USA July 2017

Tesla Model 3, VIN 0000001. Surely the first of millions. And the dawn of a new era.

The Messiah has landed

Yes, the Honda Clarity Electric has arrived, with 34 deliveries...

...Just kidding, July 2017 signaled the registration of the first units of the much awaited (and hyped) Tesla Model 3, granted, it were just 30 units and we shouldn't consider them as actual "deliveries", but more as Beta testers, as they were handed to Tesla employees, so any kinks they might have will be handled inhouse, with no disclosure to the outside world.

Anyway, these are the first of what will be many thousands units zooming Californian streets, so as Ragnar Lothbrok would say: "Skal"!

But enough of Rookies, back to the overall market, 15.607 units were registered, leaving the YTD EV Share at a record 1.1%, with over 100.000 units already registered, the US market is headed for a record year, with December possibly surpassing the 250.000 units landmark.

Good news for the problem child Chevrolet Bolt, winning #1 in July (First of many Best Seller awards?), with 1.971 units, the first time it beats its Volt older brother. Interestingly, the PHEV model registered only 1.518 units last month, its worst result in over a year. Is the new kid on the GM block beggining to hurt its sales? 

In a stable ranking, the only notable changes were the climbs of the BMW's 330e and 530e, to #13 and #21 respectively, which means the German automaker is pushing production to (finally) satisfy demand for its PHEVs.

In the manufacturers ranking, Tesla (22%, down 1%) has lost ground to the Second Placed Chevrolet (21%). Looking forward, while Chevrolet will get a (small) boost in sales from the nationwide availability of its Bolt, Tesla should trounce it by year end, once the Model 3 production hits volume numbers.

 The race for Third place is also close, with Ford (11%, down 1%) resisting (For how long?) to Toyota, also with 11% share and some 1.000 units behind.

Pl	USA	July	YTD	%
1	Tesla Model S e)	1.425	12620	12
2	Chevrolet Volt	1.518	12450	12
3	Toyota Prius Prime	1.645	11337	11
4	Tesla Model X e)	1.650	10595	10
5	Chevrolet Bolt	1.971	9.563	9
6	Nissan Leaf	1.283	8.531	8
7	Ford Fusion Energi	703	5.760	5
8	Ford C-Max Energi	844	5.224	5
9 10	Fiat 500e BMW i3	475 601	4.303 3.593	4 3
11	BMW X5 PHEV	463	2.609	2
12	Audi A3 e-Tron	218	2.338	2
13 14 15	BMW 330e Volkswagen e-Golf Hyu. Sonata PHEV	387 308 205	2.256 2.195 1.620	2 2 2
16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 29 30	C. Pacifica PHEV Ford Focus electric Por. Cayenne PHEV Kia Soul EV Volvo XC90 PHEV BMW 530e Mercedes S500e Kia Optima PHEV Mercedes C350e Mercedes B250e BMW 740e Mercedes GLE550e BMW i8 Hyundai Ioniq Elec. Mini Country. PHEV Others	125 148 160 145 174 343 124 130 112 81 80 27 55 43 75 89	1.532 1.206 1.138 981 949 742 535 520 400 398 383 295 275 200 85 230	1 1 1 1 1 1 1 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0
	TOTAL	15607	104863	100

 e) Estimate

Source: insideevs.com; goodcarbadcar.com


Tesla Model S & Others

Pl	Model	July Sales
1	Mercedes E/CLS-Class	3.876
2	BMW 5-Series	3.173
3	Mercedes S-Class	1.470
4	Tesla Model S e)	1.425
5	Audi A6	1.218

Looking at the E-Segment/full-size vehicles, both the Mercedes E/CLS-Class and BMW 5-Series benefit from volume deliveries of the new generation to stay well above the other models, with the Tesla Model S dropping to Fourth Place, thanks to a strong month of the #3 Mercedes S-Class. 

It will be interesting to see if the upcoming Model 3 will cannibalize sufficient sales of the Model S, that forces it to drop it below this Top 5.

As for the Tesla Model X, its 1.650 units were not enough to reach the Top 5 in its class (#5 was the Mercedes GLS, with 2.403 registrations), ending the month in Seventh Place, proving once again that the Tesla SUV should have been doing much better (Around 3.000 units/month) than its five year old brother.