00:00
Welcome to another episode of the Auto Buyer's Guide 2026 edition. Today we're going to be taking
00:05
a deep and nitty gritty dive into sales for all the auto manufacturers that we have numbers for
00:11
so far talk about their lineups and what we find right and wrong with them and why we think those
00:16
sales are up and or down. Well Travis before we get stuck in today's main topic let's dive into
00:29
our five star reviews. Yeah it's a new year why not start off on a good foot we have a five star
00:34
review just titled best that's from LTK of HK I pretty much watch every Alex on auto's review
00:40
and listen to every podcast as I get information here I don't get anywhere else differences in
00:45
how each car model is built how it compares with others and prior generations the EV portions are
00:50
informative how a dual clutch works so much more so thank you for that LTK and Alex happy new year
00:56
and to the viewers happy new year to you as well yes happy new year and happy new you right that's
01:01
what we're all supposed to say so it seems like I may have let myself go over the last couple days
01:06
but you know it's probably not the direction I'm heading that's that's good news I want to talk
01:12
about directions real quick I know we've got a lot of numbers to dive into looking at sales numbers
01:16
and how manufacturers did last year but the last trip I made of the year was the first trip that
01:21
or the first event that we got to talk about that was Ram and boy Ram is not doing anything
01:28
subtly these days are they no they are not but before we dive into that what's your new year's
01:33
resolution let's let's get that out there oh goodness I I'm not I gotta admit I'm not a
01:37
resolution person oh you do better work on this work on that but there's no like here's what I'm
01:44
doing in 2026 that's supposed to be my line because I gave up giving up things so but uh
01:51
yeah boring okay it's not lent but uh moving along to Ram then uh yes TRX is back-ish right
02:00
it's the upgraded TRX and still got the RHO thing and uh they're sticking an SRT name on it now
02:07
yeah and I I get it and I don't get it I don't think it needed SRT to be considered a performance
02:13
vehicle I don't think anyone looked at the TRX and went what is that though you know like what
02:18
what are we doing here is this is this supposed to be exciting uh so kind of weird to throw SRT
02:24
on there actually I think TRX does more for SRT than SRT does for TRX but I have to say they have a
02:31
fantastic T-Rex head logo uh that can be found on the back of the models we looked at and I love
02:37
embracing that instead of the really radical you know um more like splash design that they have
02:43
one of the big decals I'd just go with the giant T-Rex head on the side of mine you know I uh
02:49
that's an interesting question an interesting point you raised there I would actually argue it's
02:52
the opposite because there've been far more SRTs sold than than TRX's so I think maybe it is putting
02:58
a little bit of that shine on there because the Hellcat was always a badged as an SRT and it wasn't
03:03
just the Hellcat it was also the the uh 6-4 and the 6-2 before it and the V10s etc starting with
03:11
the Viper etc so the Viper's had a SRTs rather had a good long history we'd had a SRT Neon which was
03:16
all kinds of fun oh yeah but but kind of wish we had a small SRT but does TRX need SRT I don't think
03:24
so at all so why do it it's a lot of letters at this point I don't know if it needs it but
03:30
I think that it points to a different way of of ram thinking about performance because there have
03:37
been rumors that there might be a street truck version that would be kind of tied in with that SRT
03:43
name and some other letters other than TRX perhaps there's always been that that that question
03:49
now Ram's kind of put a little bit of water on that in the past by saying well the last time we
03:54
did an SRT truck it didn't really sell well but I think it was also the wrong truck for the time
04:00
now I I'm trying to remember and as this is just it's a crossover thing and and I'm not the only
04:05
one who didn't remember when Dodge became Ram necessarily was it the Dodge Ram SRT 10 or was
04:19
recently I can't think of anything that I don't believe so I we can we can quickly Google the
04:25
Googles here but my my understanding is that it yeah 2010 was when it became just Ram trucks
04:32
so I feel like this is trying to bring SRT into Ram and again almost has nothing to do with the
04:39
TRX it I'm not going to die on a hill there it's it's not worth it but just something just something
04:44
I thought about is is why and admittedly while that's probably technically the most exciting news
04:51
it's not the thing I was most excited about with the trucks they showed us two of the three were
04:56
TRX as the other is a power wagon that finally comes with the diesel and if you love complete
05:01
packaging that is the complete package so that would be the one that went except for the winch
05:08
the factory winch because anything else like like every other truck you can go ahead and get one so
05:14
if I was going to drive one of those trucks home I actually would take that power wagon diesel
05:20
I have to admit I would not because I find the Ram 2500 seats dreadfully uncomfortable and
05:29
and when you look at Ram sales because we'll talk about this later they are really not doing
05:34
well in the heavy duty truck market and I think it's logical because the engine is fantastic
05:38
and that's the only thing that's keeping them afloat in that segment right now
05:42
they should have done what they had promised which was give us an all new heavy duty instead
05:47
this is actually a really old heavy duty truck that's been been you know beautified and botoxed up
05:53
the wazoo to try and make it look like the current generation halftime which I think is really solid
05:58
but if you like a halftime if you're a ram fan you have ram 1500 and you're like hey I want to
06:04
get a three-quarter ton truck and I'm a dodge you know well not we're dodging anymore but I'm a ram fan
06:10
I'm a ram head I'm a ram head whatever we want to call it right then then I would say to that person
06:16
really give the GMC or the four to look first because I think either of those options is generally
06:22
speaking better than the ram in every way other than the engine if you could so if I could make
06:28
my own truck in that segment it would be the Cummins jammed in a GMC with some affords tech
06:37
yeah I no argument there but I think it's it's more impactful for me in that I don't think the
06:43
diesel is going to go away anytime soon it's not when they refresh the 2500 that diesel will disappear
06:49
so it's more hey this has entered the chat versus oh my gosh it's revolutionary you know yeah it
06:56
probably would have been cooler for ram even to have that updated 2500 but still I'm just I again
07:02
I appreciate this whole package thing and and actually you know what in 2026 you know what's
07:08
what's my new year's resolution I actually have it's more of a question for the viewer and I don't
07:13
know how many of our podcast listeners are the same people who do watch us on YouTube but
07:18
I've got an old truck myself and I get itchy a little bit on wanting to do things with vehicles
07:24
and that truck at least needs some paint but if anyone is actually interested in what you know
07:30
in any sort of mini series or you know any any breakdown of what it what it what's what it is
07:36
what it's doing what what I have in plans for it let me know because it needs to get a little bit
07:41
of work done unfortunately that means some money but I've got a truck of my own it just doesn't
07:45
see the light of day very often and that that kind of brings us along to our sales talk here
07:51
because we have numbers for most but not all car companies that sell vehicles in the US as of the
07:57
day that we're recording this episode everybody so January 7th early in the morning not everybody's
08:02
reported the numbers but most of the car companies have and you and I were talking about this before
08:07
we started recording the thing that I get out of this is that we have never seen a new car
08:13
buyer demographic like this and changing this rapidly over over the last decade or so in America's
08:20
history and that is that the American buyer of new cars is richer than before they're spending a
08:26
lot more money on top and models and I think a lot of the reason that we get so many viewer complaints
08:31
about pricing and why are you focusing on this model why are you focusing on that model why is
08:37
the price tag so high is that's that's who's buying these cars and it's it's obvious in the sales
08:42
numbers sales of top end trims are up sales of luxury vehicles are up and people are just buying
08:49
more and more pricey things I mean you you and I are some of the biggest drum bangers on please
08:54
make affordable cars we want it for everyone we want it for ourselves we want it for the neighbor
08:59
we want it for the automotive industry but we we can't on our own change that but we're looking
09:05
at the numbers and it goes yes some of these sales are going to be down and you can make the
09:10
argument and somebody will that nobody is buying less expensive cars because there are no less
09:15
expensive cars and that's a fair argument you know people are going to have a a ceiling and if
09:20
that ceiling is $25,000 there's only so many cars you can buy under that and what if you didn't want
09:25
one of those cars right that that happens but as that ceiling rises we're not seeing any increase
09:30
in sales in the lower end that you know whatever that new floor is um they're they're falling
09:37
as well by and large so it's it's it there's not a market for less expensive vehicles therefore
09:43
manufacturers won't make them and if they make them people have to buy them otherwise that that's
09:49
the end uh it's it's not across the board there are some less expensive vehicles that are still
09:53
doing pretty well but it we're seeing the increases come on the top end certainly at the bottom
10:00
the one vehicle that's bucking this trend is GM's and that would be the tracks the
10:05
trailblaze has also done pretty well and you know the small Buick things but tracks has done
10:11
especially well I would say this is this is an interesting twist though for for some shoppers
10:17
because it's a Chevy but it is not built in the United States and it's not exactly the most Chevy
10:23
Chevy because the design is coordinated with other global market general motors products but
10:28
we're talking GM first here because GM is the biggest car company in America still they sold
10:33
2.85 million things last year in 2025 on this list what struck you about GM's sales split here
10:43
uh a lot I mean it's interesting to see how things have broken up I think the conversation
10:48
with the big three which you know is now the the big 74 however you want to break those things down
10:54
either way it's always been about trucks and General Motors sells a lot of trucks before
11:01
or the F series is the best selling pickup truck in America but that's partially just because
11:06
or partially because General Motors splits their trucks from Silverado and Sierra so those those
11:12
two exist separately but they really are by and large to my mind the same truck right they are
11:18
and it's almost a million of them 944,927 full-size trucks GM produced it's a lot of
11:28
trucks admittedly GM does combine light-duty heavy-duty Silverado Sierra and the EV variants of
11:34
those all jam together but still that was that's a lot of truck and honestly the splits between
11:39
them are not enormous you know about 590,000 of those were Silverados that means we're just under
11:44
400,000 or you know that range for the Sierras so pretty pretty evenly split amongst those I also
11:50
have to say that when it comes to the EVs General Motors sells a ton of them uh compared to the
11:56
rest of the well the US market because they have such a wide variety of them the one that surprised
12:01
me is the Escalade IQ and I guess IQL they probably don't split those up uh they were 50,000 Escalade
12:08
sold but they were 8100 Escalade IQ sold that actually is a pretty pretty healthy split uh
12:16
especially for for people who are concerned that EVs are not the new thing and we'll we'll see
12:22
later on where you know EVs are not selling in the same volume I would argue that not only are
12:27
they a little bit more expensive but it is still a new product and a new concept and people don't
12:32
have to be against it to still not buy it they just go I'm not so sure or there wasn't the incentive
12:37
or I don't know what charging looks like so still I was that's impressive that's a god that's a ton
12:43
I mean and I'm talking about metric tons of Escalade IQ yeah it's Cadillac sold 173,000 things
12:51
last year and the sales split's interesting XT four five and six sales are down which is logical
12:57
because they're the end of the road OPTIQ vistic and lyric the three of them together sold 40,000
13:03
units which I think is more than I had expected to be honest but we'll see how that goes without the
13:08
tax credit Escalade IQ 8100 units so about 50,000 ish electric things we don't have numbers on
13:15
their Celestics etc offhand but not many interesting one I'll go on record not many yeah
13:22
Buick's interesting one in a way because Buick is definitely back from the grave here they sold
13:26
almost 200,000 units last year beating Acura and that's I think the best Acura corollary in the
13:33
American market really is Buick right now based on just the product lineup and the customer type
13:38
there premium versus luxury and a sort of weird line the other thing that struck me on this is
13:45
when we look down at the vehicles that they've sold we're talking big heavy inefficient things
13:52
right so Escalade 50,000 units Silverado and Sierra almost a million units there they sold
14:00
173,000 just Tahoe's and Suburbans combined basically a quarter million full-size SUVs when
14:06
you jam all the full sizes together their full-size crossover traverse a caddy and enclave those that
14:12
recently got redone why do they have really another quarter of a million yeah because they sold
14:16
a quarter of a million of those if it works it works people and let's just say none of those
14:23
are averaging over 20 miles per gallon on a on a yearly basis when you actually look and see how
14:30
much gas is going down kind of makes me wonder is GM ripe for another fuel affordability crisis
14:37
oh boy uh the timing on that is is um is interesting I I don't know what the cost of
14:44
gasoline is going to be here in the United States in the next two months six months one year oh it's
14:49
it's going to be free because now we have Venezuela right well and you know Alex way to start way to
14:55
start us off um you're gonna find yourselves in a tough spot and and I think if your General Motors
15:01
the thing that you are missing and you have got to do something very very very soon is a freaking
15:07
hybrid anything does not exist if there was a traverse hybrid imagine the sales numbers that
15:14
that can bring in obviously it has to be good they have hybrids in China uh huh uh huh right but you
15:21
know what you can't ship right now to the us easily well many stuff from China uh huh yeah yeah so you
15:29
know it's just one of those things where it's these numbers are impressive and like I said they're
15:33
on top right and General Motors actually has less brands than some of the other you know model or the
15:40
other makers or conglomerates here that we're gonna look at uh but they're doing all of this with
15:45
a healthy EV portfolio but we know right now that's not going to move the needle healthy it's it's not
15:51
going to well you know what I mean right uh a varied varied very broad a very broad EV portfolio
15:59
with relatively muted sales compared to the elephant in the room but uh let's talk about the
16:05
other elephant in the room though because that is Toyota the other General Motors I always I like to
16:10
think of Toyota as Japan's GM because a lot of what they do reminds me of GM uh and I know that
16:17
there's a lot of pushback on that but they've got a ton of models but very different very different
16:24
outlook 2.5 million yeah sold and nearly half of those about 47 percent or so of those models
16:31
were some kind of hybrid and that's only going to increase in 2026 because we have all of these
16:38
models that are hybrid only for 2026 that you know are gonna have full full sales years um
16:44
and and I expect more model not necessarily more models coming but I think everything
16:49
Toyota puts forward from this point forward will have at least a hybrid option so uh yeah it is
16:55
actually kind of as I just said sort of the counter to what General Motors is doing right now because
16:59
like Hyundai Hyundai Kia has a whole host of hybrid models now and their hybrid sales are going up
17:05
but I believe I haven't been able to get good confirmation from those numbers the sales split
17:11
numbers on Hyundai Kia directly yet but I would be willing to bet that there are more hybrid
17:17
Camrys sold than all of Hyundai Kia's hybrids put together still probably and that has to speak to
17:26
not just Toyota's engineering but also you know how how popular the Camry has been and
17:31
its dedication to go and all all hybrid so you can factor all those things in but the numbers
17:36
are the numbers yeah there are some interesting other numbers though let's talk about successes
17:40
and failures the Highlander lineup has just sort of exploded or maybe imploded not in the best way
17:47
I should say because back in 2021 they shifted 264,000 Highlanders Highlander now has really
17:56
fallen through the floor and then even if you include Grand Highlander and Highlander together
18:01
we're only talking 192,000 Grand Highlanders outselling Highlander by the way as we all thought
18:08
it would 136,000 but GM GM GM Toyota General Toyota but from 264,000 Highlanders down to 56,000
18:20
Highlanders in four years I don't think I have a great explanation for that except I wonder
18:25
how many of these folks have upgraded to Lexus in their next purchase as well I'm going to go with
18:31
none uh I when you look when you look at this I think the problem that we did see with Grand
18:37
Highlander maybe this was an opportunity for other players here I think when we look at this
18:42
over the last that that five-year mark we saw the rise of bigger competitors from the Koreans the
18:48
Koreans came in they started sucking up 100,000 units each a year so they had to come from somewhere
18:54
they came largely at the expense of pilot but also at the expense of Highlander and the transition
18:59
to Grand Highlander didn't go smoothly because they had a stop sale that was really quite lengthy
19:05
Grand Highlanders I think the best Highlander I don't know why you'd buy a Highlander just
19:08
buy the Grand Highlander I think it looks better it looks more like a Toyota it's way bigger on the
19:13
inside more practical but I am surprised though that it's not selling like Highlander I think
19:19
maybe it might be a bit expensive well don't forget about the three we just talked about the
19:24
Traverse the Acadia you know those are those are also pulling in some of those same numbers
19:29
especially because they're now in the same size range as the Grand Highlander was their last
19:33
generation was Highlander-ish now this is definitely Grand Highlander and the space in there
19:38
is enormous it's not the same person stopping GM to Toyota even though there's a lot of corollaries
19:45
but I bet you some of those sales are pulling from there as well yeah Toyota has a lot of small
19:50
volume number uh volume vehicles but we got the Highlander family at 192,000 Corolla at a quarter
19:56
million Camry 316,000 interestingly Pete Camry was all the way back in 2007 with 472,000 but
20:04
Camry is an interesting thought experiment here because they built 316,000 Camrys and sold them
20:10
that's about 317,000 kilowatt hours of batteries which would have built theoretically about
20:17
5,500 standard range Model 3s and this is going to offend yeah and this is going to offend some
20:26
viewers here probably well there's there's still a standard range Model 3 or standard range plus
20:30
whatever the smallest battery pack is available that the 58 kilowatt hour battery pack is still
20:35
available in the Model 3 but you could have built 5,500 Model 3s for that same volume of battery
20:42
and this is the interesting question taking 5,500 cars if that person had bought a regular
20:49
Camry or a regular whatever in the compact segment taking them from 30 miles per gallon to zero
20:55
gasoline or moving all 316,000 of those Camrys from a blend of hybrid non-hybrid up to at least 45
21:04
miles per gallon likely had a bigger environmental impact because there is only one way to get your
21:09
Camry and that is hybrid between 44 and 50 something miles per gallon yeah no argument on
21:16
paper I think you're gonna see you know assuming you can have to have some crazy outliers but in
21:22
a significant margin where the people who bought that Camry drive five miles a day or less or you
21:29
know something like that and the people who would have used these Model 3s drive 200 miles a day to
21:34
really say no no no trust me the impact is there I still think the answer lies in the plug-in hybrid
21:40
and what that what that corollary looks like and I was just reviewing a video I did on my Model 3
21:47
where I was comparing overall fuel costs I included the Camry hybrid and I said by the way one thing
21:54
I haven't included in this is plug-in hybrids and it's not because I forgot them or because I have no
21:58
idea what to do with them but we don't have good information I think that if you put a even 10 to
22:05
15 mile range in a plug-in hybrid that's probably better use of that battery for trying to make that
22:11
impact and Toyota has proved you can make those a little bit more interesting they can be the more
22:15
powerful more exciting versions so no no argument there I think I still think it was a Toyota cop
22:20
out when they go no no no hybrids the answer period I I think that was business not not personal
22:27
belief on the large scale but there's no argument that they're making an impact I think I think it's
22:33
a bit of both in a way because the the environmental impact of 316,000 Camrys and nearly half a million
22:43
hybrid RAV4s basically are going to be sold because now RAV4 is all hybrid that transition's
22:48
happening basically now because they're getting rid of all the old RAV4s but next year RAV4 sales
22:53
have not slowed down in the height of this transition and neither did Camry Camrys sales did not
22:58
slow down when they went all hybrid so next year we're going to see 750,000 things getting over
23:05
40 miles per gallon suddenly in the Toyota lineup that's a massive decrease in the fuel consumption
23:11
of these new vehicles versus five years ago vehicles yeah the the sort of problem in a way
23:18
with plug-in hybrids would be the the eternal question do you plug them in the lower the range
23:24
the less likely I think people are to plug them in but then there's the cost factoring into this
23:29
as well they they are definitely going to be pricier and harder for manufacturers to to justify
23:36
financially the other thing I would say is with Toyota being Toyota their electrification
23:45
and their move to full EVs would never have been exciting Toyota is not that kind of car company
23:51
no absolutely not so like could Toyota have poured the money into creating another Tesla
23:58
absolutely they've got a hundred million dollar a hundred billion dollars sorry in the bank I mean
24:03
they've got they can smash the cili if they wanted they've got cash coming out of the wazoo they could
24:09
they could absolutely blow 50 60 billion dollars and still have billions of dollars left over tens
24:15
of billions of dollars left over to create to create a model y competitor and a model y
24:23
competitive charging network etc but Toyota would never do that Toyota would always have
24:28
given us a busy because Toyota's a very conservative engineering company and Tesla is not so Toyota
24:35
would always have preferred a longer lifetime and serviceability on parts and batteries and this
24:42
and that and they always would have opted for a relatively slow and boring thing compared
24:47
against what we see from the others and the GM corollary is there because that's exactly what
24:53
we see in Altium all we would have seen on a larger scale from Toyota in their electrification
24:59
would have been would have been Toyota right and it would just be their version of that thing
25:07
and so I for the for the for the viewers out that are the like but Toyota should have done it
25:11
like should they have because it would never do it Lexus could have right but I've tried to
25:18
could have done it because if if if the US had required it if California's emissions regulations
25:23
and the and the EPA had really required it and Europe had really pushed harder on them
25:31
Toyota would have done it that there's no question I think that Toyota would have done it
25:35
it's just that it wouldn't have been any more exciting than the Toyota EVs that we already get
25:41
and in the US at least for specifically it probably actually still would have had less
25:48
of an impact than Toyota bringing half their lineup into full hybridization especially as a
25:54
mainstream car brand right if you talk about more of a luxury car brand where you can you can kind
26:00
of get away with more you can be more adventurous it can cost more as long as it feels good you
26:04
know whatever it is right yeah but yeah Toyota Toyota does need to be careful with it I think
26:10
they could have done it more under the under the Lexus banner but I also you know I appreciate
26:15
they didn't have to make the BZ better but they did right not only just by changing the name but
26:21
they also have made it better but they've also done it in partnership and now they have a small
26:25
family of of EVs there so I'm not mad about where they're at I just I would love to see more
26:31
universally plug-in hybrids and they do sell quite a bit quite a few plug-in hybrids especially
26:36
in that RAV4 obviously the Prius Prime or the Prius plug-in hybrid Prime is gone
26:42
is also great but that's just not selling in the numbers that that it could yeah the customer
26:49
has to be interested in spending the extra seven to ten thousand dollars on the plug-in hybrid
26:53
that's the question now for people that think I'm giving Toyota a pass let me just say here
26:58
that their truck line-ups feel efficiency is really bad and it has not improved dramatically
27:03
over time even the addition of hybrids is not a fantastic thing for Toyota and it says it will be
27:10
no the four-runner hybrid is is not a terribly efficient hybrid the Land Cruiser hybrid not
27:15
terribly efficient ditto on the GX hybrid and the LX hybrid and the Tundra hybrid etc so they've
27:22
got a lot of work to do and I would love to see Toyota have some sort of honest transition plan
27:27
where they say okay we're going to hybridize the entire lineup and here's our plan because they're
27:32
dramatically on the way for that mind you so in 2026 it would be logical if over half their volume
27:38
was hybrid since all RAV4s will be but if they had said you know 2026 is this goal by 2030 we expect
27:46
the entire lineup to be hybrid and then we're going to start rolling in the plug-in hybrids
27:49
and then by this date it's going to be this percentage of hybrids and plug-in hybrids and EVs
27:54
and zero emissions whatever that would be interesting and so that's I think the the missing part with
27:59
them but we should go on to Lexus because Lexus is a definite tale of car sales down SUV sales up
28:06
well and I think this is I I think that's fine because Lexus is jumping on the everyone's going
28:11
to crossovers and SUVs and you just listed through we've got a lineup you've got the UX, NX, RX,
28:19
LX, TX, GX what else are we missing those that's where all the sedan sales went
28:27
it's interesting they sold just 63,000 sedans in 2025 versus BMW's sedan sales of 163 so it's
28:35
pretty big gulf the interesting thing though is that Lexus now has the best selling three row SUV
28:42
in the Lexus TX beating the Acura MDX by actually a decent margin and it's a bit of a shame because
28:50
the MDX is great to drive but people are looking for practicality and the TX has that in spades it
28:56
also has a bunch of different engine options so if you want a powerful TX it exists if you want a
29:03
less expensive TX that exists if you're looking for an efficient TX that exists so it was always
29:10
bound to do very well just like we said with the Grand Highlander none of those engine options
29:16
is as good as the MDX type I'm not saying it is but on paper the third row the third row is the
29:25
problem it has MDX has two big problems and those are the two seats back there in that third row
29:30
for sure that takes us along to Honda who squeaked out 1.4 million sales in 2024 but that was still
29:40
well below Honda's 2017 sales numbers what do you think is going on at Honda disclosure here before
29:47
we continue Honda blames some of their sales on a chip shortage where they think well they thought
29:54
earlier in the year that that might have had a up 200,000 unit impact they did not say anything
30:00
about that chip shortage in their 2025 sales wrap up though it may or may not have had much of an
30:06
impact overall by the end of the year yeah I mean they're still coming in whatever 35% less
30:13
something like that than Toyota sales they always were going to but but their but their sales are
30:19
why is that happening um well part of it is probably going to be in the car segment because
30:24
Honda makes some good cars they're fun to drive they're interesting they're getting a little bit
30:29
pricey and they don't have things like the fit like they used to the HRV is getting a little
30:35
bit long in the tooth you know all things considered but they they don't have as much pop or much as
30:42
much variety as I think you find over in Toyota not that they don't have anything interesting
30:47
but they're they're missing out it's a good hybrid system and you can get it in their main
30:51
mainline vehicles appreciate that but you don't get any hybrids in the higher end trims so no
30:56
or you know higher vehicles coming soon hopefully they say no pilots no passports no rage lines which
31:02
obviously is not the sales leader there no uh no odyssey hybrid that's not going to help anything
31:09
it I think Honda's Honda sales tail is also a tail of a lack of SUVs because they don't have
31:16
anything big big to compete with Grand Highlander or Palisade or tell you right I know some people
31:23
want to put pilot in that category it is absolutely not size wise in that category it is definitely
31:27
smaller on the inside um real world legroom is significantly below the the big boys in that
31:34
segment and they don't have bigger than Highlander smaller than Grand Highlander yeah but they don't
31:38
have any body on frame SUVs to compete with some of these faster growing segments in the US
31:44
if we look at the numbers back in 2017 when Honda hit their peak in the US they sold 32,000
31:50
accords back then it's a 30 drop versus 2021 mind you so they still dropped a lot so they were
32:00
selling so many accords in 2000 uh 2025 they sold just 150,000 accords so when we look at their
32:07
sales trajectory since 2000 over the last 25 years we've seen an astronomical drop in sedan
32:13
sales it's thought Honda's fault americas are americans are just moving away from them uh but
32:18
civic also they fell from 377,000 civics in 2015 down to just 238 in 2025 even though we have the
32:27
hybrids and the hatchbacks and the ours and everything else in the lineup now and the SIs I
32:33
mean you got manuals and hybrids and and and well you're not coupes preludes kind of the coop
32:39
but that that hasn't hit yet it's it's a car thing right like so Honda still has good cars
32:43
the fit sold in in big numbers but it's been gone for a while it's not like I've forgotten that but
32:49
Honda's really left behind that whole affordable that affordable market the civic is is civic is
32:56
is relatively inexpensive but they don't have a tracks competitor they don't have any right right
33:01
can be but but then you're getting the base civic there's not a there's not a well equipped
33:06
inexpensive model right and even even the base civic is not not inexpensive anymore it's it's
33:11
it's a premium premium entry level option for that segment when you look at its price tag
33:18
the interesting thing is the truck sales are solidly up since 2017 from 734,000 to 908,000
33:25
but they are not compensating for that lack of SUV sales I think it's the lack of those bigger
33:31
options somehow there in the lineup or even in between right so and Antonio is not the
33:36
perfect corollary but if you look at the uh well I didn't say the chr but that's now its own thing
33:43
if you look at the Corolla Cross and which is a better value than you get in the HRB
33:49
then you look at the RAV4 which is on at least on paper a very good balance against
33:56
then you can go forerunner or you can go highlander or you can go land cruiser or you can you know
34:02
the the the tree just blossoms Honda goes one two three four and it makes sense but you know
34:09
you're gonna be really fun and cool and we're not gonna see it and that's okay uh an element like
34:14
throw an element in there and say here's your adventure vehicle and it's not built to compete
34:18
with the RAV4 but it's a it's a crv-fied passport you know something of that sort they also don't
34:26
have the crown of the crown signia which again fall into this signatory Toyota sells none of those
34:31
in the US sales numbers are so so minuscule no one no one cares about that and the Ridgeline
34:37
is not a competitor in sales to something like Tacoma or even the Tundra so yeah I mean it's
34:44
the CRV sells well it probably would sell better if it was boxier and more rugged looking because
34:50
passport is exploding that that's a fantastic addition I could see a grand passport being
34:56
a three row alternative to telluride and palisade with that boxiness and a huge interior that would
35:03
probably sell really well for them the the sad and interesting thing here it really is Acura
35:08
I was shocked by this did you know that 10% of Acuras sold in 2025 were made by General Motors
35:19
and you don't get that in 2026 because those made by General Motors are gone and that's a big
35:25
number that's a big number and even including that their sales were down over last year down to
35:32
133,000 this year so definitely on the shrinking side and MDX accounts for a big portion of that
35:39
still but MDX sales fell 17% and RDX a whopping 26% yeah well I think RDX again it's not the only
35:50
thing but hybrids hybrids hybrids hybrids you look at the Toyota as their main competitor
35:56
and they have hybrids they have performance models you know even F sports right
36:00
whereas your Type S RDX one thing I was hoping for Acura was that the ADX would do well and I
36:07
think by and large it's done okay I think it's a really good entry-level luxury offering it's
36:14
got enough of the stuff to feel good you know Alexis UX is not the oh my gosh I'm in Alexis
36:19
the ADX feels like it's pretty close to what you'd expect from the rest of the Acura lineup
36:24
but again no performance I'll air quote it right but no performance solution no real sports version
36:30
and no hybrids I'm wondering if it's really just a lack of luxury and lack of expensive options
36:36
in a way because we do see the more expensive options selling well TX is selling well and
36:43
it averages higher than MDX XC90 is the interesting twist because it's transacts significantly higher
36:49
than MDX and it looks like we don't have final sales numbers for Volvo in the US for this year
36:55
mind you but it looks like Volvo will sell more three-row luxury SUVs than Acura in the United
37:03
States in 2025 most likely and globally it's an absolute slam dunk for Volvo globally XC90 alone
37:11
his his over a hundred thousand units and MDX is technically a global vehicle as well but Acura
37:18
doesn't have that global reach like Volvo does it is an interesting twist there I have I have one
37:24
quick proposal to flip this thing around if we say Lexus is on the right track and they don't really
37:29
need to change what they're doing not just by the sales numbers but you know things are going well
37:33
there what if Acura went sort of like the mini model where it was it was hey we are bringing
37:40
personality into this so even if there were some shortfalls here or there the ADX had some
37:46
wild color and wheel options and Acura's commercials went boom here we are who are you
37:53
you're Acura you know whatever it is like is that an option to really spice things back up
37:59
I in my my personal opinion I think that Acura would need to do a wholesale renovation of their
38:07
interior style and their interior philosophy in a way and bump the price tag up by 10 grand
38:14
across the lineup to probably get better sales numbers I think they would need their interiors
38:19
to be Volvo BMW Audi level interiors materials fit and finish etc Acura's only recently embraced
38:30
real wood trim for instance they've only recently embraced slightly larger screens touch screens
38:36
etc they would need to I think more wholeheartedly embrace those things and then they I think
38:42
probably would sell better just look at Buick you know Buick has embraced some of those things
38:47
and they're selling significantly more than Acura yeah but we must move on because we're
38:52
running out of time here in our episode and we have a lot to go through so Ford we want we
38:56
skip forward there rather than doing these in order because of Toyota and Honda you know synergies
39:01
so Ford best sales year since 2019 2.2 million this is another tale of the truck and the fuel
39:08
economy problem they sold let's go through 829,000 f-series 161,000 transit fans that's
39:18
mind-blowing 70,000 rangers 146,000 Broncos still did manage to beat Wrangler though 134,000 Bronco
39:29
Sports 222,000 explorers beating Toyota at the three-row thing and none of those is overly efficient
39:39
we have Maverick though at 155,000 units which is really saying something about America's desire
39:46
for a small truck yeah I think that is that's like the big home run out of this whole thing is the
39:51
Maverick and I drove past the Ford dealer the other day and I saw rows and rows of tiny truck beds
39:58
it was cute and hilarious but you know what I have seen is Mavericks with with uh oh gosh
40:06
industrial canopies I'm just seeing you know workmen's canopies on the back so I think there's
40:10
one company who makes them right now because it's they've seen the same one the whole time
40:14
and people and their companies not necessarily fleets right but smaller companies or individual
40:20
contractors are saying hey this fuel economy is crazy two-wheel drive all-wheel drive whatever
40:26
they're looking for they say how can I make the most out of this truck and and and it shows
40:30
there's an electrical company in the same business park that bought a whole ton of Maverick hybrids
40:35
for that same reason this is the sort of the interesting twist here I think is that Ford has
40:40
proved Ford has you know had ups and downs but I think this year's sales proved that Ford's made
40:45
a lot of good progress with actually a relatively small number of models really focusing on those
40:50
small number of models and making them what people want because we've got escape sailing off into the
40:56
sunset you know sales were okay but I don't think that's exactly what the shopper was after
41:00
Bronco Sport though 134,000 Bronco sports that is the thing that Jeep and GM are both missing
41:07
and they're letting out on that cute boxy practical segment Maverick obviously 155,000 of those
41:13
Bronco itself I think is doing pretty well especially given the the the new competition
41:18
that we have in this segment with a new forerunner a land cruiser that's doing well etc Lincoln
41:25
I'm kind of surprised here Lincoln sales numbers are not great and they're primarily
41:30
a navigator company right they're sort of defined by navigator but even navigators only about a
41:35
quarter of their sales they're almost a four-way split between Corsair Nautilus navigator and aviator
41:41
Corsair's ending production soon and Nautilus is built in China so it's a bit of a problem
41:46
and that's it's that's sort of where Ford is falling away from GM right now is that
41:51
if you look at Lincoln versus Cadillac Cadillac has a lot more momentum or a firmer stance in
41:57
where they're at and where they're going and what they can do with it I'm not saying I'm not saying
42:02
here's the answer but we've talked about it before why is there not a Lincoln Mach-E
42:07
I must say Mach-E did pretty well for Ford it has done still they're discontinuing the lightning
42:13
but it sold just about twice as many Mach-Es but something like that and I'll sold the real
42:18
Mustang too it's like more Mach-Es go out if as a company you're just in investing in Mustang
42:23
then you should also be investing in that Mach-E thing yeah so put that put that into the Lincoln
42:28
lineup that yeah if you're not going to do that then what are we doing but we must now move on to
42:33
the hot mess that is Stalentus and I promise we have to go quicker here so basically we have
42:38
Gladiator selling well Wrangler was up 11% the Wagoneer Grand Wagoneer thing seems to be leveling
42:44
out and showing some positive trends towards the end of the year Ram has pulled out the nose dive
42:49
but the aging heavy duty lineup is down 9% as we talked about earlier Chrysler's all minivan lineup
42:56
is selling minivans the weird part the weird part here in in the lineup they're really odd lineup
43:03
is that Durango sales are up 34% it's the best year for Durango in 20 years I don't like that
43:12
for some of the oldest things on the market Fiat and Alpha less said about them the better
43:20
and I want to know who on earth were the six people that bought a Dodge Dart in 2025 since
43:26
it's been discontinued for forever or the 17 people that bought and registered a brand new Dodge
43:33
journey that's been discontinued for five years where were they hiding wrong if you find them
43:38
yeah wrong answers only where were they hiding uh god were those were those vehicles that got
43:48
dropped off at the port they ran out of space they got tucked in the corner and everyone
43:52
forgot where they were at I mean what are we talking about here I was I was I was going uh
43:57
you know single wide tinfoil hat club they thought the world was going to end so they've
44:01
been living in a bunker for five years and they needed a new car because they realized the world
44:05
hadn't ended and the Dodge dealer was the closest thing and there was a journey there
44:11
because also inflation yeah I mean they were set aside to be brought in as part of the president's
44:18
new armored fleet and things got a little bit rocky it didn't quite happen that way they wanted
44:23
they wanted a Durango when they went into the bunker five years ago so they put away some
44:28
Durango money under the mattress and they popped back out the Dodge dealer is the closest dealer
44:33
when they get there with their cash in their cash bags their piglet wiggly bags um all it would buy
44:39
them is a five-year-old new journey that's that's my thought there I saw I've been looking at cars
44:45
and I saw some new 2024s and I went oh boy uh that doesn't hold a candle to this
44:53
rationally speaking though I would say for the splantis haters the the seem to be pulling
44:58
themselves up here basically jeep sales are more or less stabilizing the lowered prices and
45:04
resurrections of different things have have come back for them it's about what you'd expect we have
45:10
the new Cherokee coming online soon there's a lot writing on that so I think it's a year of let's see
45:15
because we have new Cherokee coming out we have the updated grand Cherokee coming out those sales
45:21
numbers are not there we have the recon which is not going to do anything for their sales but
45:25
new can be some sort of interesting halo thing there fiat and alpha god knows god knows what's
45:31
going on with them um still here yeah still here uh rams rams light duty sales are probably ticking
45:39
up heavy duty sales probably still going to be down next year depending on what happens with
45:43
the engine lineup uh let's move on to you but you did say there's new life coming you know there's
45:48
talk of a ram suv there's the size dakota is making its return yeah that's something new derango
45:55
yeah there's probably going to be a chrysler sedan maybe something like that charger challenger
46:01
you know the charger sales we'll see how they go with the inline six etc there's a lot a lot writing
46:06
in a lot of question marks but we do that we do know that undoubtedly the correction in trajectory
46:12
to bring their sales up has caused a profitability decline because they were a massively profitable
46:17
company in 24 25 they're pretty much just average moving on though uh not going in the same trajectory
46:25
is the Hyundai Kia rocket ship that has managed to shift 1.75 million things in america last year
46:31
900 1000 on the Hyundai side 852 on the Kia side uh i'm surprised actually how close those two
46:38
brands are in sales so let's let's go down the sales numbers here and then after this i will
46:43
i will uh let's breathe for a commentary so k4 in a laundra neck and neck 140 000 approximately
46:50
each k5 and sonata k5 selling better than sonata so apparently no hybrid and no inline not a problem
46:58
celtos and kona kona's outselling celtos which i think is interesting because celtos is better
47:02
looking to me sportage and Tucson no contest Tucson is leading the pack there i think the
47:08
sportage is a little fuggly well it was until they rebooted it here uh telluride and palisade
47:13
these are neck and neck almost identical Hyundai finally caught up with the prettier palisade
47:17
basically they each match pilot so you know doubling what pilot sells actually beating
47:24
Toyota as well in that combined thing serento santa fe 142 000 on santa fe versus 95 on serento
47:31
so boxy's better carnival 72 000 units apparently are showing that hybrid was a good idea nero
47:39
stands alone at 31 000 fuel zippers and the combined entity sold 124 000 evs uh which is
47:47
actually pretty impressive and beats just about everybody else yeah i their their spread on evs
47:55
isn't as large but it does seem more focused right there if you if you compare again especially by
48:02
the numbers um they come out ahead in acceleration in charging in range and efficiency um they're
48:09
they feel more they feel more modern than some like the general motors evs do but uh
48:16
i you know the most exciting thing here serento and santa fe is i like these little three rows
48:22
you know the two and a half rows whatever you want to call them uh they're doing well
48:26
and and so they're they're capitalizing where you know they're taking off for highlander left
48:32
and yes grand highlander in the u.s is going to sell better and and you look at things like the
48:36
traverse in the akadia and the enclave those are all those are all big these are on the smaller
48:41
side so i'd love to see it and what they're doing so well is turbocharged engines across the lineup
48:47
mostly turbos hybrids plug-in hybrids um they are they are up on the tech side of things the power
48:54
drain back yeah it's like you can see key is definitely focused on that telly right because
48:58
123 000 units versus serento which is a lot less expensive at 95 000 so there's there's money in them
49:04
their hills i also think that they've also done a good job ditching the me too styling because
49:10
let's not be honest 15 20 years ago hundays and kias were boring bland copy me too things
49:15
they sold on on the promise of reliability the long warranty and cheap sticker prices
49:21
but now they've they've come into their own and whether you like the styling or not
49:25
i don't think that the sportage is the most attractive entry in its segment but it certainly
49:28
doesn't look me too um it does seem to be doing really well for them yeah and all of that leads
49:35
into genesis who we don't have full numbers yet but has done fairly well i mean they've outsold
49:41
some of the other luxury you know premium offerings overseas other manufacturers we don't know the
49:47
breakdown but we know the year end number of 82 331 which is more than infinity it's their best
49:53
sales year ever and pretty close to lincoln and they still sell some cars mm-hmm it's interesting
49:59
they're very focused on the gv 70 so the gv 70 and gv 80 account for a large portion of their
50:05
sales gv 70 is the lion's share so it's they're definitely kind of a really riding on that one
50:11
model for genesis the interesting thing i think here is that and when you look at this whole
50:16
thing together we're looking at you know almost 300 000 compact sedans being sold somewhere around
50:24
to you what does this look like you know 120 100 something thousand full size overall full
50:30
size air quotes mid-sized sedans in k5 and sonata big size instead of yeah but on the compact side
50:36
that's that's a really good showing because that is a more that's more compact sedans being sold
50:44
than a lot of other car companies coming in really really close to civic actually civics 238 so
50:51
actually hunday kia sold more really and the hatchback is just barely coming online but the
50:58
interesting thing here is that they did this without a hybrid in the kia lineup yes but they
51:03
have some of the more affordable options i think that's where things are getting ahead so it's not
51:07
the it's not the bargain basement value it's hey this is fun this is interesting and one of the
51:16
things that you know you and i have both said about something like the k4 is that it's a good
51:20
looker and it's got nice tacky so looking where it falls it falls in the driving experience but
51:28
that's the thing those putting on all the miles they go right here's a nice car but that's kind of
51:33
the point that i'm making here is that they've managed to shift 250 000 approximately of these
51:39
things but actually sorry more almost 300 000 of these things but they they've done it without an
51:46
exciting turbo option yeah there's an alantra n but i mean no one buys it and there's no alantra
51:52
nk4 there's no mid-level turbo fun one there's no hybrid k4 the hybrid alantra is a boring fuel
51:59
zipper other than the alantra n they're not overly exciting to drive they're good for their
52:05
segment they handle nicely for what they are etc but they're not a civic si either but they've proved
52:10
that you don't you don't need that interestingly to actually shift some units no you just need to
52:15
have an interesting car it doesn't have to be the best driver which is sort of a shame i mean
52:19
admittedly i'm like i don't love that but it works and that's how you get some affordability
52:24
yeah moving on to nissan they managed to shift a few more cars than in 2024 but it's it's looking
52:32
looking bleak there i am especially sad that versa which is sailing off into the sunset
52:38
is not going to have as big of an impact on their sales as it used to have if they'd cancelled it
52:44
because they only sold 51 000 last year and they used to sell nearly a quarter million
52:48
centra apparently the 152 000 so reasonable sales there for a single model
52:53
ultima apparently has been re continued for 2026 93 000 there kicks is their new new big
53:01
seller 100 000 units there path finders up a little bit frontiers down our mod is kind of
53:07
up a little bit but not selling many rogue 217 000 so definitely below crv where it used to be
53:14
neck and neck with crv up there aria is dead infinity all in only sold 53 000 things and
53:21
apparently three fifths of that was a qx 60 yeah the qx 60 part of there is not surprising i mean
53:27
even the pathfinder sales being up is a little bit strange because the pathfinder is in itself
53:32
getting pretty old nissan has plans i think they are working on it if nothing else it was hey stop
53:39
the bleeding and and it seems like they've done that in you know in in the grand scheme and now
53:46
it's here's where we're going to be careful the rogue is their next big thing they've got that
53:50
hybrid coming for 2027 model year so we should see that sometime in 2026 i suspect but they're
53:56
also trying to bring back excitement to infinity they've talked about a sports sedan coming that may
54:02
even include a manual transmission not going to move a ton of units but might draw some interest
54:06
and had people taking a look you know you put that with a with a red bull livery on it in some sort
54:12
of fashion and that that's going to draw some things but let's just say it's not going to put
54:16
butts in the seats though that's the no but the but but like i said we'd look at the versa
54:20
one of the least expensive cars you can buy in the united states people aren't buying it
54:24
yep i'm set well they're also not bringing as many as they used to and having the fire sales
54:28
they used to so it's a self-fulfilling prophecy in a way yeah the centra the centra i'll say yeah
54:34
we'll scoot along through subaru here at 650 000 approximately and mozzed at 410 000 approximately
54:40
they're both down about three percent uh for different reasons but subaru essentially says
54:45
that they cut production of less expensive and less profitable models so they've really killed a
54:50
lot of base trims also they had some retooling for forest or an outback because forest or moved
54:55
production to indiana for 2026 the wilderness model was delayed then we have an all-new outback
55:02
cross track forest or an outback are by far the biggest subarus on sale they count for the vast
55:07
majority of that sales uh there mozzed is another interesting one they really slashed cx 30 imports
55:14
because of tariffs they're coming from mexico and they were really throwing the tariff line
55:19
under the bus there the cx line is 372 000 out of that 410 000 vehicles so mozzed three sales are
55:27
really really down yeah and cx five this is going to be a very important product for them in 2026
55:32
because it is one third of all mozzed is sold in the u.s and cx 50 is one fourth of all mozzed is
55:39
sold so those two models are you know basically half of everything that they sell here between
55:44
mozza and subaru what they're missing is big impacts in the three row segments that's what
55:49
they're really missing that's yeah six nineties doing okay for mozzed but not selling an enormous
55:54
amount in ascent is kind of always stunk up the place uh moving along we have volkswagen and
56:00
outie talk about stinking it up volkswagen sales down 13 percent outie down 16 percent the eternal
56:06
struggle with the germans the problematic german brand um vw suv and sales uh car sales were down
56:14
buzz was up but 6000 units id four now pause yeah id four up at 22 000 that's not going to last
56:22
because the tariff situation here in the taxes uh everything else is down atlas down six percent
56:27
cross sport down 19 percent tals down 14 percent tig one down 17 percent jeta down 25 percent and
56:33
gti down a whopping 35 percent obviously tariffs are an impact here but i yeah i don't i honestly
56:40
failed to understand vw's perpetual problem because i think all those are fine i like the
56:46
tals i like the tig one i like the atlas the cross sport gti's fun geolize fun i mean they just put
56:52
a bunch of money into the tig one so i think that yeah that can bode well it just takes time to
56:56
kind of make that impact the atlas is getting a little bit uh aged but they're not doing anything
57:02
bad it's so yeah so why are we falling behind let's reach out to the viewer here if you have
57:08
looked at an outie or a volkswagen recently and you decided not to get one reach out to us send
57:13
us a voicemem we'll hit auto buyers guide dot com or on the the regular old jingle phone 669
57:18
eight four two one nine four seven and tell us why you didn't buy that specific volkswagen or outie
57:25
because mercedes yeah i've been out soon uh on the atlas and i asked i literally asked the same
57:33
if you didn't buy an atlas why not or if you did buy an atlas what put it because i i was i'm left
57:39
with the same question i'm sitting i go on we must hear from you let us know yeah we need to know
57:43
yeah bmw and mercedes did not have this same problem mind you mercedes has not released their full
57:49
2025 numbers as the date we are recording this so there may be some adjustments to these but
57:54
we'll start with bmw bmw beat mercedes in the us sales game and they did it without a cargo van
58:01
the tail here is the same as some of the others car sales down 13 percent suv sales up 4.5 percent
58:06
but the interesting thing is here the sales are up on expensive models of course and uh down of
58:15
course in the bev side of things bev sales were down to 42 000 still a pretty healthy number though
58:19
bmw shifted a decent number uh pf sales were up to 25 000 even though they make some really good
58:25
plug-in hybrids you can see there wasn't the sales momentum they had there before 65 percent of
58:31
bmw's volume was an suv yeah not surprising the good news mini is also up by about nine percent
58:38
and what helped their car volume is that bmw considers x1 and x2 both cars and those sell well
58:45
so so x1 and x2 cars cars cars quote unquote are they hashbacks now i i think it's a light truck
58:55
versus hatchback classification with the epa issue there maybe that's why they stick them in there but
59:00
basically riding high on x3 x5 x7 because they're all doing really well mercedes is an interesting
59:07
tail here because what we were saying earlier that the the new car buyer demographic is really
59:13
shifting in the united states and it's becoming ever more affluent ever smaller people are buying
59:18
multiple cars a year on a more frequent basis than they ever had in the past when you look at
59:23
you know s and p global sales mobility numbers where they're talking about the multi-car buyer
59:27
households we're talking i mean not huge numbers but but still a surprising number of people that
59:34
are buying two three four new cars a year absolute bonkers stuff and they're buying really expensive
59:40
things amg and mybok sales have been up by something 60 70 percent over the last few years and we're
59:47
expecting 2025 to come in with double digit sales increases on those sub brands amg and mybok and
59:55
those those msrp transactions are are absolutely staggering up there those days yeah yeah
00:03
mercedes has always had some expensive things and we talk about that every time we compare them here
00:07
where you know we got the bmw and the outie in this little category and their price tags are
00:11
high but but then you need like a paper bag to you know hyperventilate in when you look at the
00:18
top ends of mercedes there'll be an overlap but yeah but then but then it's just it's just way
00:24
off my hands off screen alex yeah because it just it just keeps going right oh you want adaptive
00:29
cruise control that's extra heated steering wheel that's extra rear airbags that's extra etc we got
00:34
it don't worry the world is your oyster but it's all it's all chaching here um and Porsche sales
00:41
of course have done really well historically over the last few years i don't have numbers for them
00:45
for 2025 yet they may be down is my guess for 2025 but on a very strong upward trend over the last
00:52
few decades because of the suvs and and ever more expensive models yeah no i i think um i think this
01:00
is what we're talking about and i know that you know 60 increase in some of these high-end luxury
01:05
brands the actual numbers are not going to be big but it does still speak to to a trend and that
01:11
trend is not the average consumer friendly or what you think of the average consumer really isn't
01:18
you know if i think i'm the average consumer but then i look at the numbers i go oh just kidding
01:22
i am not nobody's looking at me when they say what are we doing for our product planning
01:26
and the i mean just g-wagon for instance there was a time where mercedes was going to cancel g in
01:33
fact it was ostensibly replaced by gl now the gls but gls was up six percent last year up g-wagon
01:42
was up 12 percent last year and by all appearances we're going to see pretty similar increases in
01:47
both of those for 2025 because mercedes does have q3 2025 numbers out and the numbers were pretty rosy
01:55
yeah i good for them congratulations nice work uh boy wouldn't it be nice to see some of that
02:04
trickle down but we know how trickle down usually ends up working yes what's what i think is kind
02:10
of interesting too is that this this definite explosive growth in the luxury brands i remember
02:15
said he's 374000 bmw 389000 i mean even audi at 165 and then you take a look at lexus and acura
02:25
and cad lack etc we're talking an ever-growing number of expensive high-end models trickling
02:34
down into the used market after three and four years than ever before yeah and the question there
02:40
and what manufacturers have figured out is how do we how do we capitalize on that and that's
02:45
for all these subscriptions come in subscriptions for sure and then of course repair costs because
02:51
i think that's the one thing that a lot of people are forgetting in this is that that you use luxury
02:57
car upfront yeah long term but that used luxury car even a lexus or an acura is going to cost you
03:04
more long term than spending that same amount of cash on a brand new camry even just the insurance
03:11
cost which you know not everyone is thinking about insurance costs but it's the repairability or you
03:17
know covering that car for a total loss those sorts of things is going to cost the insurance
03:21
company more because the msrp was more it's not the end all be all but it pretty much tells you
03:28
what's going on underneath and what's going to cost repair means higher insurance rates
03:32
and that brings us along to tesla the brand that we haven't talked about yet we don't have full
03:38
breakdowns seemingly as of the the recording of this video but we do know that they did a 1.64 million
03:45
global sales a nine percent drop from 2024 and it looks like in the us we're going to be seeing
03:51
some sales drops as well some actually pretty staggeringly ugly sales drops i mean because
03:59
tesla competes in one segment electric globally there are so many more electric models available
04:07
there's probably some political impact there but not maybe not the number shifting that some
04:13
folks would like it to be if you look at all the r&d though they went into the same called the
04:18
cyber truck which as we know has done super well and everyone loves it and really rosy outlook
04:24
in all things light truck automotive yeah it looks like we're probably going to be seeing
04:32
tesla sales down around nine to ten percent in 2025 again we don't have the complete number
04:39
out right now but we also see some interesting headwinds for them in some markets because it
04:45
looks like the pop-out door handles are going to need a serious redesign because of some chinese
04:51
legislation that has not changed it's it's definitely going to be enforced it looks like
04:56
and it looks like in the united states the government here may actually also have
05:00
something to say about those uh those powered door handle designs it's not going to affect
05:04
just tesla it's going to affect a large number of companies and not just evz either because
05:08
this trend towards electronic door releases has grown especially in the luxury segment
05:14
i'm curious if it's going to be a effective from now on or if it's going to be a retrofit thing
05:20
you know i don't know how difficult i mean in theory it shouldn't be that difficult but the
05:25
vehicle is not designed to put another another mechanism and how much that would end up costing
05:30
you uh some people will say it's worth saving your life and that's a fair argument but um i'm
05:35
also looking at a company like tesla saying oh they need to do a massive maybe it's not a recall
05:41
but a massive uh you know re-manufacturing of the new part to put in a bunch of cars that's not
05:47
going to happen quickly if it if it does come to pass yeah it i would assume it's it could be a simple
05:53
mechanical uh replacement of the door handle a redesign of that entire door lock mechanism but
05:59
could fit within the same the same manual pop out handle designs that we find in model 3 and model
06:05
y for instance um i think that more of a problem would actually be some of the other car brands
06:10
that have the electric you know they pop these out of the car etc how are you going to redesign
06:15
that easily you just have to change the sheet metal probably with them just popping out all the time
06:20
for those that aren't familiar with the problem the origin story of this problem is the ability to
06:25
get out of the vehicle in an emergency from the inside or the outside apparently some vehicles
06:31
and i may be getting this wrong so apologies in advance but it is my understanding that the
06:37
complaint has been that in the loss of a total electrical loss in some of these vehicles there's
06:44
no way to extricate people from the outside of the rear doors in some of these vehicles or always
06:50
or especially if kids especially in child seats in the back you're not going to be able to get the
06:55
kid to be able to actuate a manual door lock release that's hidden somewhere that's not right
07:00
there where the regular physical release is i mean a kid in the rear facing child seats not
07:04
going to be able to get there anyway so you're relying on someone out of the outside of the
07:10
vehicle to actually be able to get them out of course you're also relying on the doors to be
07:13
unlocked and and all of that jazz but but that apparently has been the origin story of the problem
07:19
and in china i guess the legislation is also focusing on the location of some of these manual
07:26
releases that are not intuitive in some vehicles in some tests is i think they're actually fine
07:31
where the lever is actually kind of right on top but that's or yeah right there by the door handle
07:36
it's not the one you're supposed to use but a lot of people use them right but it's it's it's the cars
07:40
where that door release like in corvettes etc is like a little red red pole somewhere way down the
07:46
door that you aren't always using so you don't have the muscle memory in an accident i do kind of
07:52
wonder though where was the customer research that said customer said you know what i really want
07:58
is a button instead of a door lever i i don't know but i'll be the first to say that there are a
08:06
number of these designs with a button that i really enjoy i don't think i don't think the lever's
08:11
ever been an issue right but there is sort of a premium feel where you don't have to do it it's
08:17
done for you and that's why we see it in evs because of this flush door handle thing but you
08:22
see it in the luxury segment because it it feels good and there are some of these mechanisms that
08:27
do feel really good without you having to do anything and i know we're talking fractions of a
08:33
calorie to make that motion um but again it's an experiential thing it's it's funny because i don't
08:41
i don't think i like the feel of any of them and this is not a tesla thing i mean gms had had
08:46
electric door releases in some of their vehicles like elr and and corvettes and things like that
08:51
for quite some time if my memory serves actually decent time longer than tesla and i didn't like
08:56
those either something awkward teslas actually do this better but there's something awkward about
09:01
some of them where you push if you are pushing the button as you're pushing on the door like you
09:06
think you should be able to there's this like oops not yet and then the door kind of opens and teslas
09:12
are not that's not the way they they operate they have a much more immediate action but a lot of
09:19
vehicles don't and yeah manufacturers have tried to spin this as well we're we're adding extra safety
09:26
features that was lexus's deal in rx they're saying well if we if we want the ability to lock out the
09:34
door action if there's traffic coming or a bicycle coming or something's there a blind spot you got
09:40
to have time to check it well but right you have to have an electronic door release because there's
09:44
no other way for this system to function um i would argue that if you have the double pull style
09:51
mechanism that maybe the answer is in this moment where you're starting to pull on the door handle
09:57
if that situation exists then you lock the door and then you got to do a double pull to then
10:02
override that that blind spot monitoring situation right it's got to be some way to fix that and still
10:09
have a mechanical release because it's i mean it's there's no tragedy greater than than having a child
10:17
die right and for the people that have sued where their their tesla locked their children in the back
10:23
and then there was no power to actually at the door handle then child dies like that's that's
10:29
definitely a problem will this solve the problem i don't know yeah and and i won't be the one to say
10:34
oh it's it's a small number it doesn't matter but there are there are pieces of this where
10:40
a manufacturing design could have been safer or you know and it's a one-off scenario that's you
10:48
know to my to my knowledge i've you know glanced over some of these and and worldwide it sounds like
10:54
maybe a couple dozen incidents which by percentage is an incredibly small number
10:58
um but if we found that it's an issue then then how do we address the issue and i don't think it's
11:05
worth it feels a little bit better to sacrifice a life i'm never going to make that claim or that
11:09
argument but we don't know but it's an interesting one what we don't know in a way is is the number
11:15
statistically significant in that regular car regular old door handle but doors locked and
11:23
then you don't have 12 volt power you still can't get into the door because it's locked right right
11:27
because there's no electronic lock which is electric door or a mechanical or you know a
11:32
mechanical lock even for cars that have mechanical locks right so it's still on the outside right
11:37
and it's a rear doors there's not going to be a key cylinder for you to unlock it even in an old
11:42
car there wouldn't be so that's right kind of my my curiosity and i don't smash window will lift
11:49
the lever but even you know that that that old gesture there are people who might be listening
11:55
to this who don't know what i'm talking about because it's a little switch down and that is
11:59
and that is a part of this in a way it is still going to be harder with the electronic door release
12:04
because in a regular mechanical mechanism vehicle you could smash the window and assuming that you
12:10
could reach in and grab the lever you could open the door and then you could extricate a child's
12:15
seat or an adult or whatever you needed to out of the back and that is going to be tricky if you
12:21
smash the window and try and get that person out of the window because the mechanism is still
12:25
electronic and you smash the window but you can't get the person out of the car right and in case of
12:31
a fire and we're talking an engulfing fire you've got 20 30 seconds anyway seconds count which is
12:39
going to be which is going to be hard to even in a panic get a regular door open get your child
12:46
buckled and get them out of there right and and not slice them open on the broken glass and then
12:52
you know have them bleed out in your hands because that would be even worse and you know it's like
12:57
i it takes me longer than that to get my daughter in and out of a child seat in an absolute panic
13:02
and rush where i could where somehow i wasn't concerned about the additional harm that she
13:08
might get like hitting her head or whatever breaking a neck or an arm or something like
13:12
even in that i i don't think there's enough time to somehow get her out through the window i don't
13:17
know maybe i'm wrong there but does does not seem rational and there's always a world where
13:21
because it hasn't happened in mass doesn't mean it wasn't always possible and and i'm not really
13:27
going to go down this path but like there are designs out there that are known to be dangerous
13:31
that just haven't caused problems yet or the manufacturer has taken a gamble and gotten lucky
13:37
uh if it's if it's coming up let's take a look at it you know but
13:44
again not arguing against it but this is going to in theory add cost to manufacturing at least
13:49
in the short term because someone's gonna have to change something up and that probably ends up
13:54
the consumer paying for it i'll pay the extra i don't mind you know that's fine it'll be a design
13:59
it'll be a design r and d cost but true manufacturing it should be less expensive
14:05
it should be the same yeah but i just mean a short term hey we've got to put this thing in
14:09
and and and i think what we'll see at least again in the short term uh our biggest complaint over
14:15
the next four years would be that tesla door handles uh feel really flimsy now because they
14:21
didn't redesign the whole thing they said hey here's a stopgap measure you know i don't want to
14:24
just be tesla it'll but it'll be the same mechanism just mechanical not electric i don't know yeah i'm
14:30
curious to see what they do because we're going to know real soon uh china's rules are
14:34
implementing very fast and so now we will we will know in relatively short order well with that out
14:43
of the way it is time for us to sign off and wish everybody happy new year so thanks for
14:46
watching we may be on a bit of a hiatus because i will be out for a little over a week here soon
14:51
but uh we will catch you days at home myself so yeah but we will catch you all at the end of
14:57
january if we don't catch you beforehand see you everybody later