BMW Falls Behind Mercedes And Lexus Out Of The Gate - Sales Up Only 4.0% In January

"Coming after a record December and a record 2014 year-end result, the January numbers are a solid start for the new year and I am confident the trend will accelerate in the months ahead," said Ludwig Willisch, President and CEO, BMW of North America. "I am especially pleased that MINI is again showing its strength as availability of its new models improves."

To see and hear more of Ludwig Willisch's perspective on the January sales, click here.

In January, notable vehicles sales included the BMW 3 and 4 series which increased 13.2 percent to 7,348 vehicles, the BMW 7 series increased 10.8 percent to 637 vehicles and the BMW X5 increased 16.7 percent to 3,214 vehicles.

BMW Group Sales
The BMW Group in the U.S. (BMW and MINI combined) reported January sales of 22,209 vehicles, an increase of 6.8 percent from the 20,796 vehicles sold in the same month a year ago.

BMW Pre-Owned Vehicles
In January, sales of BMW used vehicles (including certified pre-owned) increased slightly, by 3.0 percent, to 14,564 vehicles compared to the 14,143 vehicles sold in January, 2014.

MINI Brand Sales
For January, MINI USA reports 3,228 automobiles sold, an increase of 26.9 percent from the 2,543 sold in the same month a year ago.

MINI Pre-Owned Vehicles
In January, MINI used automobiles (including MINI NEXT certified pre-owned) reported sales of 1,824 automobiles, a decrease of 3.0 percent from the 1,881 sold in January, 2014.

 

Car4Life - 2/3/2015 2:36:27 PM

+3 Boost

I smell something really fishy over a BMW, how does one sell over 40,000 cars in December, then sell less than 20,000 in January and for the life of me i can't find a breakdown of model to model sales...

If this is actually how much BMW sold, and there is no crooked Accountants cooking the books, i'd hate to work at a BMW dealer, that level of variance in sales has to hurt some dealers, my bet is the ones in the midwest and southern regions while the Northeast and West Coast see the bulk of the sales

cidflekken - 2/3/2015 3:36:47 PM

+3 Boost

Hmmmm...BMW sold more 3/4 Series in December than the entire make sold in January. Interesting.....

HoustonMidtown - 2/3/2015 3:44:45 PM

+5 Boost

They are trying hard to sell cars this month - my sales person called me and told me they would pull ahead my lease early - my lease has 9 months left....they normally will do 3 months and sometimes 6 months, but Ive never seen them do 9 months...

Car4Life - 2/3/2015 4:25:31 PM

+4 Boost

yea, thats extremely aggressive...somethings up, the C Class is good but is it really doing that much damage to Bimmer's Bread n Butter 3 series? crazy

gkearns56 - 2/3/2015 4:27:55 PM

+4 Boost

What happened with the breakdown by model; are we just missing something here.

Car4Life - 2/3/2015 4:38:02 PM

+4 Boost

nope Bimmer did not even include it in their official press release lol which means somethings up!

iamdabest1 - 2/4/2015 12:30:41 AM

+1 Boost

maybe they wanted to finish the year strong and knew they would sell about 30k cars in january , but used 10k of those cars to pad december 2014 on a high?

Car4Life - 2/4/2015 12:38:57 PM

+1 Boost

I dont know...if @HoustonMidtown and BMW owners like him are receiving aggressive offers like that...some high level executive at Bimmer is trying to cover their rearend or bracing for a significant dip in sales

PUGPROUD - 2/5/2015 8:17:06 AM

+2 Boost

Most large corporations backend each quarter and year with deals and discounts to juice sales so management can make their bonuses and keep shareholders happy. Thus the first few week of the next quarter are week unless you really have some hot products. BMW's problems are deeper. It has forsaken its heritage of "The Ultimate Driving Machine" to chase mass market sales across all segments. They need to push volume out the door to cover excess capacity, German union worker costs and shareholder pressure. They are not alone in pushing this strategy. The problem that once the Chinese market is saturated there will brands that disappear and other like BMW will suffer severe pressure on margins.You can't blame them...its either stay exclusive with limited volume and higher margins or go for volume and market share in new segments. Both strategies have pros and cons. Though it looks like everyone is taking the volume at all costs approached based on recent moves at Ferrari.

mre30 - 2/5/2015 11:56:55 AM

+1 Boost

The Euro weakness is gonna being killing their profits. I suspect if BMW "dumped" sales (i.e. to the dealers not to the customers) in December, it would be to get as much of the currency problems as possible out of the way into the Cy2014 year.

US-produced stuff (i.e. SUV's, etc) will be gravy for them worldwide in 2015 however the Euro-produced stuff (3, 5, 6, 7) will have currency losses built-in so sales of those lines will be a problem.

I wouldn't be surprised if BMW moves some 3-series production to the plant in the Carolina's.