March 2019 Sales Figures

Ford won't be out until Thursday.   Just waiting for the others to trickle out. 

OUCH GM

Ow!

Very mixed...

It's surprising to see Alfa down with their hot CUV out now. 

56 minutes ago, ccap41 said:

It's surprising to see Alfa down with their hot CUV out now. 

Apparently not that hot.  Their exteriors are nice to look at, but their interiors leave me flat. 

4 minutes ago, Drew Dowdell said:

Apparently not that hot.  Their exteriors are nice to look at, but their interiors leave me flat. 

I've never been in one but I've seen a few and they're quite the looker. It would be tough to take the dive in on Alfa's reliability though. I'm not sure where they are at now but FCA doesn't seem to be too high on reliability lists outside of Ram, Wrangler, GC, and the LX siblings. 

The problem with Alfa Romeo is it doesn’t have a 10 year bumper to bumper warranty.

2 minutes ago, smk4565 said:

The problem with Alfa Romeo is it doesn’t have a 10 year bumper to bumper warranty.

I could see having an Alfa as a lease for 3 years, wouldn't want one as it ages..

12 minutes ago, Robert Hall said:

I could see having an Alfa as a lease for 3 years, wouldn't want one as it ages..

Their lease deals must not be as good as the Germans.  I have to imagine buyers fear reliability and steer clear of Alfa’s.

2 hours ago, smk4565 said:

Their lease deals must not be as good as the Germans.  I have to imagine buyers fear reliability and steer clear of Alfa’s.

I just priced one on the website and it came out about $75 a month cheaper than the GLC optioned to the same price.  That's before any discounts on either. 

1 hour ago, Drew Dowdell said:

I just priced one on the website and it came out about $75 a month cheaper than the GLC optioned to the same price.  That's before any discounts on either. 

So $75 a month cheaper isn’t enough to move the needle.    The GLC outsells the Stelvio nearly 10-1. 

I don’t think the Alfa name has enough cache either and they don’t advertise a lot either.

6 minutes ago, smk4565 said:

So $75 a month cheaper isn’t enough to move the needle.    The GLC outsells the Stelvio nearly 10-1. 

I don’t think the Alfa name has enough cache either and they don’t advertise a lot either.

I agree with you that they don't advertise enough. They also don't have enough dealers.

But $550 v. $625 a month is certainly enough to move the needle. 

I just think people don't know about the Stelvio. 

40 minutes ago, smk4565 said:

So $75 a month cheaper isn’t enough to move the needle.    The GLC outsells the Stelvio nearly 10-1. 

I don’t think the Alfa name has enough cache either and they don’t advertise a lot either.

Saw a Stelvio new at the 24hr fitness last night when I went to work out, the sun roof was partially open. I told the person they were calling for rain and he looked at me pissed and said there was nothing he could do as it was no longer functional, being taken in today and so far he had buyers remorse due to the poor quality of the CUV.

I have to think that anyone that is willing to pay the money these auto's command will look at the reviews and think twice about buying their quality-less auto's.

Being Italian one would expect the Stelvio to be of low quality and poor reliability, but high style.  At least they aren't known for catching fire spontaneously like Ferraris and Lamborghinis. 

1 minute ago, Robert Hall said:

Being Italian one would expect the Stelvio to be of low quality and poor reliability, but high style.  At least they aren't known for catching fire spontaneously like Ferraris and Lamborghinis. 

Yet Italians are well know for stylish quality built boats, why can they not seem to figure this out for the Auto's they build. Just crazy. 

28 minutes ago, dfelt said:

Yet Italians are well know for stylish quality built boats, why can they not seem to figure this out for the Auto's they build. Just crazy. 

FIAT owns most if not all Italian automakers.  That is the problem.

1 hour ago, dfelt said:

Saw a Stelvio new at the 24hr fitness last night when I went to work out, the sun roof was partially open. I told the person they were calling for rain and he looked at me pissed and said there was nothing he could do as it was no longer functional, being taken in today and so far he had buyers remorse due to the poor quality of the CUV.

I have to think that anyone that is willing to pay the money these auto's command will look at the reviews and think twice about buying their quality-less auto's.

Exactly.  $75 a month savings  isn’t enough to get rained on.  They need to lease them for about $400 a month.

How did GM get its butt kicked on the sales front?

9 hours ago, smk4565 said:

Their lease deals must not be as good as the Germans.  I have to imagine buyers fear reliability and steer clear of Alfa’s.

Ding! Winner. 

Alfa hasn’t figured out how to lease these out yet.  The sales dude who went with me on my Stelvio test drive last week said they conquest some bmws but bmw sets up their lease to hook the first timer and then when you try to return it they knock you with fees so bad for ‘damage’ and other stuff.  They ‘lessen the damages ‘ if you re-lease   And the douche cycle begins and you can’t get out  that’s how bmw does it  

And yes, a huge warranty would help them sell cars too. 

9 hours ago, smk4565 said:

Their lease deals must not be as good as the Germans.  I have to imagine buyers fear reliability and steer clear of Alfa’s.

Yup. 

If anyone wants to see my test drive of the Stelvio write up I got that in the forum a couple days ago.  Stelvio is nice enough that it should sell. It just needs leasing and incentive programs. 

3 hours ago, smk4565 said:

Exactly.  $75 a month savings  isn’t enough to get rained on.  They need to lease them for about $400 a month.

Haha, I agree 400 is the magic number I think for Alfa. And that’s what I told sales guy my cap would be for an Alfa.  ?

they had one with around a 500 lease. 

I think if they can lease lease them as cheap as the genesis g70 will eventually end up. Genesis will need to lease those for 400-450. 

I’ll just wait till some Chevy dealer gets super desperate and find another Malibu to lease for an absurdly low pynt...like 250

9 minutes ago, regfootball said:

Ding! Winner. 

Alfa hasn’t figured out how to lease these out yet.  The sales dude who went with me on my Stelvio test drive last week said they conquest some bmws but bmw sets up their lease to hook the first timer and then when you try to return it they knock you with fees so bad for ‘damage’ and other stuff.  They ‘lessen the damages ‘ if you re-lease   And the douche cycle begins and you can’t get out  that’s how bmw does it  

And yes, a huge warranty would help them sell cars too. 

The Alfa interiors aren't as good as any German car, not even close. So there is one problem, they have performance but the Germans have that too.  And the reliability worries I feel like are a huge obstacle.   You almost know going in it will break so why buy it?  

Alfa almost has to give these cars away for 5 years and prove they are reliable before masses will pay money for them.  

3 minutes ago, regfootball said:

Haha, I agree 400 is the magic number I think for Alfa. And that’s what I told sales guy my cap would be for an Alfa.  ?

they had one with around a 500 lease. 

I think if they can lease lease them as cheap as the genesis g70 will eventually end up. Genesis will need to lease those for 400-450. 

They should be selling Alfa's at $400 a month for 72 months. I get that is $28k, but that is about what people are willing to risk on one of these.  For a hot second Alfa was bragging how the Guilia was the fastest 4-door around the Nurburgring and the Stelvio was the fastest SUV, then Mercedes took both those away about a month later.   So you are getting 2nd place performance with sub par interior and bottom of the barrel reliability.  Not a recipe for success.

What will Peugeot have to give their cars away for the first five to ten years?

2 minutes ago, regfootball said:

What will Peugeot have to give their cars away for the first five to ten years?

Depends on who they compete with.  If they go into a mass market at a good price, I think people will give them a chance.  Alfa is trying to go against BMW, Audi and Mercedes, those are heavyweights.  I don't think Peugeot has built in negative perception either.

4 minutes ago, regfootball said:

What will Peugeot have to give their cars away for the first five to ten years?

Considering the mess they left when they were here last, that is more like giving it away for 20 plus years to build up enough history of reliable auto's for people to pay a premium. Will not trust a Peugeot. 

1 minute ago, smk4565 said:

Depends on who they compete with.  If they go into a mass market at a good price, I think people will give them a chance.  Alfa is trying to go against BMW, Audi and Mercedes, those are heavyweights.  I don't think Peugeot has built in negative perception either.

I your 40 plus years old, you know the crap they had and how they left people holding the bag of the garbage they tried to sell and then dumped and fled. I do not trust them period. They are just barely 1 step above Alfa that should have stayed in the history books for the garbage it is.

29 minutes ago, riviera74 said:

How did GM get its butt kicked on the sales front?

Buick and GMC SUVs are a bit dated, there seem to be 5 new crossovers every month hit the market, just in the past year or so you had Atlas, Acent, Palisade, Telluride enter the Traverse segment.  Kona, Passport, etc.  They just keep coming.   Cadillac is struggling, BMW X7 is probably going to outsell the Escalade and Navigator this year, Cadillac and Chevy sedans are dated and sedans industry wide are struggling.  The butt kicking will get worse when you remove Impala, LaCrosse, XTS, Cruze, Volt off the list next year.  I don't think they'll make up that volume it will just go elsewhere, but I don't think GM is playing a market share game either.

1 hour ago, smk4565 said:

 I don't think GM is playing a market share game either.

I totally agree with this, unlike GM of past and other American manufactures that ignored Deming and Drucker who ended up going to Japan and teaching them about Quality Management for Profit, Mary is a student of them. 

Right now Mary knows that if she is able to turn consistent profits and plan for the future, they can take back the market share and leadership role, but this first comes by making sure the company is profitable which she has done even if many of us do not agree with how the auto's are being built now. She is for sure investing in the future and will leave GM with a legacy that will be realized after the fact.

Profitable GM with Quality will bring market share and long term growth.  Another outstanding CEO was IBM Gerstner hired in 1993 and turned IBM into one of the most profitable service companies and proved he also built a deep bench of leadership by taking his Golden Parachute over 10 years to prove what he built would last and still does today.

It will be very interesting to watch everyone from the Germans to the Asian and American auto companies and see who becomes the new leader in the EV auto world.

14 hours ago, riviera74 said:

How did GM get its butt kicked on the sales front?

High prices for low standard features

I’ve said this for years but I’ll say it again. More and more folks are buying used and CPO for more than obvious reasons. Sales trends over the last few years reflect this. Thank you high priced new cars.  

CPO certainly worked for my last car. 

I'm happy w/ my CPO JGC.