4 November 2005 : US hybrids turned in their worst aggregate sales month since June, when all the models now on sale were first concurrently on the market, and the third-lowest of the year. October saw 16,934 units sold, 27% down from August’s peak of 23,307, and 12% down from September’s 19,180 units. With the overall decline in combined light duty vehicle sales of 14% from September to October, however, hybrids managed to nudge up their total market share very slightly from 1.45% in September to 1.48% in October. Toyota not only was once again the leader in hybrid sales in October, it increased its combined unit sales to 14,173 from 13,021 the month before, a jump of 8.8%. The Prius did the heavy lifting, with 9,939 units sold (a 21% increase from the prior month), while the Highlander and Rx400h hybrids saw slight declines to 2,330 and 1,904 respectively. Full Article ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~` Overall good news for Toyota, but bad news for Ford and Honda. Ford took a big hit, selling 32% fewer Escape Hybrids in October compared to September. Honda's Civic Hybrid is down 88%, which is not surprising considering the major redesign of the HCH is well on it's way. But you can see clearly that the hybrid SUVs are down overall, showing that not even hybrid SUVs are immune to market trends away from SUVs and larger vehicles.
Ah yes, I almost completely forgot about that. Tax credits already are on people's minds. I'm actually surprised we haven't really seen that affect Prius sales for October.
Don't forget the Civic Hybrid is in a major model changeover at the moment. I wouldn't be surprised if this also reflects the lack of available 05 HCHs with the 06's not arriving in quantity yet. I would expect HCH sales to rebound as soon as the 06s become widely available. Also, ALL vehicle sales were bad in October. Even with the drop in Honda Hybrid sales, the hybrid percentage of all Honda sales apparently went up. Taking hybrid sales in isolation from overall vehicle sales won't show the whole picture. With all sales slumping, hybrids apparently increased market share, meaning they slumped less than others. Looks like there were some typoes in there. The way I read it. With the overall decline in combined light duty vehicle sales of 14% from September to October, however, hybrids managed to nudge up their total market share very slightly from 1.45% in September to 1.48% in October Hybrids represented 8.2% of all Toyota vehicles sold in (October), up from 7.3% in September.
Also consider that the gas prices started retreating again in October and the 'panic' to save gas waned a bit. It has come down over $1.00 a gallon here from the September high. _______________________________ 2005 Seaside Pearl #6 Got it last Saturday - getting 46.8 mpg :lol:
I'm sure Ford's "Employee Pricing Event" stole alot of sales from their October numbers. The FEH is still a very rare find on the lots. When I was looking, there were only about a dozen scattered across twice as many dealerships.
