With August in bloom and ready to go, the automotive industry has put the month of July in the rear view mirror. Despite losing two whole selling days compared to last year, 2012’s seventh month proved to be rather successful. In total, the U.S. sold 1,153,682 light duty vehicles for all 24 selling days; an increase of 8.9 percent compared to 2011. With those vehicles split into segments, the car took ultimate bragging rights with a combined sales figure of 583,667 units. Despite beating the truck and SUV, the sedan, coupe and convertible did house the biggest loss of the month as the large car dropped once again. For July, a heavy fall of 88 percent was seen as just 754 big-bodied cruisers found new homes. Given the segment’s 2012 year-to-date sales drop of 89.3 percent, the large car might just be dead in the U.S. Instead, Americans seem to be flocking to small/midsize sedans as well as other sensible offerings like minivans. The segment witnessed an increase of 23.1 percent compared to July 2011.
The Toyota Camry has been riding a wave of success recently and in July, that force raged on. Earning an increase of 10.7 percent from last year, the sedan and all of its variations sold 29,913 new copies for the month. The car’s year-to-date figure has been rising each and every day given its recent generation change and now, it’s at 243,816 units; 39.7 percent better compared to this time last year. Closely behind the Toyota was the Chevrolet Silverado which found 28,972 new buyers. Down 12.5 percent, truck buyers may be holding out for the all-new model which should be debuting rather soon. Jumping way up and out of no where was the other Japanese icon, the Accord. With 28,639 units sold, the sedan and coupe increased sales by 70.2 percent from 2011. While it may not be very high up on the individual vehicle list yet, the Toyota Prius once again witnessed a solid increase by jumping up 110.5 percent compared to last year. Oh, and the Ford F-Series managed to earn the number one sales spot…again.
The fight for top manufacture in the U.S. was once again won by General Motors. For July, GM was the only brand to break into the 200k club with 201,237 total units sold. Down 6.4 percent from last year, the general was hurt by a severe drop in import car sales as in July 2011, 3,439 examples were sold compared to this year’s 502. Also experiencing a fall was second place Ford Motor Company with 173,482 cars and trucks sold. Riding a wave of Camry and Prius success, Toyota took the other spot on the podium with 164,898 purchases. Even though they were behind from some heavy hitters, Honda witnessed one of the biggest increases as the automaker jumped 45.3 percent compared to last year. The greatest increase however was seen by Maybach, which sold a total of 4 cars. Even still, that figure is 300 percent better than July 2011.
Source: WSJ
