Chevrolet U.S. Sales Fall 5.28 Percent To 178,820 Units In July 2016

Comments

1. 

   Malibu should be off to a stronger start. I wonder how long it took for Fusion to gain traction? I’m in NYC and only see Malibus on the highway.
   For some reason GM vehicles are late bloomers. Terrain is a great example.
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   1. 

      The Malibu and Cruze are the ones most impacted by the drive to reduce fleet sales, so that’s the reason sales are down… though we don’t have exact figures of this.
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      1. 

         I’m not sure that’s the only reason. I’m still not feeling the styling on the new Cruze. And although I think the rear 3/4’s of the Malibu is gorgeous (very Audi), the front end is a mess. When Ford decided to take the Fusion to new heights a few years back, they went all out and it paid. The front end while obviously lifted from Aston Martin, is gorgeous and the rest of the car very sleek yet sporty. Chevrolet needs to fix the front end. Ford also has AWD in their cars, Chevrolet has nada… I wouldn’t even consider a sedan without AWD because of the snow and ice covered roads we have half the year. Surely there are many others. Another thing is interior trims. With Ford you can get a Titanium Fusion. Very high end… Chevrolet (Ford’s direct competitor) has again, nada. The renamed LTZ (now Premier) is nowhere near as nice and add to it, only available in 1 color when I looked at our dealer. One that’s not all that great looking either. It suffers from the same problem as the High Country trim in the trucks with just one color to get. Not everyone likes brown in their high end trim.

         Chevrolet really needs to get with the program and for once go all out. You can get nicer trimmed out Kia’s now than you can Chevrolet’s. They are really shooting themselves in the foot in many areas, on many trims, with many options, and with nearly all of their models. Ford has been going all out for a solid 10-15 years and it’s paying off huge. Chevrolet also needs to fix their designs of both cars and trucks (though the Colorado looks good). Go back to clean lines, classy and sophisticated yet sporty looking. That’s what made their 55-72 designs so timeless and created their loyal following. Their Silverado just isn’t an attractive truck, their Tahoe has an odd front end and their cars just aren’t home run designs aside from the Corvette.. And I still think the Avista should have been the new Camaro. It’s really hard being a Chevrolet guy these days.
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2. 

   Mr. Sweeney is probably not entirely happy with the current state of affairs.
   The big un’s are suffering (Silverado, Cruze, Equinox).
   But Colorado, the Volt, and a few others are dong well.

   Kind of a weird, unpredictable year for lots of brands.
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3. 

   It will take a full year to clear these lower numbers while taking out the fleet. They are comparing sales with fleet last year and sales this year with no fleet so it will be lower most of the rest of the year till they get 12 month in.

   Numbers like this need to be taken in full context as they can be misleading too.

   Things like fleet sales will change the number lower for a full year. Numbers like the Suburban list 113 vs 62 but yet it comes as a increase of 82% even with only a hand full more sold. One sale to a company or a large export sale here could mark such an increase.

   We also do not see just the private sales from last year to this year nor what kind of money they made per unit.

   At the end of the year the total volume will be off because of fleets but profits and private sales will show a increase.

   With the auto market expected to be no growth or low growth the profit per unit and increase in private sales will be important moving forward.

   Now when they clear out the fleet sales we should see better numbers with still keeping an eye on profits.
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