Overall, October was another soft month for new light vehicle sales in Canada as international headlines dampens consumer confidence and translates into a very lean market, according to industry expert Dennis DesRosiers, of DesRosiers Automotive Consultants.
Source: DesRosiers Automotive Consultants Inc.
Sales in October were up from year ago levels but by only 2.1 percent over October 2010. Year to date sales are 1,349,828 units an increase of 1.5 percent. The market was a little better on a SAAR basis with an October SAAR of 1.65 million units the best SAAR since May of this year, according to DesRosiers.
Within the Detroit three Chrysler was the big winner with sales up in October by 12.4 percent, which pushes Chrysler up by 14.0 percent year to date.
GM had a big October with sales up 9.1 percent and this finally brought their sales for the year into the positive (up 0.1 percent ). GM also outsold Ford on the month for one of the few times in the last couple years and for the month was the best-selling OEM in Canada.
Ford remained the best-selling OEM in Canada year to date although sales were down 2.4 percent in September from year ago levels. YTD Ford sales are still up 3.6 percent. Ford’s market share in September was 15.3 percent compared to their year to date market share tracking at 17.7 percent.
Chrysler, by a very wide margin, is the best performing Detroit-based vehicle company selling in Canada, says DesRosiers. Chrysler’s YTD market share is up by 1.6 points, Ford is up by 0.4 points and GM is actually down by 0.2 points.
With the exception of Toyota whose sales were up by 3.0 percent in September, all the other Japanese brands saw their sales decline: Honda/Acura down by 12.6 percent, Mazda down by 4.9 percent, Mitsubishi down by 20.7 percent, Nissan/Infiniti down by 14.2 percent, Subaru down by 4.8 percent and Suzuki down by 38.1 percent.
“The Japanese OEMs have been telling us for a few weeks now that the negative impact of the tsunami is now largely behind them so their poor performance must be rooted in other issues although there is still some supply side issues that need to be addressed,” said DesRosiers. “I personally think that it will be next spring before all the tsunami issues are fully resolved.”
The European OEMs remain hot with Volkswagen continuing their very strong year with sales up 9.1 percent in October, BMW/Mini was up 1.1 percent, Mercedes Benz/smart up 16.0 percent, Jaguar up 1.9 percent, Land Rover up by 57.2 percent and Volvo up by 13.2 percent. Only Porsche who can get vehicles to sell were down (- 65 units).
And for the umpteenth month in row ( 34 months in the case of Kia ) both Hyundai and Kia reached new sales records for the month with Hyundai up by 12.1 percent and Kia up by 15.4 percent.
It appears that the Koreans have benefitted the most from the problems in Japan. Chrysler’s strength comes from their truck heavy line up of products which is benefitting from the economic strength in our resource Western provinces.
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Detroit still dominates Canadian new car market, Hyundai gaining on Toyota
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