Friday, January 4, 2019

2018 Subcompact Sales Results

Toyota C-HR

Well, here we are in 2019. And now that it's 2019, we can reflect on the small car sales of 2018.

Pretty interesting year, frankly. A number of automakers, including Ford, announced it was going to stop selling sedans in favor of CUVs and SUVs. We saw slumping subcompact sales, too. But how bad (or good) was it?

The biggest year over year change came from the Toyota C-HR, the smallish FWD crossover, which had a 92.7% gain in sales vs. 2017. But that's where the huge gains end.

The Kia Rio and Hyundai Ioniq hybrid both posted gains over 30%. The top five gains are rounded out by the MINI Countryman and Chevrolet Trax.

2018 Toyota Yaris Liftbacks
The 2018 Toyota Yaris Liftback had the biggest sales drop on our 2018 sales list. 
The biggest drops in sales—and there some biggies—were anchored by a 77.6% decline in Toyota Yaris liftbacks. At the time of this post, Toyota still hasn't announced a 2019 Yaris Liftback. And, with sales of just 1,940 units all year long, it wouldn't surprise me if they simply won't offer it any longer. Down 67.2% was the Smart ForTwo. Frankly, I'm not really sure what's going on there. I know they're all EVs these days, and maybe that's why. It's been on a continual downward spiral for quite some time, however. The little Fiat 500 has also been clinging to life the last couple of years. For 2018, overall sales were down a dismal 58% with just 5,370 units moved. Rounding out the bottom five, are the Hyundai Accent, which was down 50.7%, and the not-so-miniature MINI Cooper Clubman, down 43.3%.

Mitsubishi Mirage G4 and Hatchback
The 2018 Mitsubishi Mirage line outsold the Chevrolet Spark for the first time since its introduction. 
Of particular interest to me is the continual sales rivalry between the Chevrolet Spark and the Mitsubishi Mirage, two of the least expensive cars for sale on the U.S. market. For the first time since its introduction, the Mirage outsold the Spark. Impressively, both cars had year-over-year sales gains with the Mirage up 8.6% and the Spark up 4.5%. Despite the large increase in CUV, SUV, and truck sales, these to pint-sized cars are still racking up sales—proof people want inexpensive, small vehicles. Granted, we don't know the breakdown of consumer vs. fleet sales. Regardless, sales were up.

2019 PREDICTIONS

I predict that 2019 will be very similar to 2018 in the subcompact market. We'll hear more small cars are going away in favor of small CUVs. However, I'll bet the Mirage and Spark continue to soldier on as economy car champs. We shall see! Onto the chart:

Make/Model Sales 2018 Sales 2017 % Change
Toyota C-HR 49642 25755 92.70%
Kia Rio 22975 16760 37.10%
Hyundai Ioniq 15076 11197 34.60%
MINI Countryman 17565 14864 18.20%
Chevrolet Trax 89916 79289 13.40%
Ford Fiesta 51730 46249 11.90%
Kia Soul 115712 104709 10.50%
Mitsubishi Mirage 24316 22386 8.60%
Buick Encore 93073 88035 5.70%
Chevrolet Spark 23602 22589 4.50%
Mazda CX-3 16899 16355 3.30%
BMW i3 6117 6276 -2.50%
MINI Cooper Convertible 5334 5512 -3.20%
Jeep Renegade 97062 103434 -6.00%
Honda HR-V 85494 94034 -9.10%
MINI Cooper 2DR Hardtop 9950 11257 -11.60%
Hyundai Veloster 10871 12658 -14.10%
Fiat 500L 1413 1664 -15.00%
MINI Cooper 4DR Hardtop 6450 7724 -16.50%
Mazda MX-5 Miata 8971 11294 -20.60%
Fiat Spider 3515 4478 -22.00%
Chevrolet Bolt 18019 23297 -22.70%
Honda Fit 35300 49454 -28.60%
Nissan Versa 75809 106772 -29.00%
Toyota Yaris iA 25269 35727 -29.30%
Chevrolet Sonic 20613 30292 -31.90%
Fiat 500X 5223 7665 -32.00%
Toyota Prius c 8399 12415 -32.60%
MINI Cooper Clubman 4385 7739 -43.30%
Hyundai Accent 29090 58955 -50.70%
Fiat 500 5370 12685 -58.00%
Smart ForTwo 650 1983 -67.20%
Toyota Yaris Liftback 1940 8653 -77.60%
Ford EcoSport 54348 0 0
Nissan Kicks 23312 0 0
Hyundai Kona 8319 0 0

1 comment:

Socarboy said...

It won't surprise me that FCA will pull the plug on Fiat and Daimler pull the plug on Smart in the NA Mkt. Of course Fiesta and Focus are gone as well as the Chevy Cruze. I also expect Spark and Sonic to go away as well. The Yaris hatch was a no brainer, even though, a reliable car it's design is really showing its age