Lexus September 2019 Sales Report

Bring on those crazy incentives

bring out the innovation!!

Replace the whole damn management at this point. Bring in someone with know-how to move RWD models back to 00s numbers. Rebadges will sell no matter what but it's RWD model sales number that will make the difference. IS under 1K units, that should have never ever happened.

Everything was down across the board except the RC. Definitely not a good month. Cars dot com says there are over 4,000 ES 350s still on the lots. Hopefully, dealers will be in a mood to deal.

They are paying the price for pushing out new models and updates too slowly. They should NOT let any cars to refresh after 3 years of release especially in the very competitive market nowadays. Looking at their car lineup, only LC, LS, and ES are recent models. IS and GS badly need an update and RC's refresh is not enough. SUV is more terrible. Other than the new UX, NX RX LX and GX all of them don't have major updates recently or in the near future. For easy upgrades like the infotainment system, they are even trying to save costs by not developing them. Current gen RX(2019), IS and GS can have an infotainment upgrade regardless of not refreshing the models. And why don't they provide Android Auto on LS and LC? I mean I just don't understand the motivation behind this? Just to show they are still resisting? Well customers are paying the price for not having a complete package. This kind of cutting corners from Lexus is really disappointing and I think that's part of the reason why people are not buying LS. People who buy cars in this price range don't want the car to disappoint them, and simply having the top-notch "craftsmanship" is not enough, or nobody is going to buy Model S, because technically there is almost no "craftsmanship". Just pack in stuff and the easiest thing to do is create a fancy infotainment system like Tesla. I don't see them trying.

TMS 2019 better see some real hotness available sooner than later, or you're basically telling your customers "come back in 5 to 10 years".

I wish they gave the breakdown of model year vehicles sold by model as well.

UX sales so far in U.S.:

2018 - 453
2019 - 11,991 YTD - January thru September, my projection 15,000 (I believe Lexus projected sales of UX is 17,000)
Total = 12,444

X1 sales since inception in U.S.:

1X1
2012 - 8,947
2013 - 26,512
2014 - 22,808
2015 - 14,420
2X1
2016 - 27,812
2017 - 30,826
2018 - 29,060
2019 - 12,673 YTD - Jan thru September
Total = 173,058

X2 sales since inception in U.S.:

2018 - 16,154
2019 - 8,335
Total = 24,489 - Jan thru September

GLA sales since inception in U.S.:

2014 - 6,884
2015 - 25,593
2016 - 24,545
2017 - 24,104
2018 - 24,136
2019 - 15,131 YTD - Jan thru September
Total = 120,393

Q3 sales since inception in U.S.:

2014 - 3,654
2015 - 13,229
2016 - 20,048
2017 - 20,633
2018 - 16,828
2019 - 6,087 YTD - Jan thru September
Total = 80,479

QX30 sales since inception in U.S.:

2016 - 2,259
2017 - 14,093
2018 - 8,101
2019 - 3,025 YTD - Jan thru September
Total = 27,478

All this decline in sales and Lexus is thinking about planes and boats?! Something is wrong here.

suxeL said:

Bring on those crazy incentives

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I sure hope so. I come up for a new lease in December and the preliminary numbers I got last night are not good at all.

Wasn't it bad for almost everyone, not just Toyota?

Tragic Bronson said:

Wasn't it bad for almost everyone, not just Toyota?

Toyota sales drop 16.5% as automakers report September results - Autoblog

Toyota's U.S. sales fell 16.5% in September, hurt by lower sales of Highlander and Tacoma, as well as declining demand for sedans. But September had fewer selling days this year.

www.autoblog.com

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It was bad for all the Japanese auto makers- Toyota, Honda, Nissan. Subaru saw its 8-year record of consecutively monthly increases end. Much recession talk now.

I can see why Highlander sales are down. Personally, I never liked the past generation. However, a very appealing and new generation Highlander is coming out in February 2020 and appears be worth waiting for.


The link works- I've never seen a URL change title like that!

CRSKTN said:

TMS 2019 better see some real hotness available sooner than later, or you're basically telling your customers "come back in 5 to 10 years".

I wish they gave the breakdown of model year vehicles sold by model as well.

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I think that's exactly what they are doing, waiting for the definite market shift in BEV/PHEV/FCV and then deliver some kind of a reboot. It's beyond obvious they've given up on turbo game.

https://www.bloomberg.com/news/arti...es-ugly-month-with-16-slide-auto-sales-update

looks like not only TMS is suffering

Deusex said:

All this decline in sales and Lexus is thinking about planes and boats?! Something is wrong here.

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Lexus can't please all of the people all the time, Lexus can only please some of the people some of the time...

NX sales so far in U.S.:

2014 - 2,927
2015 - 43,764
2016 - 54,884
2017 - 59,341
2018 - 62,079
2019 - 40,074 YTD - January thru September, my projection 60,000
Total = 263,069

X4 sales since inception in U.S.:

1X4
2014 - 2,653
2015 - 6,429
2016 - 4,989
2017 - 5,198
2018 - 4,323
2X4
2019 - 5,834 YTD - January thru September
Total = 29,426

GLC sales since inception in U.S.:

1GLC (fka GLK)
2009 - 21,944
2010 - 20,946
2011 - 24,310
2012 - 29,364
2013 - 32,553
2014 - 35,000
2015 - 27,902
2GLC
2016 - 47,872
2017 - 48,643
2018 - 69,727
2019 - 52,621 YTD - January thru September
Total = 410,882

Trexus said:

Lexus can't please all of the people all the time, Lexus can only please some of the people some of the time...

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Maybe if they are expecting a slowdown, and they have the warchest or it, maybe now is the time to build the brand with crazy projects?

Deusex said:

All this decline in sales and Lexus is thinking about planes and boats?! Something is wrong here.

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Why is it always with the knee jerk outcries?

The much more reasonable explanation for Toyota's across-the-lineup sales drop this month is weak incentives.

Good for Lexus for pursuing other avenues of brand building. Mercedes has an AMG speed boat, they didn't need to do it but luxury brands these days are all lifestyle brands. Lexus has always been enhancing the brand through marketing programs like Art competitions, Fashion Shows, retail experiences and so on.

Planes (or the rumor of) is a part of Toyota's transformation from automotive to mobility company, its a corporate survival move and would most likely be an entirely separate arm of the Toyota conglomerate with nothing to do with Lexus production cars except to support the brand. The yacht is already done so no point in complaining about it. They are contracting yacht builders, development/production costs are low, most of the budget is marketing, again a brand building exercise.

Should Toyota pump more development dollars into Lexus and lower their margins to provide better value? Sure but thats an entirely different topic. Nobody knows what they spend and recent rumors say they have been losing money for the last few years, so did Amazon for many many years. It could easily mean big expansion or production investments.

zeusus said:

Should Toyota pump more development dollars into Lexus and lower their margins to provide better value? Sure but thats an entirely different topic. Nobody knows what they spend and recent rumors say they have been losing money for the last few years, so did Amazon for many many years. It could easily mean big expansion or production investments.

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Because Toyota is such a quiet, modest, Japanese company (holds its cards close to its chest), even if Toyota is now pumping money into Lexus, we won't know what is coming until the new product is showing up, since new product development takes 4 or 5 years or more before introduction.

I don't understand all this kneejerk reaction. Sales don't drop overnight because consumers suddenly realized Lexus cars suck. When this kind of sudden variation happens it's usually because of factors other than product competitiveness. It could be macroeconomics, it could be a supply hiccup, it could be halt of incentives (the most common cause). The only time consumers stop buying a brand because "it sucks" is when a high profile flaw is revealed, like the sticky throttle, like the GM ignition switch, like the Takata airbags, like the Dieselgate.

Sales decline due to lacking competitiveness is usually chronic. You only see it over a decade long period. Failing car companies die a slow death. But statistics say Lexus is not in that camp.