The sales numbers for April 2010 are out, and they’re pretty positive across the board. Hell, even Chrysler managed a sales increase. Yes, you read that correctly. No, I didn’t mean Toyota. I meant Chrysler. You know, those cats that make the Sebring. They had a sales increase. Really.

April’s top dogs:

• Chrysler: Up 61%
• Dodge: Up 61%
• Subaru: Up 48%
• Infiniti: Up 46%
• Volkswagen: Up 42%

April’s Biggest Losers:

• Smart: Down 49%
• Jaguar: Down 30%
• Suzuki: Down 23%
• Ram: Down 22%

Did I mention that both the Chrysler and Dodge brands posted a huge sales increase? Granted, April 09 was horrific, and April 2010 was a very good month all the way around, but still. These brands haven’t posted increases in…. well… a really long time. I can’t exactly tell you why the month turned out so well for them, but it did.

On the losers side, I didn’t include GM’s brands that are being phased out – they’re all in the 90-99% down range, but didn’t seem relevent. Smart is a failed brand by any measure. It’s only a matter of time before Mercedes stops selling the brand here. There simply isn’t any real benefit in buying a Smart car, beyond being able to park anywhere. They’re too expensive, drive poorly, and don’t even get that great of gas mileage.

Hi there - could you help spread the word about Houston Cars? This is a new site, and I could really use your help in getting my work out to new readers. If you would send someone a link, email, or even mention it to your friends, I would appreciate it.April Automotive Sales Highlights is a post from: Houston Cars, home of the best darn car reviews around.

Nearly across the board, March 2010 was an excellent month to be selling cars. All major companies (with the notable exception of Chrysler) posted a sales gain for the month – though a few brands still managed to stink it up. Here are a couple of the big winners:

• Buick: Up 76% – It would seem there are a whole lot of old folks enjoying their new rides.
• Ford: Up 45% – Ford has been on a roll lately.
• Nissan: Up 44% – Strong incentives kept things moving
• Toyota: Up 41% – Recall? What recall?

And a few of the losers:

• Smart: Down 61% – This is a failed brand. Shut it down and stop the bleeding.
• Dodge: Down 19% – Pretty much the same as above.
• Volvo: Down 18%
• Ram: Down 11% – Everyone else managed to move plenty of trucks, but “Ram” couldn’t figure it out.

I didn’t include the retired brands – you know, the ones that are officially closed / closing. Brands like Pontiac, Saab, Hummer, and Saturn. Not really much point in showing shocking drops, since those guys are toast.

Seeing Chrysler in the crapper in spite of all the success elsewhere isn’t really all that surprising. There are no appealing products in the Chrysler lineup. None in Dodge. None at Ram. Jeep has one, and even it has lost its way.

The biggest surprise of the month would have to be Toyota. Through huge incentives, particularly leases, Toyota managed to make American forget about that little recall issue, and post a huge sales increase. The real question is, can they continue to post increases without the costly incentives? April will tell.

Hi there - could you help spread the word about Houston Cars? This is a new site, and I could really use your help in getting my work out to new readers. If you would send someone a link, email, or even mention it to your friends, I would appreciate it.March 2010 Sales – Fantastic is a post from: Houston Cars, home of the best darn car reviews around.

The great ( or not so great, depending on your point of view ) month of November, two thousand and nine is behind us. Another month of car sales, with some high points, and some low points. So, who came out a winner, and who came out a loser? Check out some highlights:

November 2009 Winners

• Hyundai +46% In any month of any year, a 46% increase in sales is impressive. But in November, during a recession? Stunning.
• Nissan +30%
• Subaru +24%
• Mercedes-Benz +19%
• Buick +15%

November 2009 Losers

• Hummer -85% Hummer
• Smart -70% How much longer until Mercedes-Benz pulls the plug on this (seemingly) failed brand?
• Mini -43%
• Chrysler -37%

The biggest surprises were probably the epic fall of Smart, and the increase in Buick sales.

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Hyundai’s New Rep

Ever since the launch of the anticipated Genesis, Hyundai has been stepping up to the plate. The Genesis sedan took it’s first North America Car of the year award for 2009. After judged by 50 full time automotive experts who have critically analyze each and every car from the market, with months of road testing. It had proven itself worthy to be one of the most top honored cars in North America. Ever since then Hyundai’s image has changed.

Despite the “Economic Downturn” Hyundai managed to jump from 72nd place in 2008 to 69th place in 2009 as the top 100 brands in the world. With only a -5% change in value from 2008, this $4,604,000 Hyundai icon stayed under the average -7.4% in brand value change with other automakers. They even topped Porsche’s 75th place with a -8% in their $4,234,000 brand value. And Ferrari with their $3,527,000 brand taking 88th place with no change in value. And Coke tops #1 on that list, no surprise right?

Anyway I said all that to make a point. Ever since the launch of the Genesis taking them into the  luxury/ RWD platform. They are changing their image to reach people who have different needs and wants. From a 10k small nibble work a day car like the Accent. To a 33k high end Luxury BMW fighter Genesis Sedan. Hyundai has a car for everyone. I believe Hyundai is indeed becoming the next generation Honda. I expect more from them in the future.

Source Cited

http://www.hyundainews.com/Corporate_News/Corporate/01_11_2009_2982.asp

http://www.interbrand.com/best_global_brands.aspx?year=2009&langid=1000

Hi there - could you help spread the word about Houston Cars? This is a new site, and I could really use your help in getting my work out to new readers. If you would send someone a link, email, or even mention it to your friends, I would appreciate it.Hyundai’s New Rep is a post from: Houston Cars, home of the best darn car reviews around.

As usual, I won’t bore you with every single detail on how June’s auto sales went. Instead, I’ll touch on some of the best, and some of the worst. If you don’t see it here, then you can safely assume that brand falls somewhere in between. To start off with, let’s take a look at some top performing brands:

June’s Best Performers

• Subaru +3.4% Subaru has been probably the best brand at weathering the auto sales apocalypse. Showing a 3.4% sales gain is nothing short of tremendous, and the folks at Subaru should be commended for it.
• Volve +0.6% Volvo up? Really?
• Kia -5.1%

June’s Worst Performers

• Suzuki -78% Time to shut ‘er down, Suzuki. Stick a fork it in, you’re done here.
• Porsche -66% Actually surprising in a way. Though not really, since Porsche’s aren’t exactly inexpensive.
• Saturn -60% Who knew – a dead brand saw their sale tank. Crazy, that.

As for major companies, Chrysler was down a total of 41%, while Ford was down just 10%. The combination of Chrysler’s bankruptcy, and Ford’s shunning of free Uncle Sam money is the difference here. I’m hoping that Ford can continue to move forward without accepting huge government loans. So far it seems to have provided a sales boost, or at least a smaller decline.

All in all, June was bad. But not nearly as bad as the past few months have been. Perhaps there’s a chance that we’re getting near the bottom in this whole mess. What do you think?

Hi there - could you help spread the word about Houston Cars? This is a new site, and I could really use your help in getting my work out to new readers. If you would send someone a link, email, or even mention it to your friends, I would appreciate it.June Sales Numbers is a post from: Houston Cars, home of the best darn car reviews around.

May of two thousand and nine has come and come – leaving some interesting developments in its wake.  On the sales front, there are some big surprises on who did well, and who did, well, not so well.  First let’s take a look at the Biggest Losers:

• Suzuki: –75%
• Saab: –63%
• Mitsubishi: –58%
• Saturn: –55%
• Pontiac: –52%
• Chrysler: –51%
• Dodge: –48%

I said there were some surprises – most of the Big Losers belong there.  Now on to the “Smallest Losers”

• Subaru: –5%
• Volkswagen: –12%
• Audi: –12%
• Kia: –16%
• Buick: –17%

Subaru has been weathering the storm fairly well, at least compared to just about everyone else –so their appearance on the smallest loser list is not surprising.  Seeing Buick there is a bit of a surprise.  What’s even more of a surprise is the fact that a single brand actually managed a sales increase.  That brand? 

Lincoln was up 2% in sales.

Wow. Just wow. All those alphabet soup cars must have struck a chord with consumers, or perhaps it was their awesome line of commercials.

As far as brands go, Ford was down just 24%, and GM just 29%.  On the flip side, Toyota was down 40%, and Honda down 41%.  Nissan managed to land in the middle, down 33%.  So the Japanese Big Three are no more immune to the sales decline than the Detroit Big 3. 

Hi there - could you help spread the word about Houston Cars? This is a new site, and I could really use your help in getting my work out to new readers. If you would send someone a link, email, or even mention it to your friends, I would appreciate it.May Sales Highlights is a post from: Houston Cars, home of the best darn car reviews around.

Shouldn’t that be highlights, you ask?  No, it most certainly should not, when you notice that every single major automaker suffered a drop in sales in April.  There’s no “best” and “worst” here.  Just Bad, worse, and worst.  So, who did just “bad” in April?  Let’s take a look-see.

Bad Brands

• Subaru –6.69% : All things considered, Subaru has weathered this storm pretty well so far.
• Audi –9.31% :
• Hyundai –13.56%

Worse Brands

• Kia –14.83%
• Volkswagen –16.1%
• Honda –24.51%

Worst of the worst

• Suzuki –73.7% : Are you serious?  Worse than Hummer?
• Hummer –61%
• Saturn –56%

When looking at companies, Chrysler did the worst – down 48% vs last year, and Honda nabbed the “top” spot, with a 25% drop.

April was absolutely brutal, in every sense of the word.  No one escaped the carnage, though some did spectacularly terrible.  Suzuki – seriously worse than Hummer?  Unbelievable.

Hi there - could you help spread the word about Houston Cars? This is a new site, and I could really use your help in getting my work out to new readers. If you would send someone a link, email, or even mention it to your friends, I would appreciate it.April Auto Sales Lowlights is a post from: Houston Cars, home of the best darn car reviews around.

January’s dismal numbers have been posted in detail elsewhere, but I wanted to hit on a couple of the highlights. First the good news (  you remember what good news is, don’t you? ):

• Hyundai +14%
• Kia +3.5%
• Subaru +8%

Go Hyundai, bucking the trend.  A 14% jump is strong during the good times, and it’s unheard of lately.  Most everyone else wasn’t so lucky.  Here’s some of the worst performances:

• Buick -45%
• Chevrolet -48%
• Dodge -50%
• Ford -40%
• Hummer -60%
• Jeep -50%
• Mercedes -42%
• Pontiac -60%
• Saturn -60%
• Suzuki -49%
• Volvo -64%

There are a lot of terrible, terrible numbers in that group.  But the absolute king of not selling cars in January is the unloved Chrysler brand.  This doomed brand took an absolutely unprecendented 69% dive in January.  Sixty nine percent down.  I didn’t even know that was possible.  Looks like the Germans were brilliant to unload this group when they could.  Cerberus, on the other hand…. not looking so smart.

February has to get better, right?  Right?  Bueller?

Hi there - could you help spread the word about Houston Cars? This is a new site, and I could really use your help in getting my work out to new readers. If you would send someone a link, email, or even mention it to your friends, I would appreciate it.January 2009 Auto Sales Numbers is a post from: Houston Cars, home of the best darn car reviews around.

Highlights?  Did I just say highlights?  Alright, here’s the best of the best in automotive sales for December of 2008:

Mini – up 0.1%

…. crickets chirping……

Yep, Mini sold 4 more cars in December 2008 than they did in 2007.  Quite an accomplishment, when you consider how the rest of the automotive world fared.  I won’t bore you with the whole list, just a few “standouts.”  Here we go, in no particular order:

• Acura – down 39% – The new corporate grille can’t turn things around at Acura.
• Hummer – down 59% – Sure, gas is cheap.  But the reputation of the Hummer is ruined forever.
• Chrysler – down 60% – Sixty percent.  What the fuck happened here?
• Jeep – down 49%. 
• Pontiac – down 46% – Why, again, are they still around?
• Toyota – down 38% – Even the mighty are falling these days.  And how.
• Volvo – down 47% – Nothing to see here.  Really.
• Dodge – Down 52% – Could it be the 12 MPG Ram?  Or the troll that is called the Caliber?  Nah, let’s blame it on the credit market.  Yea, the bank did it!
• Honda – Down 34%.  Almost as bad as Toyota.  Can no one escape the fury of a terrible auto market?

What else is there to say?  Even with Honda’s terrible showing, they came within 4,000 units of topping Chrysler LLC for the month.  And only one automaker showed an increase?  And that increase was four cars?  Time are bad, times are bad.  Here’s to a (hopefully) less catastrophic January.

Hi there - could you help spread the word about Houston Cars? This is a new site, and I could really use your help in getting my work out to new readers. If you would send someone a link, email, or even mention it to your friends, I would appreciate it.December 2008 Sales Highlights is a post from: Houston Cars, home of the best darn car reviews around.

Normally at the beginning of a new month, I highlight the best and worst brands with regards to monthly sales.  This time around, I can’t do that.  Why, you ask?  Well, every single automaker saw sales tank.  That’s right, every one of them.

Worst losers

• Hummer: -54%
• Volvo: -51%
• Porsche: -44%
• Jeep: -42%

Best losers?

These brand saw the smallest sales drop for September:

• Audi: -5.4%
• MINI: -6.7%
• VW: -9.4%

Wow.  With a 5% sales drop, Audi managed the best month out of any automaker in September.   Un.  Frickin.  Believable.  Times are tough, times are strange.  I have a bad feeling that October and November won’t be all that much better.  Hope I’m wrong though…

Hi there - could you help spread the word about Houston Cars? This is a new site, and I could really use your help in getting my work out to new readers. If you would send someone a link, email, or even mention it to your friends, I would appreciate it.September Auto Sales – Black September? is a post from: Houston Cars, home of the best darn car reviews around.