Toyota has remained a major contender in auto market in many parts of the world. Although the competition at the global auto stage for the top position has been keen, the Japanese brand is ahead, going by the latest report from the United States.
Having faced huge recalls last year to fix faulty parts, followed by litigations and monumental destruction of some part supplying plants in Japan after heavy floods, many expected its sales to slide drastically, especially in the US market.
But an online report by the Truth About Cars on Tuesday showed even in the mid-size car segment where the competition had been keen, a Toyota model, Camry, was leading the pack.
Sales figures as of May, it stated, showed the Camry in a decent lead over the number two Honda Accord, ahead by nearly 16,000 units.
But the Camry, which is down by 5.5 per cent year-to-date, and incentive spending is nearly double that of the Accord, according to figures from TrueCar compiled by Automotive News.
At $2,750 per unit, Camry incentives are up by 38 per cent, while the Accord’s $1400 incentive is down by 40 per cent.
The new model changeover explains the big drop in Accord spending, but the Camry’s incentives (like 0 per cent financing for 60 months) is part of a broader plan that includes a big fleet sales programme (current making up 20 per cent of sales, and expected to level off to 15 per cent, versus the Accord’s one per cent figure) to help move metal. Toyota is gunning for 400,000 units in 2013 if necessary, a figure that may be hard to match production wise for other auto makers. Then again, one has to wonder how profitable the Camry will end up being when there’s such a relentless drive for volume at all costs.
Other challengers, like the Nissan Altima, Ford Fusion, Chevrolet Malibu and Hyundai Sonata, seem to be relying on high fleet sales, heavy incentives or a combination of both, to keep their numbers up. The Fusion’s numbers are particularly interesting. Despite sales being up nearly 22 per cent year-to-date, Ford making noise about capacity issues, fleet numbers, incentive spending remains relatively high.
Ford is spending about $2,300 per car, while fleet mix runs at 34 per cent.
Even the Chevrolet Malibu, regarded as the dog of the segment, has a 39 per cent fleet mix, despite conventional wisdom holding that GM is merely dumping these cars on daily rental fleets as a means of moving them off the lot.
Still, Malibu sales are down 18.9 per cent so far, and it will be interesting to see how things progress as sales of the refreshed model loom ever closer.