Number of the Day: 4

Take that, F150!

Ford F-Series still maintains its lead in overall year-to-date sales, at 235,924 units. Camry has sold 198,152 units, Corolla has sold 152,308 units, Accord has sold 166,158 units and Civic has sold 164,994 units, from January to May.

Is that 235,924 for all F-series (F-150, 250, 350, 450, 650 very minimal) or just the F-150? While the 250, 350 and so on make up a smaller percentage of the sales, they still make up some of the sales.

@Captain America: your inability to spot a trend and project into the future makes me feel a need to ask you whether you might be, perhaps, a Clinton campaign staffer? Unless the speculators decide to stop speculating on crude oil futures, the formerly "big" 3 might be a distant memory by the end of this year at the rate things are going between the recession and high gas price inflation.

Did you know that Edmunds has been reporting that 40% of all new car buyers are upside-down in their autoloans, meaning that much like their houses, they owed more on their cars than their cars were worth? I picked that gem up at www.bankrate.com.

http://www.bankrate.com/brm/news/auto/20030728a1.asp

If it was number 1 for 17 years, I'm going to assume that there's still a shitload of these buggers out there...

The trend IS people downsizing.

Ford still sold 235,924 full size guzzlers. That is fact. They are still in sales lead.

What I think is notable is that the Honda Ridgeline
outsold the full size Nissian.
Also, the Toyota Tacoma outsold the GMC SIERRA to move into the 4th best selling truck.

Now....bring us the plug-ins!

It's great to see more efficient cars being purchased. People are finally beginning to wake up and smell the coffee. Obviously their wallets will benefit along with the environment. However let's not pick on pickup trucks. There is a big difference between a contractor or service person who actually needs a full size pickup versus the SUV or truck owner who is single, has no children, and doesn't have a practical use for the vehicle.

The only part that seems weird from the numbers released is that the sales of the Prius dropped from 24,009 last May to only 15,011 this May.

Brendan-

You're right. There is a big difference between contractors and your average SUV/Pickup owner. I work for a solar installer and we have no intention of getting rid of our 3/4 ton diesel silverado because we NEED it to haul equipment around. However, I know plenty of people who are accountants, shop clerks, politicians, real estate agents etc that also have 3/4 ton diesel SIlverados and they never have to haul 2 palettes of PV modules. The problem is that most SUV and Pickup owners don't need them. They're no different (and no more practical) than the little sports cars people used to get to inflate their egos. It will be interesting to see what some of the people who claim they NEED trucks (like my neighbor with the Ridgeline who needs his truck for his 4-year-old's hockey equipment and his 2 mile commute to his real estate job) end up getting in the future.

Want to know how GM could vault their in sales in North America, put thousands of laid off autowarokers back on payroll and get their credibility back?
It's easy...
1. Fire the guy who thought axing the EV1 was a good idea.
2. Throw the oil executives out of the boardroom. Too many regular working types depend on GM for their IRA and stock portfolio's. Oil doesn't COMPLETELY own GM.
3. Admit killing the EV1 was a mistake publicly.
4. Turn their two biggest factories to producing the EV1 exclusively, schedule them for three shift operation, and
5. Advertise it for sale as if it were worthy of your best efforts, and SELL (not rent/lease) the car nationwide.

And break even invoice on an EV1 would be $ ?

The lease rates on the EV1 were at a loss.

I'm asking both to make people think, and because I'm curious.

Just because it CAN be done, doesn't mean it can be done at a price that people will buy it. If it's $40k, I bet there would be many buyers. If it's $100k, many might choose the Tesla instead. If it's $200k, might not sell more than a handful.

But I agree, bring back the EV1 if it makes economical sense.

I have invented a way to make small cars much safer in collisions.
It will take small cars to reach 100 mpg. Low car weight (or mass) is the most important requirement for improvement in fuel economy. An electric car, a hybrid car, or a hydrogen car will be more fuel efficient if they are lighter. Light weight is dangerous in collisions unless crumple zones for the rear and side of a vehicle are provided.
Please see my website www.safersmallcars.com
If you like the idea, please tell the car companies. At this time they have rejected my idea.

@ CaptainAmerica: I agree with your points about people that don't need trucks... I know it's a matter of extreme annoyance to myself as well. On the matter of sports cars... I think that's too broad a brush to paint with. For example, I drive a car that was set up for slalom racing... it corners very well, accelerates quickly and is quite fun to drive. These often are markers of a 25MPG beast that takes up the road... but this actually gets 55+ MPG on the highway! That's because the car is a modified '93 Suzuki Swift. Of course, that's not what comes to mind when one thinks of a sports car...
So maybe it's not TOO broad a brush..

I find this statistic a little scewed. While it is great that the overall trend is that people are buying smaller cars, this is not a comparison of apples to apples. Lots of F-150 (and others in the F-series) consumers buy the truck because they need its capabilities. The F-150 is a very popular truck in the construction industry, as well as the farming community. On the other spectrum, the Honda Civic, Toyota Camry, and Toyota Corolla are mostly used for the typical commute. I think the better comparison would be between F-150 and more efficient trucks to show that people are thinking more eco-friendly.

Jenn,

The decrease us obviously happening at the utility margin, meaning that those who really need F150 will keep buying them for a while longer while those who don't really need them have stopped buying them, hence the lower sales.