Friday, August 2, 2019

Seven Month Sales Report: 2019

Ford EcoSport

We're more than halfway through the sales season in 2019, and I thought to myself, I wonder how small car sales are doing this year? So I looked into it. The answer is rather surprising.

I say it's surprising because I keep hearing that fuel is still cheap, trucks are popular, and small cars aren't popular again. Well, gas isn't that cheap in Portland, Oregon where the average price is $3.18. According to AAA, however, the national average for a gallon of 87 octane go juice is $2.72 and rising. When I looked into what sales would be, I expected a lot of big losses vs. this time in 2018, but to my surprise, it wasn't as bad as I thought, and there were some surprising gains. 

For example, The Ford Fiesta—which will allegedly be disappearing after this year—had a 50.3% gain vs 2018. It crossover cousin, the EcoSport, was also up 45.6%. Even the bargain basement cars, the Chevrolet Spark and Mitsubishi Mirage are up 20% and 3.8%, respectively (the Mirage was up 13.4% in July), and continue to defy the SUV/CUV buying trend.

Note: The insane growth on the Kicks is due to a slow roll out of sales in 2018; they'll be more realistic in coming months. 

Sure there are some models that are down; the BMW i3, the entire MINI lineup, and very likely the Fiat brand, although we won't know how far down for a couple more months as FCA has reduced its reporting increments. But the peek at seven months of sales was not as doom-and-gloom as I had anticipated. Sure, there isn't as much commotion about the segment as there was 10 years ago, and yes, there are more small crossovers, but still. Nissan has just launched its all-new Versa (starting price of $14,730 USD with a manual—and finally power windows/locks standard), but other than that, there aren't a whole lot of all-new "cars" coming out in the subcompact (or semi-subcompact) segment. At least not yet.

Anyway, here's the chart. Let use know your thoughts in the comments. 


Make/ModelYTD Sales 2018YTD Sales 2019% Change
Nissan Kicks2938358391119.8
Hyundai Kona1936643466124.4
Ford Fiesta253593811650.3
Ford EcoSport236103438645.6
Hyundai Veloster6402853333.3
Chevrolet Spark113991364920.0
Kia Rio129151471213.9
Kia Soul58235629418.1
Hyundai Ioniq9797104907.1
Chevrolet Bolt785882815.4
Mitsubishi Mirage15559161573.8
Buick Encore48635488970.5
Nissan Versa51156514020.5
Hyundai Accent16698167360.2
Chevrolet Trax4698946370-1.3
Toyota CH-R2992729402-1.8
Honda HR-V5464053056-2.9
MINI Cooper Convertible37172589-3.3
MINI Cooper 4DR Hardtop36663546-3.3
Toyota Yaris1908418027-5.5
Mazda MX-5 Miata55355023-9.3
MINI Cooper 2DR Hardtop57285033-12.1
Chevrolet Sonic105658484-19.7
Mazda CX-3830711015-24.6
Smart USA753552-26.7
Honda Fit2888220534-28.9
MINI Cooper Clubman26381872-29.0
MINI Countryman111837370-34.1
BMW i339682511-36.7
Jeep RenegadeN/AN/AN/A
Fiat 500LN/AN/AN/A
Fiat SpiderN/AN/AN/A
Fiat 500XN/AN/AN/A
Fiat 500N/AN/AN/A
Sales are for the U.S. market only.
FCA sales not reported until October, 2019

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