As everyone knows, the automobile industry has been slammed in 2020, including in the United States. Below is a look at third quarter auto sales across the country as well as auto sales in the first three quarters of the year.
US auto sales, as we all know by now, took a massive hit in the second quarter of 2020. After collecting the sales data of 31 auto brands (almost all of them), I decided to dig in a little deeper — and further back in time — to try to get a better sense of trends and which companies are facing particularly challenging mid- to long-term circumstances.
Elon Musk’s announcement early last year that Tesla was going to close its stores and shift to all online sales was met with mixed reactions with most people being shocked to hear about the change.
Now, 2020 has rolled around and a bunch more automakers have decided to ditch monthly sales reporting. Nissan (& Infiniti), Jaguar Land Rover, and Volkswagen (including Audi, Porsche, etc.) announced the change with press releases. Others didn’t seem to announce it but just stopped publishing the monthly numbers (Mercedes, BMW, and Toyota).
The head of Subaru says the only electric cars Americans want to buy are made by Tesla. But his company will only sell electric cars by 2035. By then, it will be too late.
The Tesla Model 3 ended up being the 7th best selling car in the United States in the 4th quarter of 2019 and the 9th best selling car across the whole year*.
The US auto industry took a bit of a whack in 2019. Excluding Tesla, auto sales were down by 177,839 units in 2019 compared to 2018. That said, only 13 auto brands saw their sales drop, while 18 saw their sales rise.
With all of the data tallied, we have one electric car in the top 20*, or in the top 10 actually — the Tesla Model 3. The Model 3, based on our estimates (with support from EV Volumes), lands in the #10 spot in the USA in November among all cars. For the first 11 months of the year, the Model 3 was in the #9 position.
Tracking monthly US auto sales by company or brand is one of the oddest-feeling things I’ve done in my decade or so covering cleantech. Perhaps that’s because the focus is on tracking non-clean tech. The fact is, though, it shocks me every month to see how many people still buy gasoline cars. Gasoline cars are far worse than electric cars currently on the market for the same cost (or even less). Nonetheless, there are so many people buying clunky, noisy, slow, high-maintenance, low-tech, high-depreciation gasoline vehicles every single day. Objectively, it doesn’t make sense.
Tracking monthly US auto sales has been a fascinating endeavor this past year. Unfortunately, we don’t get data from some brands — Tesla, all Ford Motor Company brands, GM brands, and Fiat Chrysler Automobiles brands, Jaguar Land Rover no longer report monthly sales. However, there are 17 brands that do report monthly US sales, so let’s have a look at them.
