Photo: Mitsubishi
Everyone and their mother are already crying out as loud as possible about 'doomsday EV' scenarios after Tesla posted its first sales decline in four years, yet some legacy automakers fared much worse during the first quarter across the US automotive market.
For sure, Tesla did announce rather disappointing production and delivery numbers during the first quarter of 2024 – production reached 433,371 vehicles, and deliveries totaled 386,810 EVs during the period, which is down 20.2% compared to the previous quarter and 8.5% from the same period last year. However, let's put that into the proper perspective, shall we?
For example, Audi of America didn't even sell 45k vehicles during the first three months of the year, and they still bragged about jumping 29% year-over-year while their mass-market cousins from Volkswagen couldn't even double that amount – Volkswagen of America reported sales of a little over 82k units for a 21% increase compared to Q1 of 2023. However, what we really want to talk about are the Asian carmakers.
We have already noticed that Toyota – with 565,098 vehicles (+20.3%) is hot on the heels of General Motors, which slipped 1.5% due to a 23% drop in fleet sales to 594,233 units in the US in the first quarter of 2024. But how about the rest of the Asian pack? Well, things are looking promising there, too, with a minor exception.
Naturally, Toyota was followed from the Asian side by their rivals over at American Honda – the division was up 11.8% in March to 130,504 units for their best first quarter since 2021 with 333,824 vehicles (+17.3%). However, Acura was down over 20% to a little more than 9k units, so it's not all rosy, but at least the impact was minimal.
Thirdly, the Nissan Group followed Toyota and Honda in the Japanese ranks with 252,735 vehicles sold during the first three months of the year, equating to a 7.2% surge in deliveries. Again, they were dragged down by the negative performance of Infiniti, which dropped almost 12% year-over-year.
With 20 months of consecutive growth, Subaru of America was also pretty happy about itself as March deliveries jumped 15.2 percent to over 61k, and the total over Q1 was almost 153k vehicles, a rise of 6.7 percent compared to 2023. Interestingly, while it's coming as an all-new generation for the 2025 model year, the current Forester crossover SUV reached an all-time high during the period!
The tiny Japanese automakers that are left are Mazda and Mitsubishi, right? Well, it's a completely different situation for each – Mazda North American Operations (MNAO) jumped 13.3% to over 100k sales during the January to March period, while Mitsubishi Motors North America, Inc. (MMNA) announced quarterly sales are up no less than 35.7% year-over-year. Alas, that doesn't mean too much – they only delivered 28,403 vehicles!
Hyundai and Kia also get an honorable mention, by the way – the former sold 184,804 vehicles for its best-ever Q1 (+0.3% only, though), while Kia was down to 179,621 units compared to 184,136 last year.
For example, Audi of America didn't even sell 45k vehicles during the first three months of the year, and they still bragged about jumping 29% year-over-year while their mass-market cousins from Volkswagen couldn't even double that amount – Volkswagen of America reported sales of a little over 82k units for a 21% increase compared to Q1 of 2023. However, what we really want to talk about are the Asian carmakers.
We have already noticed that Toyota – with 565,098 vehicles (+20.3%) is hot on the heels of General Motors, which slipped 1.5% due to a 23% drop in fleet sales to 594,233 units in the US in the first quarter of 2024. But how about the rest of the Asian pack? Well, things are looking promising there, too, with a minor exception.
Naturally, Toyota was followed from the Asian side by their rivals over at American Honda – the division was up 11.8% in March to 130,504 units for their best first quarter since 2021 with 333,824 vehicles (+17.3%). However, Acura was down over 20% to a little more than 9k units, so it's not all rosy, but at least the impact was minimal.
Thirdly, the Nissan Group followed Toyota and Honda in the Japanese ranks with 252,735 vehicles sold during the first three months of the year, equating to a 7.2% surge in deliveries. Again, they were dragged down by the negative performance of Infiniti, which dropped almost 12% year-over-year.
With 20 months of consecutive growth, Subaru of America was also pretty happy about itself as March deliveries jumped 15.2 percent to over 61k, and the total over Q1 was almost 153k vehicles, a rise of 6.7 percent compared to 2023. Interestingly, while it's coming as an all-new generation for the 2025 model year, the current Forester crossover SUV reached an all-time high during the period!
The tiny Japanese automakers that are left are Mazda and Mitsubishi, right? Well, it's a completely different situation for each – Mazda North American Operations (MNAO) jumped 13.3% to over 100k sales during the January to March period, while Mitsubishi Motors North America, Inc. (MMNA) announced quarterly sales are up no less than 35.7% year-over-year. Alas, that doesn't mean too much – they only delivered 28,403 vehicles!
Hyundai and Kia also get an honorable mention, by the way – the former sold 184,804 vehicles for its best-ever Q1 (+0.3% only, though), while Kia was down to 179,621 units compared to 184,136 last year.
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