Top 10 Best-Selling Cars: January 2012

After capping 2011 with four decent months, the auto industry hit 2012 running. Analysts expect auto sales to outpace 2011 figures anywhere from 6% to 10%, which could make 2012 the best sales year since 2007.

January enticed consumers with total incentives — including financing offers, automaker and dealer cash, and trade-in bonuses — amounting to 16% off the average car’s MSRP, CNW Marketing Research reports. That beats January 2011, when shoppers saw only 13.5% off the average MSRP.

Shoppers took advantage. January sales jumped 11%, beating Tuesday’s expectations. This marks the best annualized month since 2009, Automotive News reports. Chrysler, Nissan and Hyundai-Kia saw double-digit sales gains, with GM the only top-seven automaker to post a loss.

GM Remains Top Automaker in 2011

Most automakers reported positive sales results for the 2011 calendar year yesterday. Reports have the total number hovering around 13 million new cars sold. Optimism abounds for 2012.

GM remained the top automaker in U.S. sales, seeing sales grow 13.7% over 2010, but it was Chrysler that surged the most.

The automaker saw sales spike 26.2% over 2010's rate after introducing a number of new models with the redesigned Jeep Grand Cherokee leading the charge. The sales were so strong that Chrysler overtook Honda as the No. 4 automaker in the U.S.

As we've mentioned before, Honda ran into supply issues due to last year's Japanese tsunami, but even if Honda had been able to maintain sales at its 2010’s pace, Chrysler still would have passed them by.

Top 10 Best-Selling Cars: December 2011

The holidays sent car shoppers back to family cars, SUVs and pickup trucks as most major automakers outpaced analysts' expectations to finish the year. The top 10 sellers for the month include five pickups and SUVs and five cars, which is a similar mix to December 2010.

Top 10 Best-Selling Cars of 2011

The Ford F-Series, Chevrolet Silverado and Chrysler's Ram pickups closed 2011 strong; Ford said the F-Series had its best December since sales-heady 2006. SUVs, meanwhile, remained popular: The discount-laden Ford Escape sold more than in any December since the small SUV arrived more than a decade ago, and Jeep cranked out more than 17,000 Grand Cherokee sales, marking the SUV's best December since 2005. The Grand Cherokee nearly made the top 10 list, which would have been its first placement since we began tallying the monthly top 10 in January 2009. The Ford Explorer and Jeep Wrangler — both up more than 35% — saw outsized gains, and even aging models like the Nissan Rogue (up 18.6%) did well. The misfires? The Chevrolet Equinox, down versus a strong December 2010, as well as the aging Toyota RAV4. The Honda CR-V's fourth generation hit dealers in mid-December, but sales remain down, too.

Top 10 Best-Selling Cars of 2011

It was a year of rebuilding in the automotive industry in more ways than one. Overall, automakers were overcoming a disastrous U.S. economy, and a tsunami in March dealt Japanese automakers a tremendous blow to production of popular cars. Those two storylines directly impacted the top 10 cars of the year in terms of sales.

Top 10 Best-Selling Cars: December 2011

While the Toyota Camry remained the best-selling car in the country in 2011, the rest of the top four sellers from 2010 — Honda Accord, Toyota Corolla and Honda Civic, respectively — tumbled down the list with the Civic falling off the top 10 completely, though it was the 12th best-selling car of 2011 and the Honda CR-V was the 13th.

Why the Chevrolet Cruze Beat the Ford Focus

Philip Couts doesn't normally buy compact cars. The 53-year-old mechanical engineer downsized from his usual midsizer last August to Chevrolet's latest commuter car, the Cruze, to help save gas on his 22-mile commute between two Chicago suburbs. Except for a few small things — the seat bottoms could use more cushioning and he's not quite getting 30 mpg — Couts describes himself as "happy" with the car, a decked-out LTZ trim with leather seats and a turbo engine.

Couts shopped the Cruze against Ford's redesigned Focus, but the Ford had a smaller trunk, he says, and the Ford dealer wouldn't budge on pricing. Couts drove home in the Chevy.

Two redesigned cars — the Cruze for 2011 and the Focus for 2012 — signal ambitious hopes for their automakers. GM sells the Cruze in six continents; Ford says it developed its latest "global" Focus with a database of adults across North and South America, Asia and Germany. But here in the U.S., drivers like Philip Couts aren't alone. Year-to-date Focus sales are barely outpacing last year's aging model it replaced. The Cruze, meanwhile, has become Chevrolet's second-best-selling model, beaten only by the venerable Silverado pickup. It topped the Focus by more than 36,000 units over the past six months.

Why did the Cruze win? It's a tale of timing and supply — and the competition is far from over.

Updated Favorites Top Holiday Car-Shopping Lists

Black Friday shopping isn't just relegated to hot new gadgets and deep discounts. Last month, car buyers snapped up nostalgic nameplates like they were going out of style. But while the names were familiar, the oldies that sold best had shiny new wrappers.

America's longtime best-selling car, the Toyota Camry, was recently revamped for 2012. Sales jumped 13% last month thanks to the new design, and the Camry beat Honda's staler Accord by more than 9,000 units. The Camry reigned supreme as America's best-selling car with a 2,827-unit lead over the Nissan Altima.

America's fourth- and fifth-best-selling SUVs in November were two much-improved versions of formerly past-their-prime nameplates. Year-over-year, Ford Explorer sales jumped 217% to 12,888. Compared with October, Explorer sales climbed 7.5% in a market that shrank 2.6%.

Top 10 Best-Selling Cars: November 2011

Improved consumer confidence had shoppers spending record cash on Black Friday — and perhaps that same enthusiasm boosted November's auto sales. In what turns out the best month since 2009's Cash for Clunkers-fueled summer, automakers and dealers piled on the incentives, and shoppers are, well, shopping.

Chrysler, Hyundai and Nissan posted huge sales gains, with modest upticks from Ford, GM and Toyota. Hobbled by diving sales for the Accord — which didn't make the top 10 — Honda was the only Big Six automaker to lose sales.

Two cars fell off the list for November, but the other faces are familiar.

Japanese Automakers Show Signs of Recovery

A natural disaster can have a devastating impact on not just a country's people but also its economy. That's certainly the case with March's earthquake and tsunami in Japan that hampered the health of the country's automotive industry.

Last month, we saw the strongest signs yet that Japanese automakers are recovering, but there are still obstacles to overcome.

Top 10 Best-Selling Cars: October 2011

Falling consumer confidence hasn't deterred car shoppers, as pent-up demand raised October sales versus a year ago for all but one major carmaker. Chrysler, Hyundai/Kia and Nissan posted big gains, with GM, Ford and Honda growing modestly. Toyota was the sole loser, dropping 7.9 percent in sales. Pickup trucks, typically strong in the fall, saw continued gains, but family sedans made a comeback, taking three of October's top five slots — something not seen since May.

Detroit pickups took the top two spots, with GM's Chevrolet Silverado and Ford’s F-Series posting some sales gains. The F-Series stayed atop the sales pile this month, comfortably outselling the No. 2 Chevrolet Silverado. Six-cylinder engines account for more than half of all F-150s sold, Ford sales chief Ken Czubay said in a conference call. It gives shoppers of the soon-to-be-discontinued Ranger a truck with similar gas mileage, he said.

Despite the 2012 redesign hitting dealerships last month, Toyota's popular Camry fell 11.9 percent — dethroned for the moment by the Honda Accord, down 1.1 percent. Accord inventory is only about half of what it was in October 2010, according to Automotive News.

Class Warfare Extends to Car Buying

Cars intended for upper-crust buyers are bucking an overall economic trend that has the mainstream American media talking about a double-dip recession. It’s not just media hype. September marked the end of a quarter that saw stocks tumble like it was 2008.

Don’t take that as a suggestion that mainstream buyers aren’t buying mainstream cars. In general terms, higher-priced mainstream-badged cars — we’ll call them middle-class vehicles — aren’t demonstrating an ability to fight their way above 2010’s lackluster sales.

Two examples prove the point. Nissan just threw down the gauntlet with America’s least expensive car, the proletarian new Versa, with a starting price under $11,000. Instantly, Versa sales shot through the roof, rising 68% compared with September 2010. At the opposite end of the spectrum, the $78,750 Audi A8 — a car that isn’t exactly priced right for double-dip recessions — saw a 395% increase. Through the first three quarters of 2011, A8 sales are up 542%.

Although some other Audis posted higher sales volume in September compared with a year ago, the brand’s least expensive model — the A3 hatchback, one of those middle-class vehicles — saw its sales fall 18%. Back at Nissan, the company’s premium-but-value-oriented Infiniti division was up just 2% in September in a market that grew 10%.