November 2008 Auto Sales Continue Bloodbath
By Chris Haak
12.02.2008
Though we still don’t have all of the full results from Acura to Volvo available to digest, the news is predictably not good on the new car sales front for November 2008. Some of the lowlights:
- GM sales down 41.3%
- Chrysler LLC sales down 47.1%
- Ford sales down 32.6%
- Toyota sales down 33.9%
- Honda sales down 31.6%
As of this writing, Nissan has not yet reported its November 2008 sales, but industrywide (pending results from Nissan, Suzuki, Jaguar, and VW), the industry was down 36.9% from November 2007.
There were very few bright spots industrywide in November, and December may prove to be just as chilly – if not moreso – to the industry. When a 33% sales drop gains marketshare, you know everyone’s hurting; even the mighty BMW is down 26.9% from November 2007.
In response to these market conditions, Ford has already announced plans to trim production output by a similar margin in the first quarter of 2009, with many of its competitors likely to follow the same pattern.
Stay tuned in the next day or two as we delve into the bad news with a model-by-model analysis of where the pain was worst, and where there might have been a few bright spots.
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