There was little doubt that U.S. auto sales would plummet because of the coronavirus and that has panned out as automaker after automaker has posted significant declines.
Starting with GM, the company delivered 618,335 vehicles in the first quarter which is a drop of approximately 7% compared to last year. Much of that blame is being placed on March numbers as GM noted the entire industry “experienced significant declines” due to COVID-19.
Despite the overall sales decline, there were a few bright spots as both the Chevrolet Silverado and GMC Sierra saw gains. The Chevrolet Bolt was also up 36.1% and the often forgotten Spark saw sales jump 45.6% to 9,352 units.
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FCA sales were down 10% as the company said “strong momentum in January and February was more than offset by the negative economic impact of the coronavirus in March.” This caused sales to fall from 498,425 units last year to just 446,768 in Q1 2020.
Sales were largely down across the board, but pickups proved popular as Jeep sold 15,259 Gladiators and Ram truck sales climbed 7% to 128,805 units. The only other model to post a gain was Dodge Durango which was up 5% to 17,805 units.
Perhaps more importantly, Jeep sales fell 14% in the quarter. Wrangler sales declined by 21%, while the Renegade, Compass, Cherokee and Grand Cherokee were down between 13-32%.
Hyundai saw March sales drop a staggering 43% compared to last year “due to the substantial business disruptions … from the COVID-19 global pandemic.” This helped to push first quarter sales down from 147,585 units in 2019 to 130,875 units this year.
Virtually all models saw quarterly declines, but the Ioniq was up slightly. The Palisade is also proving to be a strong seller, while the Venue is still relatively fresh out of the gate.
Volkswagen also saw a huge drop in March sales as they declined 42%. Sales were up 9.4% for January and February, but these gains were more than wiped out by last month’s performance.
The brand sold 75,075 vehicles for the quarter and that is down 13% compared to last year. The only model to post a gain was the Golf R which was up 448% to 789 units.
On the premium side of things, Porsche sales fell 20.2% for the quarter to 11,994 units. Every single model was down except for the all-new Taycan Turbo and Turbo S which racked up 221 deliveries.
Infiniti moved 25,558 units in the first quarter which is a 25.5% decrease from last year. On the bright side, sales of the QX50 were up 16.4%.
Nissan fared even worse as sales dropped 30% to 232,048 units for the quarter. The only models to buck the negative trend were the Kicks (11.6%), Pathfinder (4.3%), Murano (33.7%) and NV200 (1.8%).
Sticking with Japanese automakers, Mazda’s March sales were down 41.8% and this pushed their first quarter sales down 4.5%. Mitsubishi saw an even bigger drop as March sales were off 52% and first quarter sales were down 15.5%.
A number of automakers haven’t posted their results as of this writing, but every company is dealing with the coronavirus crisis and are expected to post significantly lower March sales.