October 2014 Auto Sales: Winners and Losers

The year’s spookiest month has finally passed. Gone with the calendar’s page-turn are bags of corn syrup-laden foodstuffs, poorly thought-out costumes and strangers ringing your doorbell at night demanding sweets in exchange for protection from vandalism.

Overall, auto sales in the U.S. were up six percent compared to October 2013, healthy if unspectacular growth. Deliveries for the month topped 1.28 million units. To date more than 13.7 million cars and trucks have been sold in the U.S.

This performance boosted the SAAR, seasonally adjusted annual sales rate, pushing it to 16.5 million. Think of this figure as an estimate of how many new cars and trucks will be sold for the year. It’s also a broad measure of the industry’s health.

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So far this year the SAAR has exceeded 16 million every month since March. This is a strong indicator that the economy is improving. Naturally in all of this some brands did better than others. Here’s a look at which marques got treats in October and which ones got tricked.

Lincoln and Subaru both had a spectacular October with sales growing by 25 percent at each brand. Ford’s luxury division had nearly 9,000 deliveries, making this their best 10th-month performance since 2007. The all-new MKC crossover is proving to be popular with buyers; it accounted for a quarter of the brand’s sales.

Of course Subaru really moved the metal. Its deliveries squeaked past 43,000. October marks their 35th consecutive month of year-over-year increases. To date dealers have sold nearly 419,000 vehicles.

Ram is a major reason why the Chrysler Group’s October was so strong. Deliveries at this hard-working division were up 36 percent. Dealers sold in excess of 42,000 units. A strong lineup and innovative products are clearly bringing customers in.

If you’re curious, the Chrysler Group’s sales, which includes all of the company’s diverse brands, was up 22 percent, reaching nearly 171,000 cars and trucks. So far they’ve had 55 consecutive months of year-over-year sales increases.

But not every brand did well last month. A number of them had to contend with drastically reduced showroom traffic. Hyundai and MINI were two such divisions. The former’s sales dropped 7 percent to slightly more than 50,000 units. The latter’s also fell 7 percent with deliveries dropping to an even 5,300. For the year MINI has sold nearly 45,000 cars, which means Hyundai, a mass-market brand, has outperformed the total of its deliveries this year in just one month.

Both Land Rover and Scion had a rough month. These brands, located at opposite ends of the automotive spectrum, shared a 15 percent decline. Land Rover sales totaled 3,643, though Scion’s were scarcely better, clocking in at 4,182. Which one is a purveyor of high-end luxury vehicles and which one sells mass-market models? Based on these totals we can’t tell.

And finally we come to Jaguar, the automaker with the largest year-over-year sales drop last month. Big-cat deliveries were off 34 percent in October compared to the same month in 2013. Sales totaled just 1,007 meaning they were beaten by niche automakers like Tesla and Porsche, though at least they topped smart.

[Source: Automotive News]