Poised For A Crash? Pickup Truck Demand Called Into Question As Production Rises

One look at April’s results leaves little doubt about why each of the Detroit 3 is scrambling to build more pickups.

Full-size pickup sales shot up nearly 10 percent last month and are up nearly 7 percent for the year. Average transaction prices continued marching higher -- up 5 percent for the year through mid-April, to $41,543, J.D. Power data show. Inventories remain tame by historical standards.

Straining to keep their big-gest profit engine humming, Fiat Chrysler Automobiles, Ford and, to a lesser extent, General Motors are mobilizing to make more. In all, they are on track to boost total capacity by about 5 percent, or an extra 125,000 pickups, by 2017, IHS Automotive estimates.

TomM - 5/9/2016 5:16:22 PM

+2 Boost

For most of the last 100 years - Chevy and Ford have battled it out for the best selling vehicle in the USA. For most of that time - the full size Chevy and Ford cars were in the lead - now replaced by their respective Trucks. For those people who say there is no market for FULL SIZE vehicles anymore - that is simply not true. The fact is - People are buying more and more of them - only today they are Trucks and SUVs - and the price of gasoline staying at a low level allows that to happen. In addition, the sales of alternative high mileage vehicles have topped out - and are being split by more manufacturers.

MDarringer - 5/9/2016 8:27:54 PM

0 Boost

Truck sales will remain strong, but in the end it will be Ford and Chevy standing alone.

GM and Ford are not inventivizing (sic) as much as FCA, but enough to keep FCA incentivizing. The Ram is an old design with a progression of styling upgrades.

FCA does not have the money to go aluminum like Ford.

I predict Ford and GM will successfully run up FCA until FCA cannot withstand their pyramid scheme at Ram.

The Nissan Titan? Laughable.

Tundra? Not even.