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The BMW 7-Series and Volvo XC60 joined the list of 30 best-selling luxury vehicles in America in May, taking the place of the Acura RDX and Porsche Cayenne. For the first time in 2011 the BMW 3-Series reacquired its position as America's favourite premium brand vehicle. This means the Lexus RX350/RX450h falls back to second spot as sales of America's most popular luxury utility vehicle fell 36%.The abundance of red font in the table below is no mistake. 17 of America's 30 best-selling luxury vehicles suffered from declining sales when compared with May 2010. That goes for vehicles as different as the #1-ranked 3-Series (down 16%) and the defunct 26th-ranked Cadillac DTS (down 34%). You'll see more on the subject in the coming days in this section of GoodCarBadCar.net, but in case you miss it, check out the BMW X3 and its competitors. Forging ahead in second-generation form with a 229% year-over-year increase, the 16th-ranked X3 was undoubtedly strong, but seeing off the Audi Q5 (up 9%), Mercedes-Benz GLK (up 22%) and Volvo XC60 (up 43%) couldn't have been easy. Every sale in the small luxury SUV segment is a battle worth fighting. The same could be said for the 3-Series' segment, where the Volvo S60 roared ahead of the Acura TSX and Lexus IS with a year-over-year sales bump weighing in at 2404%.Oh, and if you don't appreciate the inclusion of the Hyundai Genesis, or the Chevrolet Corvette for that matter, next up would be the Porsche Cayenne, followed by the Lincoln Town Car.
149,034 new vehicles were sold in Canada in May 2011. Only 46.6% of those sales were passenger cars. General Motors, Ford Motor Company, and the Chrysler Group (excluding Fiat) found 72,041 buyers, the majority of sales came about in dealerships which fly foreign logos. For a complete rundown on brand-by-brand volume, click here.As for market share, GM, Ford, and Chrysler all owned more of it in May than in April. Toyota's share of the market fell four percentage points to 8.1%. Hyundai/Kia improved, as did the Volkswagen Group, although only slightly. In fact, "other brands", a group made up by Mercedes-Benz, BMW, Subaru, and Mitsubishi most notably, moved up nearly a full percentage point in May. Quite clearly, the losses at Toyota and Honda didn't all go the way of the domestics. South of the border, General Motors, Ford, and Chrysler (excluding Fiat) held 49.6% of the market in May.Ford, Canada's favourite brand, has sold over 100,000 vehicles so far this year. Counting Lincoln, the Ford Motor Company nearly made its way to 107,000 sales. The Dearborn, Michigan-based company has increased its market share in Canada from 16% at this time last year to 16.6% through five months of 2011.Not in the last eight years has there been a May as bad as May 2011 for automakers competing in Canada. New car sales last month were also significantly lower than April and March's totals, as well.
Ford couldn't match May 2010's 25,191-unit sales pace but ended up in top spot despite a 2% year-over-year decline. Neither Dodge nor Chevrolet were close behind. Ford and Lincoln sold 25,440 vehicles in May, 2000+ more than General Motors managed. The Chrysler Group was closer, however, with 24,406 sales. Hyundai/Kia found 20,895 buyers.But it's too easy to simply pay attention to the big volume automakers. Scanning Canada's 21st-to-28th-ranked manufacturers is particularly interesting in May 2011's rundown of Canadian Auto Sales By Brand. Volvo beat Cadillac. Volvo also beat its old Ford PAG partner, Lincoln. Fiat, with the 500 alone, came awfully close to surpassing Lincoln. The Good 12-winning Fiat 500 finished ahead of Scion and its three models while also handing Mini its lunch. Mini sells the Cooper hatchback, a Cooper convertible, Clubman, and four-door Countryman. Scion nipped ahead of Mini, too, but Mini had no trouble ending May with more sales than Infiniti.Indeed, no automaker posted a sales decline worse than Infiniti's 39.4% drop. Porsche, on the opposite side of the ledger, was up 60.1%. Volkswagen, a Porsche partner/owner/subsidiary/somethingerother, was next-best with a 25.9% year-over-year improvement.Back to the major players, Toyota remains ahead of Hyundai through the first five months of 2011. But the Koreans are very careful to point out that no automaker has sold more passenger cars than Hyundai this year. Canada Auto Sales By Brand, the May 2011 edition, is ready for reading in the table below. Rank | Automaker | May 2011 | %
Change | Year To Date | YTD
% Change |
|
#1 | Ford | 24,681 | -2.0 | 103,673 | +6.2 |
#2 | Dodge | 17,064 | +14.8 | 73,113 | +12.1 |
#3 | Chevrolet | 14,292 | -5.9 | 61,173 | +7.8 |
#4 | Hyundai | 13,967 | +10.7 | 55,286 | +9.0 |
#5 | Toyota | 10,470 | -36.4 | 60,282 | -15.4 |
#6 | Honda | 8739 | -13.3 | 43,820 | -8.3 |
#7 | Kia | 6928 | +20.9 | 26,018 | +26.0 |
#8 | Mazda | 6587 | -18.2 | 27,806 | -17.3 |
#9 | | | | 27,629 | -1.4 |
#10 | Nissan | 6251 | -16.5 | 29,647 | -2.3 |
#11 | Volkswagen | 5776 | +25.9 | 21,936 | +19.2 |
#12 | Jeep | 4708 | +16.0 | 16,990 | +14.7 |
#13 | Mercedes-Benz | 3286 | +14.7 | 12,663 | +6.4 |
#14 | BMW | 2813 | +19.1 | 10,942 | +9.9 |
#15 | Subaru | 2576 | +5.7 | 11,694 | +6.0 |
#16 | Chrysler | 1956 | -0.2 | 5943 | -14.4 |
#17 | Mitsubishi | 1730 | -4.4 | 8422 | +2.3 |
#18 | Audi | 1411 | +15.1 | 7335 | +18.5 |
#19 | Buick | 1245 | +17.5 | 4789 | +15.3 |
#20 | Acura | 1092 | -27.3 | 5323 | -19.5 |
#21 | Lexus | 989 | -30.3 | 5589 | -6.0 |
#22 | Volvo | | +19.9 | 2857 | +6.4 |
#23 | | 761 | +2.8 | 3348 | +11.1 |
#24 | Lincoln | 759 | -17.3 | 3194 | -3.6 |
#25 | Fiat | 678 | ----- | 1993 | ----- |
#26 | Scion | 571 | ----- | 1686 | ----- |
#27 | Mini | 553 | +10.2 | 1788 | +12.7 |
#28 | Infiniti | 470 | -36.9 | 2638 | -15.3 |
#29 | Suzuki | 424 | -39.4 | 2390 | -33.8 |
#30 | Porsche | 309 | +60.1 | 1154 | +45.7 |
#31 | smart | 268 | +9.8 | 810 | -8.6 |
#32 | Land Rover | 245 | +8.4 | 1175 | +11.4 |
#33 | Jaguar | 70 | +1.4 | 316 | +8.6 |
#34 | Saab | 20 | ----- | 61 | ----- |
#35 | Maserati | 18 | -14.3 | 60 | -6.3 |
#36 | Bentley | 9 | -25.0 | 37 | +15.6 |
Source: Automakers, AIAMC, Desrosiers, & Automotive News Data Center
We'll be taking a deeper look at U.S. truck sales later in the month, just as we did in April, so rather than present a deep analysis of America's best-selling trucks now, let's just spread out the facts.Not surprisingly, the most popular truck in America in May 2011 was the Ford F-Series. Even if you join the Chevrolet Avalanche to GM's Silverado/Sierra tally, Ford still trounced General Motors by 1991 sales. The F-Series was down 15% in May, however. Ford's dying Ranger was off 14.1%. Silverado sales fell 15.7%. Sales of the GMC Sierra were down 4.9%.On the flip side, Dodge Ram sales improved to the tune of a 16.3% song. Toyota Tacoma sales also rose, up 5.3% to 9091. The usual fifth-place truck in this chart (behind the F-Series, Silverado/Sierra, Ram, and Tacoma) is the Toyota Tundra. But Tundra sales slid from May 2010's 8491 total to just 4307 in the same period of this year.
Whether or not Ford cares, there appears to be little doubt that the 2011 Ford Explorer is eating away at sales of the Ford Edge. One reason Ford won't care: the Edge was still America's seventh-best-selling utility vehicle in May. Another reason not to care: altogether, Ford SUV sales totalled 51,982 last month, up 12.7% from May 2010's total when the Explorer was all but all-new.By themselves, Ford's five utility vehicles - the three you see below plus the Flex and Expedition - owned 4.9% of the overall new vehicle market in the United States in May. Pair Ford's dominance with the effects of March 11th's disasters in Japan - now being firmly felt by Honda, Toyota, Nissan and others - and there are barely enough SUV buyers to go around for Ford's foreign rivals. These points have been made on GoodCarBadCar.net before, so rather than belabour them any longer, consider a couple of other facts stemming from the list of the Top 10 Best-Selling SUVs in America you'll scroll through in a moment.The Jeep Wrangler, one of the planet's most old-fashioned new vehicles, posted a 3.9% year-over-year increase in May. "That's nothing special," you say, "After all, Kia Sorento sales rose 45.8%." True, but it's recently been revealed that the Wrangler will soon feature the powerful Pentastar V6 and a 5-speed automatic. This basically means that America's favourite off-roader could be even more popular come this time next year. Moreover, the Wrangler was the best-selling Jeep in May, ahead of the civilized Grand Cherokee. And while the 3.9% gain seems small, any increase in a market which shrunk 4% can be celebrated. The Jeep Wrangler, by the way, is a member of GoodCarBadCar.net's The Good 12. Rank | SUV | Status | May 2011 | Last Month | May 2010 |
#1 | Ford Escape | ↑ | 23,140 | 21,240 | 19,203 |
#2 | Chevrolet Equinox | ↑ | 17,587 | 17,067 | 13,134 |
#3 | Honda CR-V | ↓ | 16,307 | 21,683 | 17,820 |
#4 | Ford Explorer | ↑ | 13,318 | 12,593 | 5677 |
#5 | Kia Sorento | ↑ | 11,936 | 12,001 | 8189 |
#6 | Jeep Wrangler | ↑ | 10,008 | 9051 | 9634 |
#7 | Ford Edge | ↑ | 9486 | 9361 | 13,660 |
#8 | Jeep Grand Cherokee | ↓ | 9484 | 9802 | 3246 |
#9 | Toyota RAV4 | ↓ | 8624 | 15,586 | 13,102 |
#10 | Honda Pilot | ↓ | 8560 | 9488 | 9834 |
