Chevrolet Sold 23,461 Volts In 2012
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Despite falling well short of the initial sales goal for 2012, the Chevrolet Volt still set a new sales record for itself, as sales grew over 205 percent year-over-year, selling 23,461 units. That in itself is an impressive statistic, and does not count variants sold in other parts of the world, such as China or Europe.
GM originally wanted to sell 40,000 Volts in the U.S. in 2012, but as the year went on, the projections became more realistic. And just for fun, we would like to point out that the Volt outsold the Corvette in 2012 by nearly 10,000 units.
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I’m pleased to hear this news.
I thought they were hoping for 45000 sales, either way they are basically half so what 5k here or there.
People need to get accustom and still familiarize themselves with the Volt. There are still a shitton of people who don’t understand what the Volt is. I’ve had many people say “the Volt? the electric one? I don’t want that I can barely get to work and back”. I’ve heard that or similar personally more than 15 times (I don’t even sell or work for GM in any capacity).
The Volt need a halo car to get people interested in figuring out what it is and how it operates, 30 second commercials that people barely pay attention to isn’t enough. This is where the ELR comes in, people look at it and get excited, then they see the price and think other wise, but they have the Volt alternative, such is the way with any Halo car, even if it is a case like this where it is cross brand.
Buick should get their version, and I hope it’s Encore sized, gives the Voltec platform a coupe, sedan, and small CUV.
Would also be very cool to see the Voltec technology incorporated into the next gen Colorado/Canyon.
How many units were sold globally?
When we know, you’ll know.
Very impressive that Volt rebounded in sales numbers for December even after incentives had ended.
This will be an extremely interesting year for cars with plugs. Fusion Energi will be on sales floors very soon, and Honda’s PHEV Accord a couple months after. Of course,
these cars look nearly exactly like their non-PHEV brethren, while Volt looks like
nothing else. Truly, the others’ trunks are stuffed with large battery boxes that take up
most of their cargo space. While a Volt can be floored constantly up to it’s 35-50 mile all-electric range and never revert to gas propulsion – the others will post 11-20 miles all electric if you baby them with kid gloves (IOW, it aint gonna happen).
Ford and Honda ad execs will advertise their questionable “higher than Volt” MPGe
EPA numbers at risk of the backlash when consumers don’t see those results. Volt’s
competitors have also shown their hands in telling consumers their PHEVs have
a longer TOTAL range than Volt….But again, who drives 400-600 miles on a regular basis? The battle here will be in the press and all over media. Volt just plain will handle
better, and not be just a version of an existing line – as are the others. Volt will suffer
sales losses over the lacking center rear seating capability.
All in, hopefully dealerships will train their staffs to point out the differences and highlight these obvious advantages Voltec has over it’s competition.
As all others have said – truly GM has to have Voltec in other platforms to truly take
advantage of it’s technological lead before spin and superior sales targeting equals
big loss in a category GM literally invented with Volt.
GM-Just say YES to a plug-in CUV and pickup truck. Colorado would be perfect.
For me, a salesmen can’t tell me something about a car that I already don’t know. But one thing I hate the most, is when they talk about other manufacturers cars and a pro-con sort of fashion. I’m not saying they shouldn’t acknowledge other cars/competitors, but I don’t want to listen to a dealer/sales person play a childish game.
I randomly just remembered, Ray Wert (former Editor-in-Chief at Jalopnik, and is know one of the big(ger) wigs with Gawker Media) said via his personal Facebook that his mother called him, very excited, that she had just hit 800miles in her new Volt and had only used 4 gallons of gas, in two months.. 200MPG.
His mother is quite the lady, if anyone hasn’t read her review of her old 2010 SRX you should check it out http://jalopnik.com/5524001/2010-cadillac-srx-awd-moms-first-drive
I’m really wish that gas stations and restaurants around interstates had recharging stations correctly spec’d for high speed recharging while you are having breakfast, bathroom breaks etc.
There is a SAE J1772 standard for fast DC charging, and the 2014 Chevy Spark EV is the first GM vehicle that qualifies. So if GM sells many Sparks, the charging stations will comply , following the supply and demand rules. Newer Voltecs will also follow the standard.