Sporty Car Sales And Premium Sporty Car Sales In America - March 2012

March 2012 U.S. Sporty Car Sales Chart
Click Either Chart For A Larger View

GoodCarBadCar.net has finally decided to include the Infiniti G37 Coupe and Convertible in the U.S. rankings of sports cars, roadsters, GTs, and generally sporty cars. BMW still isn't breaking down 3-Series sales by bodystyle, and Toyota only provides Lexus ISC and ISF numbers in Canada. Nevertheless, the Infiniti G's sales figures are interesting for a number of reasons.

First, the G37 two-doors are proving more popular than the Nissan 370Z. Possession of a rear seat appears to count for something. Second, there's the G37 vs. Audi A5 race, one which the Audi's winning, but not running away with. Finally, the non-sedan G37 is suffering from drastic year-over-year declines. The G25 and G37 sedans were down just 8.3% in March and just 3.4% in the first quarter. 

Of course, the truly popular two-doors are American muscle cars. Chevy Camaro sales were up nearly 4% in March to 9299, 246 more than the Ford Mustang's total. At this point last year, the Camaro's lead over the Mustang was a slim 407 units - its up by 1791 this year. By the end of 2011, the Camaro ended up beating the Mustang by 17,811 sales.

March 2012 U.S. Premium
Sporty Car Sales Chart

March 2012 finished with a German roadster sales race victory at Mercedes-Benz. SLK sales weren't far from tripling in March, and are indeed double what they were at this point last year. BMW's Z4 was up 2% to 261 sales. The soon-to-be-replaced Porsche Boxster was 203 sales behind the Audi TT in March.

There are detailed sales figures for these cars and numerous other two-doors and clearly sporting four-doors after the jump. You'll notice astonishingly strong BMW 6-Series volume. The big BMW coupe and cabrio combined for 3.2% of all BMW sales. For context, Mercedes-Benz's SLS AMG, SL-Class, and CL-Class accounted for just 1.1% of all Mercedes-Benz USA volume last month. The Automotive News Data Center estimates March 2012 sales for Aston Martin, Ferrari, Lamborghini, and Lotus to have been 68, 145, 29, and 20 units, respectively. March sales for the two British brands in their home market were 207 (Aston) and 10 (Lotus).

As usual, find monthly and yearly sales data for these cars and every other model currently on sale in North America by accessing the dropdown menu at the top right of this page.

Sporty Car	October 2011	% Change	Year To Date	YTD % Change
Audi A5	1714	+ 23.5%	3711	+ 3.5%
Audi TT	221	+ 3.3%	547	+ 25.5%
BMW Z4	261	+ 2.0%	610	+ 4.5%
Chevrolet Camaro	9292	+ 3.7%	21,924	+ 9.8%
Chevrolet Corvette	1376	+ 18.3%	2932	+ 3.3%
Dodge Challenger	4304	+ 7.9%	10,524	+ 8.0%
Ford Mustang	9046	+ 5.7%	20,133	+ 30.6%
Honda CR-Z	536	- 68.2%	1365	- 62.8%
Hyundai Veloster	3848	-----	8781	-----
Infiniti G37 Coupe/Convertible	1299	- 31.3%	3329	- 24.6%
Mazda MX-5 Miata	714	+ 10.7%	1454	+ 10.5%
Mazda RX-8	31	- 49.2%	62	- 68.8%
Mercedes-Benz SLK	567	+ 179%	1091	+ 102%
Mini Coupe	336	-----	736	-----
Mini Roadster	144	-----	254	-----
Mitsubishi Eclipse	228	- 33.7%	462	- 40.2%
Nissan 370Z	1095	+ 12.4%	2065	- 2.2%
Porche Boxster	18	- 89.3%	101	- 79.8%
Porsche Cayman	69	- 35.5%	282	- 13.5%
Scion tC	2275	- 8.3%	5233	- 4.8%
Subaru Impreza WRX	1197	- 12.8%	2829	- 21.0%
Volkswagen Eos	664	+ 4.4%	1448	+ 10.8%
Volkswagen GTI	1677	+ 6.5%	4193	+ 6.8%
Volkswagen Golf R	269	-----	735	-----
Volvo C70	574	+ 14.3%	1134	+ 3.2%

Premium Sporty Car	October 2011	% Change	Year To Date	YTD % Change
Audi R8	90	- 15.1%	243	- 12.9%
BMW 6-Series	759	+ 1050%	1697	+ 566%
Dodge Viper	-----	- 100%	20	- 76.2%
Jaguar XK	191	+ 63.2%	1224	+ 54.3%
Lexus LFA	4	- 50.0%	14	- 17.6%
Mercedes-Benz CL-Class	64	- 27.3%	210	- 29.8%
Mercedes-Benz SL-Class	74	- 58.7%	270	- 50.5%
Mercedes-Benz SLS AMG	123	+ 20.6%	286	+ 12.2%
Nissan GT-R	139	- 50.0%	226	- 33.1%
Porsche 911	465	- 23.6%	2004	+ 38.2%

Source: Manufacturers & ANDC
Clearly GoodCarBadCar is not suggesting that the cars in the two tables above are all direct competitors. Establishing categories among cars as unique as even the Audi TT and Porsche Boxster has never pleased a single reader, so cars have been lumped together so you can simply see how buyers looking for sports cars, roadsters, hot hatches, convertibles, GTs, and wanna-be sports cars spend their money. Greater categorization of cars would only lead to problems that automakers create by not isolating model-specific sales figures: we don't know how many M3s BMW has sold or how many Civics are Si models, for example. The numbers we do have are listed above.

Related From GoodCarBadCar.net
Sporty Car & Premium Sporty Car Sales In America - April 2012
Sporty & Premium Sporty Car Sales In America - February 2012
Sporty & Premium Sporty Car Sales In America - March 2011
U.S. Auto Sales By Brand - March 2012