It was a rough way to start the year for automakers. When all was said and done, U.S. sales fell roughly 16% from a year ago in the first quarter.
Just as a reminder, the first quarter of 2021 was a time when America was coming out of the Covid pandemic and car sales were quite brisk, mainly due to dealerships opening back and a backlog of people wanting new vehicles. It was late in March of 2021 when we discovered there was a shortage of microchips for cars. However, this did not affect sales, there were plenty of new vehicles in stock. What we didn’t know, was inventories of in-stock vehicles would dwindle to historic low levels.
Here are your Q1 2022 sales results (including some of the startup electric automakers) and how they stacked up to the same time in 2021. As usual, Mercedes-Benz can’t pull off the feat of reporting sales like every other automaker in the world.
| 1. | Toyota | 450,227 | 15% |
| 2. | Ford | 410,026 | 17% |
| 3. | Chevrolet | 340,309 |
20% |
| 4. | Honda | 238,182 | 23% |
| 5. | Jeep | 193,281 | 2% |
| 6. | Nissan | 189,835 | 29% |
| 7. | Hyundai | 159,676 | 4% |
| 8. | Kia | 151,194 |
. 5% |
| 9. | Ram Trucks | 138,153 | 15% |
| 10. | Subaru | 132,246 | 17% |
| 11. | GMC | 121,437 | 7.5% |
| 12. | Mazda | 82,268 |
1% |
| 13. | BMW | 73,714 |
3% |
| 14. | Volkswagen | 64,993 | 28% |
| 15. | Lexus | 64,365 | 13% |
| 16. | Dodge | 41,042 | 36% |
| 17. | Audi | 35,505 | 35% |
| 18. | Chrysler | 29,113 | 27% |
| 19. | Acura | 28,236 | 25% |
| 20. | Cadillac | 28,216 | 24% |
| 21. | Mitsubishi | 26,400 | 6% |
| 22. | Volvo | 22,757 | 16% |
| 23. | Lincoln | 19, 148 | 25% |
| 24. | Buick | 19,146 | 58% |
| 25. | Land Rover | 17,400 | 26% |
| 26. | Porsche | 13,043 | 25% |
| 27. | Genesis | 11,723 | 43% |
| 28. | INFINITI | 11,246 | 41% |
| 29. | MINI | 6,876 | 9% |
| 30. | Alfa Romeo | 3,291 | 29% |
| 31. | Jaguar | 2,815 | 33% |
| 32. | Maserati |
2,100 |
33% |
| 33. | Rivian | 900 | --- |
| 34. | Bentley | 739 | 12% |
| 35. | Lamborghini | 557 | 13% |
| 36. | Rolls-Royce | 390 |
18% |
| 37. | Fiat | 340 | 58% |
| 38. | Polestar | 260 | --- |
| 39. | McLaren | 190 | 37% |
| 40. | Lucid | 190 | --- |
| 41. | Karma | 90 | --- |
Note: Tesla does not report actual sales, they report production numbers which I don’t find useful because who knows how many were built, but not sold? The number they report was 110,000 which would place them as #12 on the list.
Photo Credit: Andy Dean Photography/Shutterstock.com.