Chart Of The Day: Jeep's Importance At FCA In America
Outside of Maserati, which sold more cars than Jaguar in August 2014, Jeep is America’s fastest-growing auto brand in 2014. Through the first eight months of 2014, Jeep’s U.S. volume is up 45%, an increase of more than 143,235 sales.
Total FCA/Chrysler Group sales are up 14%. That’s no small feat, but it’s abundantly apparent that Jeep is motivating much of the Chrysler/Dodge/Fiat/Jeep/Ram gains. (Ram brand sales are up by nearly 58,000 units year-to-date.)
As FCA/Chrysler Group car volume plunges, sliding 18% this year according to the automaker, Jeep’s massive improvements are all the more important.
And it’s not all Cherokee-derived. Sales of Jeep’s other models, the Wrangler, Grand Cherokee, Patriot, and Compass, are up 11% in 2014. The Chrysler family now relies on the brand for more than three out of every ten sales, well up from fewer than two out of every ten in 2004.
More by Timothy Cain
Comments
Join the conversation
This seems to reflect differences in brand equity between cars and trucks in the US. There are some consumers who would never dream of buying an American passenger car but who would willingly buy an American truck or sport utility. The domestics have far more credibility as truck makers than as car makers. It seems that the goodwill lost by the likes of the Vega, Pinto, Citation, etc. didn't create a stigma for the trucks.
There's plenty of countries that have free trade agreement with the US to side step the chicken tax if they wanted to, if Toyota cannot sell pickup trucks to Americans no one can. Because let's face it, the tundra is a colossal failure if you look at their sales projections.
A Dutch company, headquartered in London, under Italian control. Vehicles engineered in assorted countries (including Germany and Italy) and assembled in multiple countries. How, exactly is Jeep 'American'? Is the B&B so easily fooled?
I wonder how much of that was in the original plan, back when Chairman Lee was at the helm? Chrysler absorbed what was left of AMC in 1986, and kept the Cherokee and CJ-7, which was morphing into the YJ. Eagle was a failure, and eventually shut down, leaving, what, two SUV's? Soon, Jeep will be what Chrysler once hoped to be; the standard bearer for the company. Prices for Jeeps are creeping up and getting fancier by the minute. And I will soon own a new Wrangler of my own.