They Wanted Fewer Fleet Sales, and They Got It

Steph Willems
by Steph Willems

Replay the last couple of years and you’ll hear a chorus of automaker pledging their allegiance to sustainable business practices. Streamlined operations, pared-down lineups and build configurations, reduced incentives, and a newfound preference for retail sales over the volume-at-all-costs approach. No single company touted this more than Nissan, though it was hardly alone.

The coronavirus pandemic, in some cases, sped up the need to find firmer financial footing, even if incentivization became the name of the game in order to move any car or truck. One thing’s for sure: fleets, especially rental fleets, sure weren’t interested.

Data from Cox Automotive shows that, even as retail sales rebounded following the lifting of lockdown orders, fleets orders remained radically depressed.

Year over year, fleet sales in May fell 83.2 percent, Cox reports, compared to a retail drop of just 16 percent. In terms of actual units, that comes out to 52,203 vehicles sold to fleets versus 311,202 sold the same month last year.

As executive analyst Michelle Krebs noted, the slow ramp-up of production and the need to replenish starving dealerships means vastly reduced (and less profitable) fleet sales are of a lesser concern. “If there is ever a good time for bad fleet, it’s now,” Krebs remarked.

While overall fleet sales in May were a shadow of its former self, sales to rental agencies appeared on the side of a milk carton. With agencies like Hertz drowning in debt, cancelling fleet buys, and seeking bankruptcy protection, it’s no shock to learn that rental sales fell 91.3 percent, year over year, last month.

Seeing the greatest volume loss from vanished fleet sales in May were rental lot denizens Nissan and Fiat Chrysler, Cox data shows.

[Image: Nissan]

Steph Willems
Steph Willems

More by Steph Willems

Comments
Join the conversation
2 of 8 comments
  • Fred Fred on Jun 05, 2020

    Our company had OEM sales. We didn't make a lot of money on them, but once engineered they sold in good volumes, maybe 10%-20% of total, to keep the shop going with steady work. So I don't see the real problem with fleet sales. I think this is more of a problem with management not doing their job.

  • Lorenzo Lorenzo on Jun 07, 2020

    I'll be happy to see fewer Altimas when I rent. I was looking forward to the old Impala after awhile. I had nothing but trouble with the clunky keyless Altima ignition units.

  • Rochester "better than Vinfast" is a pretty low bar.
  • TheMrFreeze That new Ferrari looks nice but other than that, nothing.And VW having to put an air-cooled Beetle in its display to try and make the ID.Buzz look cool makes this classic VW owner sad 😢
  • Wolfwagen Is it me or have auto shows just turned to meh? To me, there isn't much excitement anymore. it's like we have hit a second malaise era. Every new vehicle is some cookie-cutter CUV. No cutting-edge designs. No talk of any great powertrains, or technological achievements. It's sort of expected with the push to EVs but there is no news on that front either. No new battery tech, no new charging tech. Nothing.
  • CanadaCraig You can just imagine how quickly the tires are going to wear out on a 5,800 lbs AWD 2024 Dodge Charger.
  • Luke42 I tried FSD for a month in December 2022 on my Model Y and wasn’t impressed.The building-blocks were amazing but sum of the all of those amazing parts was about as useful as Honda Sensing in terms of reducing the driver’s workload.I have a list of fixes I need to see in Autopilot before I blow another $200 renting FSD. But I will try it for free for a month.I would love it if FSD v12 lived up to the hype and my mind were changed. But I have no reason to believe I might be wrong at this point, based on the reviews I’ve read so far. [shrug]. I’m sure I’ll have more to say about it once I get to test it.
Next