BMW Reports December 2018 and Year-End U.S. Sales

[Jason]

BIMMERPOST NEWS

BMW Reports December 2018 and Year-End U.S. Sales

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BMW brand sales increase for 14th consecutive month.
U.S. built BMW X3 posts best year of sales of any SAV in BMW history
BMW 5 Series iPerformance is best-selling premium plug-in hybrid in U.S.

Woodcliff Lake, NJ – January 3, 2019… Sales of BMW brand vehicles increased 0.3 percent in December 2018 for a total of 34,357 compared to 34,253 vehicles sold in December 2017. For the full year, BMW brand sales increased 1.7 percent on total sales of 311,014 compared to the 305,685 sold in 2017.

“We have seen the momentum building throughout 2018 and BMW in the U.S. starts the New Year with 14 straight months of sales increases and our best sales month ever for our U.S. built BMW X3 Sports Activity Vehicle,” said Bernhard Kuhnt, President and CEO, BMW of North America. “Our optimism for 2019 is based on solid facts including the continued strong sales of the 5 Series, with the 5 Series PHEV as the best-selling luxury plug-in hybrid vehicle in the U.S. Now, the all-new X5 is making a strong impact in its first two months in the market and we are looking forward to the arrival of the all-new X7, and the highly anticipated launch of the all-new 3 Series in the months ahead.”

BMW’s lineup of Sports Activity Vehicles accounted for 63 percent of BMW brand sales in December 2018. For the tenth consecutive month, the BMW X3 was the top-selling BMW model in the U.S., followed by the new BMW X5. Taken together, the BMW X3 and X5 represented more than two out of every 5 BMW vehicles sold in the U.S. in December.

BMW Group Electrified Vehicle Sales
BMW brand sales of electric and plug-in hybrid electric vehicles totaled 2,774 in December 2018, an increase of 2.0 percent over the 2,720 sold in the same month a year ago. For the full year, combined sales of BMW Group (BMW and MINI) electrified vehicles exceeded 25,000 for the first time, and grew 17.9 percent in comparison with 2017.

BMW Group currently offers five electrified models in the U.S., including the BMW i3, BMW i8 and i8 Roadster, BMW 530e, BMW 740e, and MINI Countryman plug-in-hybrid electric vehicle. Plug-in hybrid versions of the all-new BMW X5 and the all-new BMW 3 Series have been announced and will begin sales in the U.S. at a future date.

MINI Brand Sales
For December, MINI USA reported 2,797 vehicles sold, a decrease of 39.3 percent from the 4,611 sold in the same month a year ago. Total year sales for the MINI Countryman sport-activity vehicle increased 18.2 percent in 2018 compared with 14,864 sales in 2017. In 2018, MINI USA reported a total of 43,684 vehicles sold, a decrease of 7.3 percent from the 47,105 vehicles sold in 2017.

BMW Pre-Owned Vehicles
BMW Certified Pre-Owned sold 9,858 vehicles, a decrease of 14.9 percent from December 2017.
Total BMW Pre-Owned sold 21,388 vehicles, a decrease of 0.7 percent from December 2017.

MINI Pre-Owned Vehicles
MINI Certified Pre-Owned sold 988 vehicles in December, an increase of 16.8 percent from December 2017.
Total MINI Pre-Owned sold 2,461 vehicles in December, derease of 6.5 percent from December 2017. For the whole of 2018, total MINI Pre-Owned sales increased 4.9 percent compared with 2017.

[Miko M]

X3 did very well, I am sure X5 will start catching up sense just for released.
I owned 18' X3 and I loved it, drove the new X5 and I love it!

[Red Bread]

Can we just let Mini die? Did they kill the small project? That seemed like their only hope, getting back to actually being mini.

[M3 Adjuster]

Originally Posted by Miko M

X3 did very well, I am sure X5 will start catching up sense just for released.
I owned 18' X3 and I loved it, drove the new X5 and I love it!

BMW... as most other companies.. including Porsche.. have become an SUV/SAV company in order to maintain profitablity. . Just as the Macan is 40% of Porsche sales... the X3 and X5 are the top two selling BMW models.


i hope that strong SUV?SAV sales as well as i/e models allow niche model sports cars to continue to be supported.

It continues to be automotive tragedy that BMW doesn't have a 2 series sedan alongside the coupe and has allowed competitors to take the small sporty euro sedan mantle.

[Laki021]

Amazing result, taking into account that sales of most of the other brands plummeted ~10% in the same period, mostly due to the two working days less than the year ago.

I expect that in January we will see a blockbuster numbers.

[Ibiza]

Interesting is that CPO had a significant year over year decrease, but pre-owned was almost flat year over year. Centers might be selling returned leased vehicles as pre-owned non-CPO now due to the reduction of the CPO program and the added CPO cost.

With light passenger vehicles having the significant growth, and MEX plant coming online, only a mater of time before engines/transmissions are built in North America.

Impressive 8 series numbers, let's see if stays that way over time.

[mose121]

So where are all the more affordable enthusiast based models that were supposed to be made viable by selling the dozens of other models that have overly bloated the model lineup over the last decade? Still no Z4M planned, haven't heard anything about a small entry level ///M product, G2X wagons aren't coming to the U.S., but thank God the hideous beast that is the X7 is coming to market. Come on BMW. Several years straight of record sales and we're still not getting any bones thrown our way. Give us a pure, simple, lightweight, 2 door coupe ///M car at an entry level pricepoint. The M2 doesn't count. I'm talking about a two door, two seat, no frills, sports car. I guarantee you'll sell twice as many of those cars vs every 6 series variant combined.

[Ibiza]

Originally Posted by Red Bread

Can we just let Mini die? Did they kill the small project? That seemed like their only hope, getting back to actually being mini.

Recently reported that BMW NA is considering Mini to be a sub-section of BMW showrooms in the US, not to be a requirement to have a separate showroom. Makes sense with significant drop in sales, lights can't stay on with these numbers, unless there is a future mini SUV.

[Red Bread]

Originally Posted by Ibiza

Recently reported that BMW NA is considering Mini to be a sub-section of BMW showrooms in the US, not to be a requirement to have a separate showroom. Makes sense with significant drop in sales, lights can't stay on with these numbers, unless there is a future mini SUV.

Like a version of the X7? Stop with the SUV's. Get back to making something fun to drive. The F56 is so boring.

[Ibiza]

Originally Posted by mose121

So where are all the more affordable enthusiast based models that were supposed to be made viable by selling the dozens of other models that have overly bloated the model lineup? Still no Z4M planned, haven't heard anything about a small entry level ///M product, G3X wagons aren't coming to the U.S., but thank God the hideous beast that is the X7 is coming to market. Come on BMW. Several years straight of record sales and were still not getting any bones thrown our way. Give us a pure, simple, lightweight, 2 door coupe ///M car at an entry level pricepoint. The M2 doesn't count. I'm talking about a two door, two seat, no frills, sports car.

Simply answer is profit margins. Why cannibalize US manufactured SAV sales with a wagon that needs to be important from Germany? BMW AG is going upmarket with the X7 & 8 for higher profit margin.

What do you consider an entry level ///M, $30,000? No way would BMW NA import that to the US market, nor would R&D costs be recouped at that price point.

[psuibmw]

They need to release the G20 now ... the 3 and 4 series are hurting them

[Remonster]

Originally Posted by mose121

So where are all the more affordable enthusiast based models that were supposed to be made viable by selling the dozens of other models that have overly bloated the model lineup over the last decade? Still no Z4M planned, haven't heard anything about a small entry level ///M product, G3X wagons aren't coming to the U.S., but thank God the hideous beast that is the X7 is coming to market. Come on BMW. Several years straight of record sales and we're still not getting any bones thrown our way. Give us a pure, simple, lightweight, 2 door coupe ///M car at an entry level pricepoint. The M2 doesn't count. I'm talking about a two door, two seat, no frills, sports car. I guarantee you'll sell twice as many of those cars vs every 6 series variant combined.

I agree with you but the problem is the need to sell way, way more than twice as many of the proposed entry level sports car vs 6 series. A 6 series is essentially a 5 series, the bulk of R&D costs translate over to both cars since they share the same platform, engines, and a lot of other parts are either the same or similar between these cars. The additional expense to engineer a variant of the 5 series is not that big so they only need to sell a small number of them to turn a profit. Even fewer once we consider that this is a "premium" variant so price per unit sold is quite high.

The other problem: The Z3 and Z4 M Coupes and M Roadsters sold terribly, nobody bought them.

If BMW comes out with a 2 seater M vehicle in the $40-50K range, I would buy the M2 every time to have the flexibility of 2 more seats, large trunk, etc.

[alex2364]

Originally Posted by M3 Adjuster

It continues to be automotive tragedy that BMW doesn't have a proper RWD 2 series sedan alongside the coupe and has allowed competitors to take the small sporty euro sedan mantle.

Fixed.

[vladberca]

X2 had quite good sales.
X1 will receive a refresh later this year.
The new 3 series is coming soon.
i3 is not doing that well, too expensive for what it can offer.
Mini needs a revised strategy, it's doing so bad right now.

[wdeerfield]

strong 5 series sales? thats only because for the price of a nicely equipped 3er you can get into a newly refreshed 5er. The 3er decline offset the 5 series % and then some.

those statistics for the x4/x6 show just how poor those SACs are. just get rid of them. they should be forced to separate out the outgoing 5gt from the 5 too so we can see an accurate picture for december of the 5gt vs 6gt numbers.

[mose121]

Originally Posted by Ibiza

Simply answer is profit margins. Why cannibalize US manufactured SAV sales with a wagon that needs to be important from Germany? BMW AG is going upmarket with the X7 & 8 for higher profit margin.

What do you consider an entry level ///M, $30,000? No way would BMW NA import that to the US market, nor would R&D costs be recouped at that price point.

I'm not buying the profit margin per unit argument, and BMW's decision in the mid 2000's to move to a model based on sales volume after they ousted the old guard and brought in a bunch of bean counters from Japanese brands, would seem to support my statement.

Development wise, there's no reason they couldn't have developed a car like this by sharing the new Z4 platform. That would have reigned in costs and spread them out over 3 different models if you include the Toyota variant. Something BMW already does on several current models.

My point is really that BMW said going to a higher sales volume business model would allow them to produce lower production (and lower margin) enthusiast based products. Well, it's been 15 years and a decade plus of record sales and profits. So, where are these models they said they'd build and can clearly afford to build for niche markets?

[wdeerfield]

Originally Posted by Ibiza

Simply answer is profit margins. Why cannibalize US manufactured SAV sales with a wagon that needs to be important from Germany? BMW AG is going upmarket with the X7 & 8 for higher profit margin.

at least just allow us who want a wagon to do ED for it and bring back to the states a nice M340i wagon.

[mkoesel]

2017:

BMW Cars: 202,201 - 30,826 = 171,375
BMW SAVs: 103,484 + 30,826 = 134,310

2018:

BMW Cars: 193,465 - (29,060 + 16,154) = 148,251
BMW SAVs: 117,549 + (29,060 + 16,154) = 162,763

[TreDirtyFive]

Another Year..Another Mercedes Benz beatdown. Yikes.

[uniqueMR]

Kill MINI or keep it at Europe, Asia, Africa, Middle East.
Or kill MINI for a decade and bring it back. Build the interest.
Well, VW Beetle is doing it. Killed the Beetle, for now

[stevenvillatoro]

Originally Posted by uniqueMR

Kill MINI or keep it at Europe, Asia, Africa, Middle East.

MINI may be more viable and/or useful to BMW in EV form, coming soon.

[MechX3M40i]

I think Mini can help BMW to claim a higher average gas mileage on all cars/SAV combined sold, unless someone know for sure they separate that calculation between the two brands. This, together with electric cars, can help BMW survive existing and new gas mileage mandates.

I don't think wagon, even performance versions, is making a come back any time soon. The new X3 drives better than many cars on the road. My G01 M40i can more than hold its own vs many sporty cars (or even sport cars) on the road. I cross-shopped this vs. 540i and have to say the M40i was much more BMW-like than the 540 sedan.