Subaru reported the brand’s 41st consecutive month of year-over-year U.S. sales improvement last month and in so doing produced the brand’s highest-volume April in the history of Subaru of America.
47,241 Subarus were sold in the United States last month, an 18% increase compared with April 2014. The 7,158-unit increase was powered by gains from the Forester, Outback, Legacy, XV Crosstrek, and the WRX/STi.
High-riders – the Forester, Outback, and XV – accounted for 71% of Subaru’s volume last month.
The XV has proven so far this year to be significantly more popular than the Impreza sedan and hatch combined (excluding the WRX/STi that Subaru sees as a unique model). XV sales are up 20% to 27,017 through the first four months of 2015; Impreza sales are up 2% to 20,597. The XV led the Impreza by only 2,390 units at this stage a year ago.
The Outback fell 2238 units shy of matching last December’s best Outback month ever but exceeded the nameplate’s previous best April by 1,871 units, an 18% improvement.
Forester sales, say Subaru, have risen beyond 10,000 units in each of the last 21 months. In comparison with the category’s top-selling CR-V, Equinox, Escape, and RAV4, Forester sales aren’t terribly high. Those four nameplates averaged nearly 27,000 April sales. But the Forester’s steady march forward is unmistakable. Between 2007 and 2012, Subaru averaged fewer than 6000 Forester sales per month.
By the standards of top-tier midsize contenders, Legacy sales are a pittance. Yet by Legacy standards, Subaru’s midsize sedan is booming. April sales shot up 69% to 5,276; year-to-date volume is up 68% to 19,647.
The numbers are small, but the Legacy is proving tremendously helpful for Subaru in the United States, where the majority of midsize cars – and the midsize segment as a whole – are failing to match last year’s sales pace. The Legacy has added nearly 8,000 sales to the Subaru tally over the span of just four months, nearly on par with the volume added by the Outback.
With growth across much of the lineup, where does this position Subaru? We’ve stated previously that the brand is clearly now among the mainstream players, as declared by what is now a 14-month-long streak of 40K+ sales months. Subaru’s U.S. market share increased to 3.2% in April 2015, up from 2.9% at this time a year ago, 2.6% in April 2013, and 2.2% in April 2012.
The likelihood that a successor to the discontinued Tribeca will be far more successful than the Tribeca will provide further expansion.
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Subaru
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April 2015
|
April 2014
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% Change
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2015 YTD
|
2014 YTD
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% Change
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| Forester | 13,977 | 11,547 | 21.0% | 51,613 | 46,937 | 9.9% |
| Outback | 12,534 | 10,663 | 17.6% | 48,021 | 39,589 | 21.3% |
| XV Crosstrek | 6,936 | 5,678 | 22.2% | 27,017 | 22,553 | 19.8% |
| Legacy | 5,276 | 3,126 | 68.8% | 19,647 | 11,670 | 68.4% |
| Impreza | 5,311 | 5,444 | -2.4% | 20,597 | 20,163 | 2.2% |
| WRX/STi | 2,713 | 2,698 | 0.6% | 9,974 | 8,213 | 21.4% |
| BRZ | 494 | 820 | -39.8% | 1,653 | 2,886 | -42.7% |
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—
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— | — | — | — | — | — |
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Total
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47,241 | 40,083 | 17.9% | 178,522 | 152,471 | 17.1% |
Subaru was the ninth-best-selling auto brand in America over the first four months of 2015, 10,000 sales ahead of Dodge; 16,000 sales back of Kia.
Timothy Cain is the founder of GoodCarBadCar.net, which obsesses over the free and frequent publication of U.S. and Canadian auto sales figures. Follow on Twitter @goodcarbadcar and on Facebook.
The post Old Hat? April 2015 Reveals Another Subaru U.S. Sales Record appeared first on The Truth About Cars.
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