VALUE BRAND SALES IN MARCH

The Good Car Guy reviewed March auto sales in the States, took a look at how Volvo pushes older models in Canada, continued with a numerical view of the German vs. Japan luxury rivals, and peered into the Swedish/American high-end marques owned by Detroit's Big Two.  

How about the sales results for cars available on the cheap? For this post (and maybe for this post only), you can consider the following brands as the high-value badges that compete for your $ in America: Chevrolet, Dodge, Ford, Hyundai, Kia, Mitsubishi, Saturn, and Suzuki.  

If a company can't justify selling for premium or top dollar, they need volume. Among this group, Chevrolet and Ford best personify the 'volume' approach to selling. Ford's numbers this March were about 30,000 lower than in March of 2007, but with total sales of 187,828 volume still applies. Chevrolet's percentage drop was 10 points worse than Ford's. What was 213,156 vehicles sold in 28 selling days of March 2007 became 164,564 during the 26 sales days in March/2008. Volume, people. Volume.

Seeing 25,000-odd sales disappear from the third month one year to the third month of the next has got to be discouraging.  Disheartening. Perhaps... depressing. Disappointing for sure. Yes, there's an economic crisis. Housing prices, the cost of a new Xbox 360 once every month or two, food prices, fuel prices all suck.

Wait a second. Fuel prices? Ah, doesn't the cost of fuel drive some people to small cars? Ford, General Motors, and Dodge produce a decent small car, maybe two.  

Hyundai sales rose 9.8% this March. Its Kia underling had lower sales this March, 2.8% down. Mitsubishi and Suzuki are two companies that can't rightly afford to see - signs beside their percentage changes. The drop at Mitsu was 7.7% while Suzuki's fall was not as bad; just 2.6%.  

Despite the economic crisis, Saturn's very fresh lineup in the United States doesn't look like the sort of model array that fits with a 7.5% percentage loss compared with March/2007. You would think that the Astra, Vue, and Outlook would help Saturn reach into cash-challenged wallets. You would think that? You would be wrong.

PSEUDO-AMERICAN LUXURY

Ford Motor Company's remaining luxury brands post-Land Rover/Jaguar sale form a duo that is eerily similar to General Motors' upper tier tandem. Yes, it's Swedish/American.

The Ford trio of Brits are long gone. Aston Martin is now in handled by a British/Kuwaiti setup with some American influence, too. Jaguar and Land Rover are Tata's.  That leaves Dearborn with Volvo and Lincoln. General Motors sticks it out with fledgling Saab and Cadillac.  

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How do they do? March was not a good month for Ford. Lincoln faced a 20% drop in sales compared with the same period last year. Volvo met a drop of over 6%. This equates to approximately 5,000 fewer sales from those two brands this March. 

Meanwhile, Saab sales increased. 125 extra units exited dealer doors this March. Cadillac produced a slight percentage drop of 0.8 with sales down 1,490 vehicles during a month which held two fewer selling days. 

Although The Good Car Guy already discussed Japanese and German luxury sales last month, it is interesting to take note of the numbers.  

Cadillac sales personnel sold more cars than Audi, Infiniti, or Acura consultants could manage. Then again, two German brands (BMW & Mercedes-Benz) and Lexus sold at a greater rate than Caddy. Acura and Infiniti outperformed Lincoln. The Swedish battle was over before it started. Volvo only needed a little more than one quarter of the month to sell more than Saab's total.  

One more fact? The People's Car - that'd be Volkswagen - was outsold by Cadillac last March. This time around, Volkswagen produces a jump of over 20% and thus claimed a 2,134 advantage over the preeminent American luxury marque.

GERMANY vs JAPAN - luxury

In March of 2007, the trio of Japanese luxury marques - Acura, Lexus, and Infiniti - reached total US auto sales of 59,718.  That is more than the German luxury trio - BMW, Audi, and Mercedes-Benz - which sold 54,957 vehicles last March.

In the 31 days of March just concluded, the Japanese triumvirate produced numbers of 52,048. Yes, that's down significantly. But don't blame Infiniti. (And don't forget about the two extra selling days in 03/07.) On the other hand, Germany's aged brands formed a total of 51,910. 

If you're curious, which you are or else you wouldn't be reading this, Lexus and BMW are their team leaders. Both brands have sales in the mid-20,000s.  Infiniti and Acura are in the mid-teens, with Mercedes around 5K ahead. Audi brings up the rear, but makes gains every month.  Audi and Infiniti sales were up over 7% when you take into account the number of selling days, comparing March/08 with March/07.

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What does all this mean? I don't know. It is interesting, however, to see that Acura is facing tumbling sales month-over-month month-after-month-after month, but still sold about 5,301 more vehicles than Audi did in March.This is Audi, the company that tells us it will be the biggest worldwide luxury automotive seller sometime early next decade. It's also interesting that amidst the economic turmoil, money is somehow making itself available for 100,000+ sales from luxury brands. That's just these luxury brands. We've not touched on Saab, Volvo, Cadillac, Porsche, Jaguar or the ultra-luxury Bentley/Rolls-Royce/Ferrari field.  

Lexus sold twice as many cars as Buick did last month. So did Kia. Audi doubles Mini. Mercedes sells about 2 cars every time Mitsubishi sells one and after beating Saturn by a few hundred in March of 2007, Benz beat them by 2,662 vehicles this March. 

Still, Chevrolet; Ford, and Toyota all sell more cars than these six prominent luxury badges combined.

BMW FOR THE ROYALS

"I shall be discovering the advantages of the BMW Hydrogen 7 with interest over the coming weeks." Those are the royal sounding words of Prince Albert of Monaco. This comes at an environment exhibition in the Prince's home country, a tax haven which happens to be the home garage to an inordinate amount of the world's supercar population. 

Yes, supercars and environmental exhibitions don't typically go hand in hand, but keep one thing in mind: Ferrari, Lamborghini, Pagani, and the like make up an ever-so-tiny small fraction of the world's automotive pollution. Automotive pollution itself is not even the world's main source of greenhouse gases. 

Nevertheless, the irony is on the surface. In a city where highrises are more common than excessively botoxed women (oooh, harsh) and where Google Earth reveals as much 'green' as Death Valley in the dry season (ooh, harsher), Prince Albert touts his enviro-cred by taking the keys to one of 100 hydrogen-powered German limos.

Other noteworthy BMW Hydrogen 7 drivers have included the likes of Jay Leno, Will Ferrell and the Vice-President of the European Union. Prince Albert should be made aware of his old bobsleighs - human-powered.

"THAT'LL BE 9 BILLION...THANKS AND HAVE A GOOD DAY"

Reports indicate that DaimlerChrysler has received offers of up to $9 billion with a b for their Chrysler arm. Any cheque with 9 zeros on the end of it sounds good enough for me, whether its from Magna or General Motors.

But oh must it sting. When Jurgen Schrempp orchestrated the 'merger of equals', the cost for acquiring the Chrysler Group was approximately $40 billion in 1998. With inflation, that works out to about $48,000,000,000. I'm not a mortgage specialist, but if that's your house aren't you really, really, really upset?

Let's take a look.

Purchase price - $40,000,000,000
Profits made (9 years) - don't laugh
Selling price - $9,000,000,000

It seemeth to me that what we have here is a loss of billions of dollars. $31 billion. Put that in perspective: If Mercedes-Benz had gained $31B and handed out freebies to every individual in the world, we'd all get a few bucks.

VOLVO CANADA INCENTIVES HEAVILY

The S60 and XC90 are Volvo's current senior citizens. While the C30 and XC70 may be newer; younger; and hipper, the midsize sedan and SUV are instantly familiar and known to be good and decent vehicles. Unfortunately for Volvo - and just about every automaker - models don't perform on the sales chart quite as well as one would wish in their latter years. 

What does Volvo Canada do with excess supply of less desirable cars in a small market? It starts with heavy discounts. Then it continues with some heavy discounts. Finally, the ending includes... heavy discounts. 

In the words of Volvo's press release: "Regardless of the trim, the XC90 will benefit from up to $10,200 in cash rebates. This comprises $7,200 in the company’s new Currency Cash Rebate program and a $3,000 loyalty bonus for existing Volvo vehicle owners." This will apply regardless of the method of receipt; whether that be cash, financing, or lease. "S60 customers will also benefit from up to $7,000 in cash rebates; $5,000 for the Currency Cash Rebate and a $2,000 loyalty bonus for existing Volvo vehicle owners."  

One Volvo Canada VP, Peter Johnson, said this "represents the largest incentive program the company has ever offered Canadian customers."  I guess that is saying something. 

MARCH SALES IN BRIEF

Audi, GMC, Honda, Hyundai, Infiniti, Jaguar, Mercedes-Benz, Mini, Nissan, Saab, and Volkswagen were successful brands in the United States last month. Contrasted with March of 2007, sales were up; at least a smidge. For instance, GMC sold at a 1.2% increase.  On the other hand, Jaguar was up 13.2%; VW was up 21.5%; and Mini sales rose 26.4%.  

Pontiac, Porsche, Lincoln, Land Rover, Hummer Dodge, Chrysler, Chevrolet, Buick, and Acura were all in the negative double digit percentile losses. For a brand like Porsche, that means a sales drop of 600 or so.  For Chevrolet, the double digit % losses equate to 50,000 fewer sales than in March of 2007.  

Volvo sales were down 6.4%. Check back in a few minutes to see what Volvo of Canada is doing to push older models off the lot.