Cleveland, Ohio – Better weather equaled better auto sales in January, with major producers reporting numbers up in the mid-teens.
Massive snowstorms and cold weather sapped January sales in 2014, and that awful weather didn’t fully let up until March. Results were so bad in January and February that some analysts revised their sales targets downward and expressed concerns of a coming recession.
Those fears were absent in 2015 as General Motors kicked off the year with an 18% sales jump, Toyota was up 16%, Ford and Nissan both climbed 15%, Chrysler posted a 14% gain, and Honda was up about 12%.
”Customer demand is strong for our newest vehicles, driving retail sales gains across our lineup in January,” says Erich Merkle, Ford’s U.S. sales analyst. “Momentum is especially strong for our F-Series pickup, with the all-new F-150 the hottest product on our dealer lots in January.”
Though weather was responsible for depressing sales last year, automotive sales analysts say the jump this year also comes from general improvements in the economy.
“Consumers feel very good because more people are working, the U.S. economy is expanding, and fuel prices are low,” says Kurt McNeil, GM’s U.S. vice president of Sales Operations. “Consumer and commercial demand for trucks and crossovers is really driving our business.”
The strong commercial vehicle segment was especially apparent at Ford and Chrysler. Sales of Ford’s commercial vans – the Transit large van, Transit Connect small van, and the outgoing Econoline large vans – were up 39%, mainly on the strength of the Transit that launched last year. At Chrysler, sales of the Cargo van, ProMaster van, and ProMaster City small van nearly tripled to 2,774 units from less than 1,000 a year ago.
Even Volkswagen, the only major automaker to post a sales decline for the full year in 2014, managed to grow slightly in January. Sales of the Golf/GTI line more than doubled, making up for losses with all of the company’s other vehicles.
Sources: Ford, General Motors, Chrysler, Nissan, Volkswagen, Honda, Toyota