U.S. Auto Sales Brand Results: February 2015 YTD


An unexpectedly strong winter impact slowed February 2015 auto sales compared with the expectations of forecasters but not in comparison with February 2014. The market jumped by more than 5% with the strongest gains coming from Jeep, GMC, Subaru. A number of lower-volume brands – Mini, Mitsubishi, Land Rover, Lexus, and Infiniti – all posted year-over-year improvements of at least 20%.
Ford Motor Company suffered the loss of sales at its namesake Ford brand and at Lincoln. GM volume dropped at Buick and Cadillac but increased at the automaker’s two higher-volume brands. FCA/Chrysler Group suffered a sharp drop at Dodge, but the big Jeep improvement was married to strong Chrysler and Ram sales.
AutomakerFeb. 2015Feb. 2014% Change2015 YTD2014 YTD% ChangeAcura 12,99211,54512.5%24,97422,36811.7%Alfa Romeo 47——144— —Audi 11,45510,8815.3%22,99620,9829.6%BMW 25,20122,01714.5%44,18240,2709.7%Buick 17,41819,192-9.2%29,97132,470-7.7%Cadillac 11,73913,437-12.6%23,41924,823-5.7%Chevrolet 159,788153,9133.8%302,670273,00210.9%Chrysler 28,50225,23013.0%51,895 46,34312.0%Dodge 42,11549,744-15.3%77,46284,649-8.5%Fiat 3,2893,465-5.1%6,5446,687-2.1%Ford 173,509 176,688-1.8% 344,331 324,2096.2%GMC 42,43335,56219.3%78,10463,29523.4%Honda 92,47488,8604.1%182,676169,6687.7%Hyundai 52,505 49,0037.1% 97,010 93,0084.3%Infiniti 11,6599,72919.8% 21,317 18,72713.8%Jaguar 1,4101,552-9.1%2,6762,899-7.7%Jeep 55,64245,946 21.0%107,16587,85622.0%Kia 44,03041,2186.8%82,32978,2295.2%Land Rover 4,9174,00622.7%10,1988,68017.5%Lexus 22,99518,85522.0%46,12636,49226.4%Lincoln 6,1646,661-7.5%12,78312,6341.2%Maserati 481837-42.5%9331405-33.6%Mazda 25,65024,3415.4%45,92143,1546.4%Mercedes-Benz 23,61622,609 4.5% 48,235 45,213 6.7%Mercedes-Benz Sprinter 1,6751,421 17.9% 3,180 2,709 17.4%Total Mercedes-Benz 25,291 24,0305.2% 51,415 47,9227.3%Mini 3,7202,45951.3%6,9485,00238.9%Mitsubishi 7,5335,97726.0%14,02610,84429.3%Nissan 106,777 105,6311.1% 201,226187,1037.5%Porsche 3,2023,232 -0.9%7,1396,32812.8%Ram 33,99130,481 11.5%65,38356,51415.7%Scion 3,8644,529-14.7% 7,5548,540-11.5%Smart 458941-51.3%9501462-35.0%Subaru 41,35834,90918.5%82,17067,90921.0%Toyota 153,608135,90013.0%295,981260,61713.6%Volkswagen 25,71027,112-5.2%49,21450,606-2.8%Volvo 4,0123,9910.5%7,8067,7830.3%————— ——BMW-Mini 28,92124,47618.2%51,13045,27212.9%FCA/Chrysler Group 163,586154,8665.6%308,593282,0499.4%Daimler25,74924,9713.1%52,36549,3846.0%Ford Motor Company 179,673183,349-2.0% 357,114336,8436.0%General Motors 231,378222,1044.2%434,164393,59010.3%Honda Motor Company105,466 100,4055.0%207,650 192,0368.1%Hyundai-Kia 96,535 90,2217.0% 179,339 171,2374.7%Jaguar-Land Rover 6,3275,55813.8%12,874 11,57911.2%Nissan Motor Company118,436115,3602.7% 222,543205,8308.1%Toyota Motor Corporation 180,467159,284 13.3%322,840 305,6495.6%Volkswagen Group * 40,56341,403-2.0%79,64178,2861.7%———————Industry Total1,258,570 1,194,679 5.3% 2,411,050 2,208,105 9.2%* Volkswagen Group includes sales figures for Audi, Bentley, Porsche, and Volkswagen brands
** Industry total takes into account Automotive News estimates for brands such as Tesla (2000 February units) and other low-volume, high-priced manufacturers.
Timothy Cain is the founder of GoodCarBadCar.net, which obsesses over the free and frequent publication of U.S. and Canadian auto sales figures.
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- Max So GM will be making TESLAS in the future. YEA They really shouldn’t be taking cues from Elon musk. Tesla is just about to be over.
- Malcolm It's not that commenters attack Tesla, musk has brought it on the company. The delivery of the first semi was half loaded in 70 degree weather hauling potato chips for frito lay. No company underutilizes their loads like this. Musk shouted at the world "look at us". Freightliners e-cascads has been delivering loads for 6-8 months before Tesla delivered one semi. What commenters are asking "What's the actual usable range when in say Leadville when its blowing snow and -20F outside with a full trailer?
- Funky D I despise Google for a whole host of reasons. So why on earth would I willing spend a large amount of $ on a car that will force Google spyware on me.The only connectivity to the world I will put up with is through my phone, which at least gives me the option of turning it off or disconnecting it from the car should I choose to.No CarPlay, no sale.
- William I think it's important to understand the factors that made GM as big as it once was and would like to be today. Let's roll back to 1965, or even before that. GM was the biggest of the Big Three. It's main competition was Ford and Chrysler, as well as it's own 5 brands competing with themselves. The import competition was all but non existent. Volkswagen was the most popular imported cars at the time. So GM had its successful 5 brands, and very little competition compared to today's market. GM was big, huge in fact. It was diversified into many other lines of business, from trains to information data processing (EDS). Again GM was huge. But being huge didn't make it better. There are many examples of GM not building the best cars they could, it's no surprise that they were building cars to maximize their profits, not to be the best built cars on the road, the closest brand to achieve that status was Cadillac. Anyone who owned a Cadillac knew it could have been a much higher level of quality than it was. It had a higher level of engineering and design features compared to it's competition. But as my Godfather used to say "how good is good?" Being as good as your competitors, isn't being as good as you could be. So, today GM does not hold 50% of the automotive market as it once did, and because of a multitude of reasons it never will again. No matter how much it improves it's quality, market value and dealer network, based on competition alone it can't have a 50% market share again. It has only 3 of its original 5 brands, and there are too many strong competitors taking pieces of the market share. So that says it's playing in a different game, therfore there's a whole new normal to use as a baseline than before. GM has to continue downsizing to fit into today's market. It can still be big, but in a different game and scale. The new normal will never be the same scale it once was as compared to the now "worlds" automotive industry. Just like how the US railroad industry had to reinvent its self to meet the changing transportation industry, and IBM has had to reinvent its self to play in the ever changing Information Technology industry it finds it's self in. IBM was once the industry leader, now it has to scale it's self down to remain in the industry it created. GM is in the same place that the railroads, IBM and other big companies like AT&T and Standard Oil have found themselves in. It seems like being the industry leader is always followed by having to reinvent it's self to just remain viable. It's part of the business cycle. GM, it's time you accept your fate, not dead, but not huge either.
- Tassos The Euro spec Taurus is the US spec Ford FUSION.Very few buyers care to see it here. FOrd has stopped making the Fusion long agoWake us when you have some interesting news to report.
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Way to go Nissan. Sales continue to rise and Honda is again in the rearview mirror.
Some awfully big swings, both up and down, for many makes. It'd be nice to get a brand by brand analysis of why.