Chrysler and Ford had big drops in July.

Although comparing this July's sales rate with last year's employee discount driven free-for-all is like comparing how many friends you have living on the streets vs just hitting the lottery, it's still a good measure to see what cars are REALLY successful.

Keep in mind, these vehicles saw increases for the month of July without incentives, in a month that the new car market overall has dropped 17% from last year!

Chrysler:

300: Sales up 4%
Charger: Sales up 53%
Viper: Sales up 38%
Sprinter Van: Up 5%


Ford

Mustang: Sales up 30%
Ford GT: Sales up 62%
Econoline Van: Sales up 1/2%

The Lincoln Mercury division saw a sales gain of 24%, but that's on the back of the Zephyr (everything else in the showroom plunged from 31% (Town Car) to 56% (Merc's Mariner).

and since you're gonna ask:
GM

Chevy Aveo: Sales up 4%
Chevy Corvette: Sales up 55%
Chevy Impala, sales up 60%
Chevy Malibu: up 25%
Chevy Monte Carlo: up 44%
Pontiac G6: up 81%
Pontiac GTO: Sales up 65%
Saturn Ion: up 1.5%
Chevy HHR: up 250%
GMC Savana: up 140%
Hummer H1: up 22%
Hummer H3: sales up 24%


These were the ONLY domestic vehicles that saw sales increases this month.

Again, most significant is that these vehicle's sales gained despite the market this month dropping 17% over last years, and the inflated sales numbers last July due to employee pricing and massive giveaways.


But what's really impressive is that big ticket sports cars (Ford GT, Dodge Viper, and the Corvette) as well as cars that either are sporty or have a reputation for performance (GTO, Mustang, & Charger) are also doing extremely well at defying gravity of high fuel costs and a drop in the total US market.

http://prnewswire.com/cgi-bin/storie...4408081&EDATE=
http://media.gm.com/servlet/GatewayS...74&docid=27722
http://media.ford.com/article_displa...&make_id=trust

 

By looking at those figures I can't imagine how much better off Chevy will be when their new products begin to hit. It's interesting however that there is no increase over 7/05 for the Cobalt, Avalanche and Tahoe (with the 07 releases.) As always thanks for keeping us informed. I for one really appreciate it.

 

The employee pricing firesales in July 2005 have much to do with that. In the first half of 2006, Cobalt was the 10th best selling vehicle in America. It has been a success.

 

Retail sales for the Ford Fusion, Mercury Milan, and Lincoln Zephyr were a record 19,440 in July, up 18 percent compared with June. Total sales (including fleet deliveries) for the company's new mid-size sedans were 20,129.

Whoa, that's pretty impressive!

 

With more than half of the public currently driving trucks or SUVs, I'm sure that someone takes a look at the 17/25 estimate on a Hemi LX or 19/28 estimate on a Corvette and starting thinking, "Hot damn, now that's some good mileage!".

 

250%? thats all they could muster up?

Thats quite a HUGE gain. Actually I am pretty surprised to see the GMC Savanna doing so well.

I am seeing more and more GTO's around, dealers are getting more in, and are a little more willing to deal I think too.

 

Anyone else suprised with the H3 #'s?

HUMMER H3 5,566 up 24%

This was nearly double the Monte Carolo at 3,524. I thought the Monte was a higher volume car than this..

 

I would think that the Viper and the Ford GT would be more or less immune to the rising cost in gas prices. People that buy cars like that usually seem to have the big dollars to pay the fuel costs.

 

That or these vehicles sit in a garage and only get driven on "special" occasions or whatnot. I doubt they drive a Ford GT to work... But some might I'm sure...

 

Plus a lot of those sporty cars get decent gas mileage anyway, except for the exotics (and fuel costs don't matter to those buyers anyway).

 

Actually, in a rich neighborhood that we work in, a guy drives a white/blue Ford GT just about everyday. Pretty cool to see it atleast getting driven instead of sitting.

 

Vanpools my friend, vanpools. In L.A., individuals can set-up vanpools thru mass transit quite easily. Call them up they lease you a van. There are like 20 different vanpools at the place I work. Fleet sales on the Savannas must be going thru the roof!

The word finally got out on the GTOs and of course it must now go on hiatus. Edmunds has it as the 2nd most popular (according to Consumers) Coupe under 35k. It was beat out by the G35 by 14 votes. The editors rated both G35 and GTO an 8.0.

 

Congrats to the GTO, MANY dealers did not offer the gto at employee price and that is a true increase in sales. I think it took awhile for the G6 style to catch on but now I am seeing them everywhere. I think it will continue to grow in sales. How about the solstice? got any numbers?

 

That was funny