subject: Michigan Chevrolet Dealers Hear GM Up 97,000 Units for 2011 Even with Shift in March Sales Numbers [print this page] Michigan Chevrolet Dealers Hear GM Up 97,000 Units for 2011 Even with Shift in March Sales Numbers
DETROIT, M.I. Michigan Chevrolet dealers watched as numbers increased once more for General Motors for the third month this year. Other automakers such as Chrysler and Honda also changed for the positive, with Ford even surpassing GM for the month of March. General Motors may have shifted the smallest amount in sales from last year, but GM is still holding the highest spot for total vehicles sold this year with 97,000 units more than any other automaker.
General Motors reported its seventh consecutive sales gain for March with its total sales hitting 206,621. This marks a 9.9 percent change from last March with 188,011 vehicles sold. In February, General Motors as well as Michigan Chevrolet dealers had offered a $700 per vehicle reduction, which may have lead to the large increase in February, but softened sales once the incentive was removed for March.
"We don't see anything significant that's going to slow down the industry," said Don Johnson, GM Vice President for U.S. Sales Operations, in a conference call. "I don't see a big change in consumer demand, unless something very dramatic comes out of Japan that we don't see right now."
Total sales have placed GM with 16.6 percent of the market share, while Ford took the lead with 17 percent. Ford saw an increase of 19.1 percent for March with 212,295 units sold in total from 178,188 last year. This is only the second month since 1998 that Ford has sold more than General Motors. March saw a 21 percent increase in truck sales for Ford, which was part of the large increase over Michigan Chevrolet dealers and others across the country who sold 148,197 Chevrolet units. Although Ford sold 9,797 units of the Ford Fiesta, introduced last summer, GM's Chevrolet Cruze increased 75 percent from last year's Cobalt model.
The following are sales numbers for other automakers in percentage changed from last year to this year:
Chrysler: 31.4 percent with 121,730 units
Toyota: -5.7 percent with 176,222 units
Honda: 23.5 percent with 133,650 units
Nissan: 26.9 percent with 121,141 units
Toyota was the only automaker that saw a decrease in numbers from last year. The popular Prius models were up 58 percent, but due to the Japan disaster, has only about 18 days of inventory available. This could hurt the automakers number for the month of April with no inventory to offer customers.
"We've been there many, many times before with this vehicle having demand ahead of supply but we've been able to manage that," said Robert Carter, a Toyota Group Vice President, in a conference call with reporters.
In the U.S., automakers sold 857,313 cars and trucks in March, which is a decrease from previous years. According to Motor Intelligence, the Seasonally Adjusted Annualized Rate (SAAR) of sales for March was the highest so far this year at 9.8 million vehicles. January saw a SAAR of 9.5 million and February dropped to 9.1 million. The estimated SAAR for March was under 9 million, signaling the achieved March numbers exceeded expectations.
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