GM's Volt numbers for August: Not Pretty

GM appears to have a smidgen of confidence in the Volt left, because they produced ~ 2400 cars in August. I think the low August sales can be explained by the supply pipeline, although low demand cannot be excluded. The next couple months will tell the tale.

 

I hope so. The Chevy Volt is an amazing car. A friend of mine at work has one and, were it up to me, we would have bought one too. I have a seven mile commute to work so I would have basically never used gas.

However, my wife was concerned about the newness of the technology, etc. Certainly a valid point, I'm just more of a first adopter than her.

But anyway you cut it...Prius, Leaf, Volt, these are all technologies headed in the right direction and we should all hope each of these technologies succeed!

 

GM isn't promoting the Volt at all. No mention of it in dealer ads.

It looks like business as usual at GM--two years after being bailed out by the taxpayers.

 

no way a $45,000. car is going to keep up with a $35,000. car. and they are not both electric cars. you get more with the volt. or less, depending on your perspective.

 

People just aren't willing to take a chance on GM anymore - that's the bottom line. RIP Volt.

As Bush once said ... fool me once .... well you get the picture.

-Brad

 

PriusSport you are so right. I stated in other threads the lack of support and marketing of the volt will be its downfall from within. I have been at several fairs anf festivals this summer that had new vehicles and all had chevrolet. The volt was there off to the side like a cast off. The cruze and camaro we front and center. They were the only models with chevrolet reps standing along side to answer questions and give sales pitches. I walked over to the volt off to the side with my wife and after checking out the volt for about 10 minutes none of their reps. even came over to the volt. Sadly this was repeated at the other locations, This needs to change or the volt might not survive. In my area the volt is being treated like the redheaded stepchild by Chevrolet dealers and reps. The culture needs to change even some of their sales people are bad mouthing the volt. WHY...

 

Here in the burbs of Houston, I went from seeing zero Volts in the wild to 5 different vehicles within the course of two weeks- and none with dealer plates either. I have yet to see another Leaf other than my own here or in Houston proper. IMO, any suburban-downtown commute with any kind of real freeway travel is going to put the Volt at the forefront for now, so I would be surprised if (at least in this region) the Volt hasn't already overtaken the Leaf in sales numbers.

Of course, this place is also swarming with Prii.

 

Lets see what the numbers show at end of year. Doesn't GE have a contract for 12K volts??? Volt needs to make some inroads quickly since they will have som stiff competition coming down the pike next year...

 

The Volt isn't selling either because it's expensive or because they weren't building enough of them. Either way, it not because people won't buy GM.

Here's manufacturer US sales for August (also note the improvements for the much-maligned Chrysler):
GM August Sales up 13.4% with 218,479 vehicles sold.
Ford August Sales up 7.0% with 175,220 vehicles sold.
Chrysler August Sales up 25.6% with 130,119 vehicles sold.
Toyota August Sales down 16.1% with 129,483 vehicles sold.
Nissan August Sales up 17.7% with 82,517 vehicles sold.
Honda August Sales down 27.2% with 82,321 vehicles sold.
Hyundai August Sales up 4.9% with 58,505 vehicles sold.
Kia August Sales up 22.0% with 41,188 vehicles sold.
VW August Sales up 6.2% with 25,232 vehicles sold.

Here's what the Cruze has been doing:

GM has just started selling the new Sonic (a significant upgrade to the Aveo), will launch a new Malibu next year and a new Impala in 2013.

The Equinox is selling well, as it its GMC sibling Terrain. They are the top-selling "light truck" models after the pick-ups. It's the pick-ups that are needing big incentives to sell.

 

MY experience here in San Diego is that I see six Leafs to one Volt.

 

GM is saying that those are dealer demos.... lol... didnt they say that few months back too?

 

Think about the dealer/salesperson perspective, having a demo model available but none in inventory. Why bother with a Volt sale, knowing the customer will pester them for months while waiting for delivery?

It's so much easier to sell a Cruze, a wide variety available for immediate purchase. And what if the financing for the much more expensive Volt doesn't actually come through? Think about waiting for months, then not getting loan approval. All that effort for nothing.

This is very much the "halo" effect that GM wanted all along. They claimed that's what Prius did for Toyota, but refused to acknowledge how much Prius were actually being sold. Way back in 2004 when the anti-hybrid campaigning got really bad, worldwide annual sales had already exceeded 120,000. When will Volt reach that, especially knowing GM is also pushing eAssist at the same time?
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The disruption to the industry from the earthquake and tsunami could still be a factor in inventory and sales. If so, why doesn't it seem to affect Nissan here? Is it just a one month blip, or was it as disruptive to Nissan?

 

Nissan wasn't as badly affected. See http://priuschat.com/forums/other-c...-minimum-now-half-empty-lots.html#post1372403.

 

I find it fascinating that GM supporters avoid that topic, pretending the lack of vehicles available for sale from Toyota had any influence on the rise of GM numbers.

It would have been amazing had GM actually been producing enough Volt to take advantage of the situation. After all, enthusiasts were expecting a sales boom immediately following rollout anyway. Instead, even with the disasters in Japan, only a small number of Volt actually made it to consumers.

Missing opportunity like that makes each step for Volt even more difficult... as the hype fades and the competition grows.
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Once again Gm is slow to react and misses a golden opportunity to get a foothold in the market, because of the disaster in Japan. The Cruze is selling great and they are content i guess. Look at their history and how they handled stiff competition from the Mustang, Civic, Accord,Corolla,Camry, Elantra, Sonata,Altima not to mention Chrysler mini vans and the great offerings from Honda and Toyota. Then lets talk about trucks. Now the green hybrid and Ev challenges coming from several automakers. Toyota and ford Toyota and Tesla sharing. Government motors will need another bailout. This is really a shame my family was Gm to the core growing up, my last 5 new cars were from Japan and i liked everyone of them.

 

You are assuming that every part of Japan was equally affected by the earthquake and tsunami. Toyota and Honda, because of the location of their facilities had more devastation.

 

Comprehensive list of auto sales: http://priuschat.com/forums/prius-h...lt-toyota-hiring-2000-us-factory-workers.html

Hill's only singling out this article because he has a Leaf.

I didn't see it mentioned in this article, but didn't previous articles say there are components in the Volt that come from Japan and were delayed due to the earthquake? Does anyone know?
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This time they're saying it's more for national roll-out.