Hey all. I often hear posters refer to terms such as "high volume" or "mainstream" sales. I suspect different posters may have different meanings for these terms. As such, I thought it would be helpful if we had a standard definition. My question to you, is what are your thoughts on this? To start off, should we focus on U.S. Sales, Worldwide? John1701a has recommended a number of 5,000/month as a target. This seems a reasonable number although I would suggest 60,000/year as this helps eliminate some of the swings in monthly sales. Thoughts and opinions?
I consider the mid-size sedans and pick ups to be high volume sales. 60k/yr is reasonable for saying a model has broken through from niche. Keep it US only since some models aren't globally available.
IMHO: USA sales only - we do not know enough about other countries and cultures. >>2,500 is well penetrated. 2,500-3,500 solid, mid level, has customer driven market sales. 1,000-2,500 third level, subject to easily disappearing. <1,000 specialty or testing technology with small scale production. May be 'compliance' for CARB market. Bob Wilson
Good points! All right, U.S. only, those were good points. So, for this definition, can we keep "successful" or "sustainable" aside, or is it necessary to include those concepts? BTW, I'd agree with your numbers Bob. I'm just looking at it from a viewpoint that perhaps sales numbers alone define "high volume". Although, for replacement of a large number of ICE vehicles, sustainability of the business model is necessary, so I'm not so sure about separating the definitions.
CY 2012: Source: 2012 U.S. Vehicle Rankings - Top 266 Best-Selling Vehicles In America - Every Vehicle Ranked - GOOD CAR BAD CAR Overall Market 14,492,398 Ford F-series: 645,316 Camary: 404,886 Prius: 147,507 Chevy Volt: 23,461 Chevy Corvette: 14,132 Nissan Leaf: 9819 Insight: 5846 Dodge Viper: 20 My Takeaway: Like many things in life, Big is in the eye of the beholder. I tend to agree with Bob that 5,000 units starts to feel like a mass produced car rather than a hand-built line, but Corvette owners may tend to think of themselves as being in a less mass produced car than say......a Camary. YMMV.
The leaf broke 59,000 in sales in 2014, but I would not call it mainstream. It is a niche vehicle. But these numbers and mainstream are pretty meaningless terms. Compared to the sales of the corolla, elantra or focus (around 1M cars each), or even the Prius (315,000 units worldwide in 2013) its not a hot seller. The model S with 30,000+ sold last year is pretty mainstream for the sports sedan category. The bmw 3 series is the big seller here with 500,000 sold in 2013. Still the model S is just starting in many of those markets, and super charger networks need a few more years. No the model S is rather mainstream in the sports sedan market in California or Texas where super chargers are already built. So there has got to be a better term than mainstream. Perhaps > than n percent in its segment (lets say 2%). Mainstream is not very meaningful as a yard strick, and it is difficult to define. plug-ins have quite a bit of seasonality to them, much more so than bread and butter cars like the corolla or focus. Yearly, not monthly sales are more meaningful. I guess if we separate markets the (aqua/prius c) is mainstream in Japan but not the US, but again I'm not sure that is meaningful. The high volumes of the aqua in Japan bring economies of scale to the prius c, allowing for good cost reduction.
