Blog Posts
Fiat Chrysler's Bet On Trucks And SUVs Is Paying Off Big
1st Gear: Fiat Chrysler’s Trucks and SUVs Are Raking In the Cash
Automakers that still report sales monthly started publishing their November numbers from the U.S. this week, and amid slowdowns and modest gains from a lot of companies, Fiat Chrysler posted a huge leap of 17 percent.
Why, you ask? Trucks and SUVs.
FCA’s sales report from November said it sold 181,310 vehicles in the U.S., up 17 percent from November 2017—a huge jump compared to other automakers. But that wasn’t the only big figure in the company’s November report, because Ram trucks took the biggest spotlight. From Bloomberg:
Fiat Chrysler Automobiles NV was first with a plan to cull its car lineup. A week after General Motors Co. followed suit and sounded a death knell for many of its sedans, the merits of this move are coming into clearer focus.
Fiat Chrysler’s 17 percent jump in November U.S. deliveries led a better-than-expected month for the industry. The seasonally adjusted annualized rate of sales accelerated to 17.55 million, according to Automotive News, exceeding analysts’ average estimate of 17.3 million.
The standout figure in Fiat Chrysler’s results was a 42 percent surge in Ram pickup sales. Combine that with gains of at least 20 percent for the Jeep SUV brand’s Cherokee, Wrangler and Compass models, and it’s easy to see Fiat Chrysler’s strategy of focusing on light trucks is paying off.
Here’s a quick rundown of the sales, by brand rather than by model: refer to link for graph.
Yeah, Fiat Chrysler did well last month.
