2,500. May you tow in interesting times.

Andrew Rush

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4 of 28 comments

Sherman Lin on Aug 05, 2007

This is going to be fun watching the automakers fighting a no holds barred all out fight to make the best full sized truck. Too bad the former big three didn't have the same attitude with small cars in the 70s and 80 and then with cars in general after that.

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Chickenfarmer on Aug 05, 2007

How refreshing! The comments posted on this blog are quite intelligent and informative...unlike those emotional ones on others where arguments are mostly about the back and forth bashing of domestics vs imports(read Japanese). Think I'll check in more often :)

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Johnson on Aug 05, 2007
Pch101 That is false. The “model year” begins October 1. The mid-year report runs from October 1 to March 31. If you want to be credible, you have to get off the right/wrong kick that you’re on. There is nothing inherently better about model-year data versus calendar-year data. The point is to look at various time periods and to compare them, not to have a contest about whether my six months are better than your six months. When combined, both data sets provide useful information. Yet again, you missed my point. The time period that Fleet Central does their report is from October 1st to March 31st. That does NOT mean that there is any industry standard in terms of when a model year starts or ends. My point was, WHY are you looking at the time period between Oct - March? Are we living in the past? Last I checked, it was August, not March. That was then, this is now. Also keep in mind the new Tundra did not come out until February 2007, so the Fleet Central figures you are looking at ARE in fact irrelevant to the discussion currently at hand because the Tundra figures from Fleet Central are mostly of the old model. Again, what the Fleet Central figures show ... that was then. The GM trucks were selling a bit better then, and the new Tundra has just come out. This is compared to me looking at Year-to-date sales figures up until July 31st, where the new Tundra has been on-sale now for a few months, and where we can ACTUALLY see what effect it's had on the truck market. If we go by the Fleet Central figures, we cannot see what effect the new Tundra has had on the market; that effect which is sales being taken away from Ford and GM. RobertSD, one thing I will mention is that GM, Chrysler and Ford do not have the resources to compete with Toyota toe-to-toe at this point. The 2009 F-Series won't be a full ground-up redesign like the current F-Series was, or like the new Tundra was. It will also take some time for all the new engines to appear. Word from Ford insiders is that some of the TwinForce engines could be delayed. And at this point it's not going to get much better for GM as their trucks are new and they've already got the HDs out. The only thing GM can do is offer incentives/discounts and offer the 6.2L/6 speed combo across it's entire truck line. That of course in unlikely to happen. GM does have an upcoming diesel, as does Ford and Dodge, but those are all years away. We don't know what Toyota has up it's sleeve. And if Toyota comes out with an HD Tundra, it will only make things tougher for the American Big 3. Toyota has a huge war chest to use in this truck war but the American Big 3 do not. Their resources are much more limited. Not only that, but the American Big 3 cannot afford to keep focusing on trucks, as they are vastly lagging in many other segments.

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Pch101 on Aug 05, 2007
The time period that Fleet Central does their report is from October 1st to March 31st. That does NOT mean that there is any industry standard in terms of when a model year starts or ends. The only person who referenced an "industry standard" was you. You falsely claimed that it is wasn't possible to know what time periods Fleet Central was reporting, and I corrected you by pointing out that Fleet Central defines it as being October - March for the purposes of its mid year report. My point was, WHY are you looking at the time period between Oct - March? Are we living in the past? Because (a) it is a highly reliable source and (b) because it takes awhile to gather this data from new vehicle registrations, as Fleet Central does, so you can rest assured that those are reliable figures that allow for apples-to-apples comparisons. In contrast, the July YTD figures are preliminary figures that are reported by the manufacturers (who do not all define "sales" in the same way), so they are subject to more adjustment. They are also useful, but you can't use them without understanding that they are subject to revision later. By definition, ALL historic data is a matter of "living the past." The YTD data from Reuters also includes the prior model year Tundra. The focus here is not on the Tundra specifically, but on the truck market as a whole, regardless of what products were introduced when. For whatever reason, you seem hung up on showing the Tundra as being some fantastic success, but it really isn't. (And mind you, I say this as one who is a consistent critic of GM and who generally lauds Toyota's business savvy.) Edmunds estimated Tundra total incentives during June as being more than $5,000 per unit, which tells you that the truck hit the market at too high of a price point, and still has difficulty competing on its merits. It's going to take awhile for TMC to make headway in this segment, although I have little doubt that it will get there eventually.

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