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FCA US reports highest calendar year of retail sales in 17 years (Dec 2018 + 14%)


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FCA US Reports 2018 December and Full-Year Sales

  • FCA US reports highest calendar year of retail sales in 17 years
  • Jeep® brand sets full-year record as sales climb 17 percent
  • Ram brand notches full-year record as sales climb 7 percent  
  • Dodge Challenger reports full-year record

 

January 3, 2019 , Auburn Hills, Mich. - FCA US LLC today reported December U.S. sales of 196,520 vehicles, a 14 percent increase compared with sales of 171,946 vehicles in December 2017.

Retail sales for the month rose slightly to 151,077 vehicles. Fleet sales totaled 45,443 vehicles and accounted for 23 percent of total sales during the month. 

The Jeep® Wrangler was the standout for the month and the year. Wrangler notched record December sales of 19,800 vehicles and full-year sales of 240,032. The results significantly exceeded the former full-year sales record of 202,266 set in 2015.   

For the year, U.S. retail sales were 1,760,488, marking the highest level since 2001 when sales reached 1,833,186 vehicles. Total U.S. sales rose 9 percent to 2,235,204 compared with 2,059,376 vehicles for 2017. Fleet sales accounted for 21 percent of the company’s overall sales in 2018.

“This year’s performance underscores the efforts we undertook to realign our production to give U.S. consumers more Jeep vehicles and Ram pickup trucks,” Head of U.S. Sales Reid Bigland said. “We see sales remaining solid in 2019 and we look forward to expanding our vehicle portfolio with the addition of the much anticipated Jeep Gladiator.”  

Jeep Brand
Jeep brand sales rose 10 percent to 80,449 vehicles in December. For the year, sales increased 17 percent to a record 973,227 vehicles, eclipsing the last record of 926,376 vehicles in 2016.

The Jeep Cherokee and Jeep Compass joined the Wrangler in setting new records for December and the year. Cherokee sales rose 7 percent to 20,800 vehicles. For the year, sales were 239,437 vehicles. Compass sales rose 46 percent to 12,745 in December. For the year, sales were 171,167, which beat the previous record of 94,601 set in 2016.      

Ram Brand
Ram brand sales rose 37 percent in December to 68,195 vehicles. For the year, sales hit a new record of 597,368 vehicles. The Ram 1500 – the Most Awarded Full-size Truck – drove the performance as total sales climbed 15 percent to 377,286 vehicles for a new record. Ram ProMaster and ProMaster City reported the best December ever. ProMaster sales rose 75 percent to 5,857 vehicles while ProMaster City sales increased 35 percent to 2,183 vehicles.         

Dodge Brand
Dodge brand December sales rose 17 percent to 32,528 vehicles. For the year, Challenger sales rose 3 percent to 66,716 which is a new record for the nameplate. The previous record was 66,377 in 2015.

Alfa Romeo Brand
Alfa Romeo brand December sales fell 4 percent to 1,946 vehicles. Alfa Romeo’s 2018 annual sales rose to a record 23,820, which was almost twice as much as the brand sold in 2017. Both Stelvio and Giulia finished the year notching more than 11,500 vehicle sales.  

Chrysler Brand
Chrysler brand December sales fell 28 percent to 12,425 vehicles. However, the Pacifica reported higher year-over-year results as vehicle sales totaled 118,322. Overall, the brand has seen some softening during the year following the continued wind-down of the Chrysler 200 and the Town & Country.   

FIAT Brand
Fiat December sales declined 44 percent to 977 vehicles in December. Fiat finished the year with 15,521 vehicle sales.  
 
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FCA getting pretty close to Ford/Lincoln (2,497,318)

Jeep (973,227) outsold Ford SUVs (797,238) by a huge margin.  Ford ranks behind GM, FCA, Toyota and occasionally Nissan and Hyundai in terms for utility sales.  Something they are very aggressively trying to fix over the next 3 years.  The good news is that Ford's utility sales are higher margin along with GM.  

 

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Alfa Romeo is bleeding. Very sad to see a car as good as Giulia selling so little. Lincoln's decision to have more SUVs seems right (also observing the miserable sales of the Cadillac sedans). It caught my eye that the Dodge Charger had a 7% growth. I'd like the Taurus to have some survival

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13 hours ago, fordmantpw said:

Ram pickup less than 50k behind Silverado for the year.  Does the Ram pass the Silvy in 2019?

And then what year do they pass F-series?  2021?

Ok, - let's hear the "...it can never happen..."   But anything can happen!

 

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56 minutes ago, papilgee4evaeva said:

FCA has only been a thing for 4 years.  How disingenuous is this? ?

Anyway, good for them, I suppose.  Surprised to see Charger actually post an increase YOY.

Good catch papilgee4evaeva sir. With the first bullet point, FCA seems to be disguising previous corporate structure and ownership of the brands listed in their U.S. sales chart. To your point, the current parent company Fiat Chrysler Automobiles N.V. was established in October 2014.

They could have just said "FCA US reports highest calendar year of retail sales since company inception"! But in any case FCA's U.S. sales growth in 2018 is very impressive.

Dodge Charger's sales performance is due to excellent marketing and product planning. FCA knows better than any other automaker how to make a full size sedan attractive to young buyers. That's why Charger does so well. It has a much lower average age of buyers than anything else in the class.

Edited by rperez817
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8 minutes ago, Kev-Mo said:

And then what year do they pass F-series?  2021?

Ok, - let's hear the "...it can never happen..."   But anything can happen!

 

It can definitely happen. Here’s the way I look at life in general. If you never do anything new or different, you will never progress. So if ford’s next redesign turns out a bust, then it could loose the sale crown. They took a big gamble with the aluminum. They took a big gamble with ecoboost. Both those have paid off. Ford has screwed up a lot of models and made some “corporate “ decisions by bean counters. But one thing they can do is sell trucks. 

On a side note. Isn’t it interesting how the automotive industry plays follow the leader. Turbo engines were a euro thing from the 80s. No one hardly but SAAB did it. Now Ford paved the way for major use of turbos. Everyone from GM to Honda, are doing it for the US Market now. 

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12 minutes ago, fordtech1 said:

It can definitely happen. Here’s the way I look at life in general. If you never do anything new or different, you will never progress. So if ford’s next redesign turns out a bust, then it could loose the sale crown. They took a big gamble with the aluminum. They took a big gamble with ecoboost. Both those have paid off. Ford has screwed up a lot of models and made some “corporate “ decisions by bean counters. But one thing they can do is sell trucks. 

On a side note. Isn’t it interesting how the automotive industry plays follow the leader. Turbo engines were a euro thing from the 80s. No one hardly but SAAB did it. Now Ford paved the way for major use of turbos. Everyone from GM to Honda, are doing it for the US Market now. 

Hell yes  - the Dodge Ovis canadensis could pass the F-series with the momentum they have.  It's in the back of everyone's mind on this forum!  If someone were to have said that 2-3 years ago, the string would have gone nuts saying it could never happen!  It's gong to be the Ranger vs. Jeep Gladiator to determine if Ford can even maintain a sales lead over FCA. Jeep shows no sign of slowing down and Toyota will have their version of a Bronco (or any new vehicle they see a market for) long before Ford will ever have one for sale.  In the next year or two Ford could lose 2 spots to both Toyota and FCA. 

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1 hour ago, Kev-Mo said:

And then what year do they pass F-series?  2021?

Ok, - let's hear the "...it can never happen..."   But anything can happen!

 

I think F-series is the one place Ford always pushes forward/innovates, though.  It's not like GM phoning it in.

1 hour ago, rperez817 said:

Good catch papilgee4evaeva sir. With the first bullet point, FCA seems to be disguising previous corporate structure and ownership of the brands listed in their U.S. sales chart. To your point, the current parent company Fiat Chrysler Automobiles N.V. was established in October 2014.

They could have just said "FCA US reports highest calendar year of retail sales since company inception"! But in any case FCA's U.S. sales growth in 2018 is very impressive.

Dodge Charger's sales performance is due to excellent marketing and product planning. FCA knows better than any other automaker how to make a full size sedan attractive to young buyers. That's why Charger does so well. It has a much lower average age of buyers than anything else in the class.

What marketing?  There hasn't been any Charger marketing in years.

4 minutes ago, akirby said:

So what would you guys think if F series lost the #1 spot, Ford overall ends up #3 or #4 but profit margins are at 10% and they make $10B in profit whereas the others make a lot less than that at a lower margin?

I think at this point, F-series is where they'd work to maintain that #1.

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44 minutes ago, Kev-Mo said:

Hell yes  - the Dodge Ovis canadensis could pass the F-series with the momentum they have.  It's in the back of everyone's mind on this forum!  If someone were to have said that 2-3 years ago, the string would have gone nuts saying it could never happen!  It's gong to be the Ranger vs. Jeep Gladiator to determine if Ford can even maintain a sales lead over FCA. Jeep shows no sign of slowing down and Toyota will have their version of a Bronco (or any new vehicle they see a market for) long before Ford will ever have one for sale.  In the next year or two Ford could lose 2 spots to both Toyota and FCA. 

By your assessment, it sounds like Ford won’t take the appropriate steps to counter the Ram. 

Do you own a late model Ford truck, or have you spent significant time in one?  It’s a great truck, and it’s sales suggest it is as well. This isn’t to say the Ram isn’t a great truck, but in reality, it was just catching up to the F150, and perhaps surpassing it in a few ways.  Sure, there are some doodads inside the new cab of the Ram that are very nice and the ride might be slightly better, but those are things that can be countered in short order. Ram has had coil spring rear suspension since 2009, which is capable of providing a better ride but that was never able to push it above the Ford or the GM twins for that matter.  

I like the new Ram, but this is one sales category that Ford will pull the stops out to protect, you can count on that. 

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Ford is maintaining sales pretty close to capacity while still maintaining ATPs and profit margins on F series.  If RAM starts to eat into that I’m sure they’ll lower prices and/or add rebates to counter it.   F series sales have increased every year since 2009 (except 1 where it was only down 10K).  It’s not like they’re losing sales at this point regardless of what Ram is doing.

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2 hours ago, rperez817 said:

Good catch papilgee4evaeva sir. With the first bullet point, FCA seems to be disguising previous corporate structure and ownership of the brands listed in their U.S. sales chart. To your point, the current parent company Fiat Chrysler Automobiles N.V. was established in October 2014.

They could have just said "FCA US reports highest calendar year of retail sales since company inception"! But in any case FCA's U.S. sales growth in 2018 is very impressive.

I wouldn't read too much into that.  I'm pretty sure they just mean that all the vehicles they (and their previous entities, a la Chrysler) have been selling in the US for the past 14 years.  I dont think they need to spell it out.  It is a sales press release, not a Wikipedia article.

Its not like Ford goes around touting "Best retail sales since Mercury was shuttered and we sold our shares of Mazda".  Companies change, ownership changes....but the basic makeup of FCA in the US is not much different than Chrysler was 14 years ago. Trucks, Jeeps and cars.

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One thing all this ballyhoo about rams air ride is all good until some age hits. Ask any Lincoln Navigator owner of a 03-06 model. Better yet MB, Land Rover, bmw, anything else with air ride past 6 years old.  These things are expensive to fix and ended up getting converted to coil springs. 

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28 minutes ago, fordtech1 said:

One thing all this ballyhoo about rams air ride is all good until some age hits. Ask any Lincoln Navigator owner of a 03-06 model. Better yet MB, Land Rover, bmw, anything else with air ride past 6 years old.  These things are expensive to fix and ended up getting converted to coil springs. 

And the coil springs are great for ride quality but they suck for towing. Ever see a late model Ram towing a boat with the headlights pointing at the moon?

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Generally speaking if you want a luxury truck, definitely buy the RAM or Denali, but if you want a work truck or mid-range truck, F-Series and Chevy hit the sweet spot.  RAM and Sierra certainly do more to modify their vehicles for the  luxury customer than F-150 which is mostly "cake-decorating" once you get to King Ranch, Platinum, or Limited.  I'm not sure if that will change with the success of RAM, but Ford knows this business pretty well.

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2 hours ago, tbone said:

By your assessment, it sounds like Ford won’t take the appropriate steps to counter the Ram. 

Do you own a late model Ford truck, or have you spent significant time in one?  It’s a great truck, and it’s sales suggest it is as well. This isn’t to say the Ram isn’t a great truck, but in reality, it was just catching up to the F150, and perhaps surpassing it in a few ways.  Sure, there are some doodads inside the new cab of the Ram that are very nice and the ride might be slightly better, but those are things that can be countered in short order. Ram has had coil spring rear suspension since 2009, which is capable of providing a better ride but that was never able to push it above the Ford or the GM twins for that matter.  

I like the new Ram, but this is one sales category that Ford will pull the stops out to protect, you can count on that. 

I'd like to see Ford step up on the interior - especially/mainly the higher trims.  The interiors aren't bad, just Ram stepped it up to a new level.  The GM twins aren't a factor in this regard.

2 hours ago, akirby said:

Ford is maintaining sales pretty close to capacity while still maintaining ATPs and profit margins on F series.  If RAM starts to eat into that I’m sure they’ll lower prices and/or add rebates to counter it.   F series sales have increased every year since 2009 (except 1 where it was only down 10K).  It’s not like they’re losing sales at this point regardless of what Ram is doing.

I'll have to go back a few years and make sales charts for the trucks out of curiosity.

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3 minutes ago, Assimilator said:

Generally speaking if you want a luxury truck, definitely buy the RAM or Denali, but if you want a work truck or mid-range truck, F-Series and Chevy hit the sweet spot.

I really don't get the hubbub with the Denali trucks.

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19 hours ago, rmc523 said:

I really don't get the hubbub with the Denali trucks.

I don’t either. I’ve been in plenty of Yukon Denalis and actually considered buying one, but I didn’t think there was anything that really stood out about it. 

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