Looking up? Hybrid market share up in May
The fact that auto sales are down from the levels recorded a year ago is no surprise. In fact, it's a bit of a broken record. Note that on Autoblog's monthly By the Numbers post, there's not a hint of green to be seen anywhere, indicating that sales numbers were down across the board for all automakers. That doesn't mean there isn't at least a bit of good news to glean from the doom-and-gloomy sales figures. For instance, both Ford and General Motors posted smaller sales decreases than expected. More intriguing, though, may be last month's uptick in hybrid vehicle market share when compared to the previous month of April.
According to Green Car Advisor, new car sales were up by 12.9 percent last month over the previous month, while hybrid sales, at a grand total of 25,693, were up 18.2 percent from April. Recently introduced models like the Ford Fusion Hybrid and Honda Insight definitely help these figures somewhat, but nearly all individual models posted gains over the previous month. Further, the new 2010 Toyota Prius is a virtual lock to boost figures significantly higher, so there's reason to expect good things from hybrids throughout the rest of 2009.
[Source: Green Car Advisor]
Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)
paulwesterberg 5:44PM (6/04/2009)
Hybrid buyers have been waiting for the new Prius, Insight & Fusion to hit dealer lots. Hybrid sales curves will follow vehicle availability for these new models.
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anoldbikeguy 7:56AM (6/05/2009)
Uh - yes there was a green spot on the sales figures. Lincoln is up year to year. Also, Ford's market share and GM's are up for another month compared to the competition.
The real test to see if there is a recovery starting is whether or not the month to month sales increase we have seen this year makes it to a year to year sales increase when last years sales dive is compared to this year.
As last year's sales dive coincided with $4+ a gallon, and our illustrious 'wizards' on wall street are again bidding up oil futures, it appears that wall street wants to stop any kind of recover in its tracks.
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Dave - Phoenix 7:05PM (6/04/2009)
This is no surprise.
Prior to two months ago, you had basically two legitimate options for hybrids...The Prius and the Civic Hybrid.
With the Ford Fusion, the Honda Insight and now the new Prius we are finally starting to see some hybrids available that meet Americans needs and desires. These Hybrids:
1. Are becoming more affordable
2. Are becoming more stylish
3. Are becoming more available, in more options and combinations
This is all happening even with gas around $2.00 per gallon.
This is only the beginning........
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Seth 10:37AM (6/05/2009)
I just read a bunch of back to back posts on flex fuel vehicle fuels, and then a post on hybrid sales, why not mention FFV sales just to complete the topic?
As it happens there is an order of magnitude more FFV's on the road and sold every year vs. hybrids. This will show the good business case of providing an alternate fuel without changing the drivetrain.
Hopefully there will be more variety of hybrids as there are FFV's to give people more choices across the board.
It will put into perspective the various impacts of each new alternative that gets put into use.
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Sasparilla 5:24PM (6/05/2009)
All you have to do is watch the price of oil. Its currently double its low of last fall, the higher it goes the more of a reminder people have that they might want one of those hybrid things.
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