I'm sure we all heard today's news from automakers around the world, they sucked in sales! In October GM lead with a 45% decline, even Japanese automakers sucked. BMW brand sales also declined 13.9% but one bright spot was Mini with a 56.4% increase during October. Mini's are still hot!

 

Wow, I haven't seen the figures yet, but that is very impressive for Mini. I assume a lot of that was due to the backlogs and issues getting September deliveries out, still very impressive.

It will be interesting to see what November and December hold for the dealerships. BMW did all they could do to hold up sales with near invoice price selling and low interest rate offers. They can't keep doing this and the impact diminishes after a while. Domestic and some Japanese brands have been using incentives for so long that at this point, it doesn't seem to help much. Tough time for automakers.

 

Here's the BMW breakdown in sales... http://www.marketwatch.com/news/story/BMW-Group-Reports-October-Sales/story.aspx?guid={984BA62C-12BC-4DF5-82B0-9A97A5EE10D2}

 

wow. BMW's little goose keeps laying the golden eggs...

 

Yesterday I saw the October car sales report and bleak is an understatement

But a big thumbs up for MINI being 1 of only 2 car manufacturers for posting an actual sales increase

 

Not really , there are tons here sitting now and most are going 1K under sticker, they have stopped dead at the moment.

 

Here is an interesting analysis... take a look at Porsche and some of the higher end cars>>

http://online.wsj.com/mdc/public/pag...=topnav_2_3000

Ferrari and Rolls up +50% and +75% respectively.. what a surprise
Michael

 

Then bring them up to the DC area, we seem to be delivering a MINI to someone continuously, and are still taking plenty of orders. I know we are not selling for under sticker, maybe some free floor mats.

 

Are you a MINI dealer or MA? I'm curious as to where are there "tons" of MINIs sitting with no buyers.

 

DITTO what EMY-RDL said... IN THE metro Washington DC area 95% of all MINIs in dealer inventory are pre sold... the 5% is the occassional allocation that comes in un-ordered and that gets snapped up quickly.... no surplus up in these parts
Michael

 

I am not surprised, I see more MINI every day in Houston!!!

 

I know the dealer in Honolulu has about 44 Mini's on the lot... They normally move pretty quickly though....

 

Nope see them at the MINI dealer and the BMW dealer, some people are getting great deals Orlando, Jax to name a few Even Apple which i sold a month ago is still sitting there...

 

I heard news reports this morning that car sales in october exceeded last years average overall by upwards of 10% Ford and GM were down, but asian and european cars were way up to compensate.

 

I didn't see any automaker up, you sure you heard that right? Mini was up but that's part of BMW...

"Double-digit declines in October sales: Ford was down 30%, GM off 45%, and Chrysler down 36%. Overall, auto sales were down 32%, according to Autodata. Toyota (TM), despite huge ad spending and zero-percent financing, reported a sales drop of 23%. Nissan (NSANY) was off 33%. Hyundai was down 31%. Suzuki was down 44%. Luxury makes weren't spared. Mercedes-Benz (DAI) was down 26% and BMW was off 10%."

 

same here!! just got your jcw? hope to see you around town, i keep photo logs of spotted minis, LOL

 

That's surprising considering the large sales increase for MINI year-over-year for October. Here's a summary of the BMW USA sales release for October:

MINI USA reported October sales of 5,272 automobiles, up 56.4 percent from the 3,370 cars sold in October 2007. Year-to-date, the division reported sales of 45,966 automobiles, an increase of 30.2 percent, compared to the 35,306 cars reported in the first ten months of 2007.

I know that some areas of the country have been harder hit then others by the economic downturn, and October sales may very well reflect orders placed months earlier, but it's still surprising to hear that some MINI dealers are loaded with unsold inventory.

However, that's good news for those still in the market for a new MINI!

 

We got Hilla in the first week of September, after a four month wait!!!

 

I wonder if people are just going for new cars since the difference in price is not that great?

 

Folks keep referring to the price of used MINIs being close to the price of new MINIs. Where is the information regarding sales prices? All I ever see is asking prices...who knows if the car ever sells and at what price?

I can put ads on Craigslist, etc., all day long to sell my car for $100 less than new, but if it doesn't sell for that much, how do you ever find that out?

 

These were specific to the Canadian market, not worldwide.

 

Mini sales are down 40% in in the UK ....
http://http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/business/7712376.stm
Things are getting tough all over....

 

Not surprising, we're in a global recession, probably even a depression - the only real question is how long and how do we shovel our way out. MINIs won't be immune, but maybe if the credit and job sector would stabilize - there might at least be a chance that the sales do not totally collapse. Money's tight and the big car manufacturers are going to get the worst of it.