The majority of the sales figures from the United States are in and it immediately becomes clear that it is in bad shape. Although the corona crisis has only been there for a month, the quarterly figures look very bad.
The first quarter is over, so manufacturers have traditionally announced how many new cars have been sold in the past three months. In Europe, and therefore also in the Netherlands, the corona crisis is already clearly visible and that is no different on the other side of the large lake. US sales were largely on the decline, but the month of March only made things worse.
The biggest loser is Fiat, which compared to Q1 2019 sold only half that number of cars. The biggest home-grown loser is Buick, which saw sales plummet by 34.7 percent. Dodge and Cadillac are also hit hard, with -20 percent and -15.8 percent respectively. Ford also recorded a sharp drop of 13.2 percent. The home-grown brands that still lose the least are Chrysler (-5 percent) and Chevrolet (-3.8 percent). Lincoln and RAM are doing remarkably well and even sold 2.3 and 3 percent more in 2020 than in the first quarter of 2019, respectively. These are, apart from Kia, the only brands that still have black sales.
The list is not yet complete, because the wait is, for example, for the Tesla figures. That is of course an important player in the American market. Due to the strong growth in sales in the first two months, Tesla is expected to be just a few percent more. Various experts expect growth of around five percent. Undoubtedly, that is a lot less than Tesla had in mind after the good start this year. When the actual figures are in, we will of course show them here on Techzle.nl.
Sales figures United States Q1 (vs. Q1 2019)
| RAM | + 3% |
| Lincoln | + 2.3% |
| Kia | + 1% |
| Chevrolet | -3.8% |
| Mazda | -4.5% |
| Chrysler | -5% |
| GMC | -5.5% |
| Genesis | -5.9% |
| Toyota | -7.9% |
| Hyundai | -11% |
| Volkswagen | -13% |
| Ford | -13.2% |
| Jeep | -14% |
| Alfa Romeo | -14% |
| Audi | -14% |
| Bentley | -14.2% |
| BMW | -15.3% |
| Mitsubishi | -15.5% |
| Lexus | -15.6% |
| Cadillac | -15.8% |
| Subaru | -16.7% |
| Honda | -18.9% |
| Dodge | -20% |
| Porsche | -20.2% |
| Acura | -21.6% |
| Infiniti | -25.5% |
| Nissan | -30% |
| Buick | -34.7% |
| Lamborghini | -38.4% |
| Mini | -41.2% |
| Fiat | -49% |