Ford Motor Company today said that it tallied October sales of 167,803 vehicles, with increases largely from Ford brand SUV and truck sales. After touting crossovers with car sales, and boasting of retail sales gains earlier in the year, Ford is now emphasizing truck sales and adding crossover sales with them.
This is because Ford Motor Company car and retail sales are down in October compared to last year, hurt by bad results at Lincoln (-11% at 6,100 units), and the absence of 7,500 units from now defunct Mercury. With the strength of trucks, though, overall Ford Motor sales of 1,771,801 units is up 10.9%, above industry growth of 7.5% Fleet sales, however, are 33% of the total, which based on early numbers, appears to be leading the industry, well ahead of GM’s 23% of October sales. Overall, October sales year-on-year are down about 10% in the slowly recovering industry.
Ford brand truck sales totaled 69,068 in October, an 8% increase versus year-ago levels. Year-to-date truck sales were 651,837, up 9%. Ford’s F-Series sales totaled 52,511 vehicles, up 7%, in October. Year-to-date F-Series – long the best selling vehicle in the U.S. – totaled 468,899 pickups, an 8% increase.
Ford is the country’s best-selling utility vehicle brand, helped by heavy incentives on the aging Escape. Utility vehicles sales totaled 45,877 in October, up 38%. Year-to-date, Ford utility vehicles total 471,787, up 31%.
Ford brand car sales totaled 576,994 through October – up 18% versus the same period a year ago – more than doubling the industry-wide passenger car sales increase. For news releases, related materials and high-resolution photos and video, visit www.media.ford.com.
Year-to-date, Ford is the best-selling brand of vehicles in America with sales totaling 1,700,618, up 17%, versus Chevrolet at 1,485,747. Lincoln, at 70,935 ytd, is a footnote and just treading water compared with last year’s level. New Lincoln products are years away. With this performance, the Ford brand claims it is now on track to increase its market share this year by about one percentage point.
