This post is very late because of a problem with the website for My Electric Vehicle Journey. I upgraded to the authoring tool WordPress 5 and it hosed EVERYTHING, locking me out of my blog’s authoring screen. It took several days, working with my web host, to get things working again. For you bloggers out there, I rolled back to WordPress 4.
Okay, so it’s old news that 1,000,000 plug-in vehicles have sold in the U.S. So where do we go from here? Well, I’m projecting that, by the end of this year, that that number will increase by more than 100,000 additional vehicles. Right now, my spreadsheet indicates total cumulative sales will be 1,106,181 but that’s probably conservative. With end-of-year tax considerations fueling plug-in purchases and the Model 3 deliveries taking off, It may go quite a bit higher!
Tesla Motors’ Model 3 sales rebounded a bit, compared to the previous month, but it still experienced the second-best plug-in vehicle monthly sales figure to date.
As I predicted, GM joined Tesla in hitting the 200,000th plug-in vehicle sale, near the end of last month. So GM customers have until the end of March 2019 to get the full $7,500 income tax credit. After that, it will be cut in half.
That being said, GM is trying to keep the tax credit beyond that date while Trump wants to kill it earlier for GM, due to the plant closings. GM, still seems to be having difficulties with deliveries of Bolt EVs. Classic Chevrolet still has Bolt EVs, that have been built for customers, languishing in a rail yard in Ohio or at the factory in Orion Township. Some have started trickling in though. I need them all here for the end of year plug-in vehicle sales rush:
Another item of interest, for residents of Texas, is the number of plug-in vehicle grants that have been handed out. Out of an allowed 2,000 grants, 969 have been issued. That’s 49% of the available grants and an increase of 207 EVs and PHEVs, over the last month. That means the program will probably stop, in April or May, due to lack of funds. That’s well before the planned end date of September 1st. The last time this program was run, Texas shut it down at the end date, with about $4.2 million still available! Times they are a changing!
Notice the high purple line, in the chart below, at the far right side of the graph. That’s the Model 3 sales curve. Although sales are down, from the September peak, it’s still the 2nd best sales month of any plug-in vehicle. Ever.
Here are the November 2018 sales figures, compared to the previous month. This month all but two vehicles I track showed higher sales, over the previous month, reversing last month’s trend:
- Chevy Volt: UP 166% (3,930 vs. 1,475) **estimated
- Chevy Bolt EV: UP 46% (3,025 vs. 2,075) **estimated
- Nissan Leaf: DOWN 9% (1,128 vs. 1,234)
- Plug-in Toyota Prius: UP 16% (2,312 vs. 2,001)
- Tesla Model S: UP 104% (2,750 vs. 1,350) **estimated
- Tesla Model X: UP 161% (3,200 vs. 1,225) **estimated
- BMW i3: UP 16% (490 vs. 424)
- Ford Fusion Energi: UP 150% (1,131 vs. 453)
- Honda Clarity BEV & PHEV: DOWN 8% (1,894 vs. 2,051)
- Tesla Model 3: UP 5% (18,650 vs. 17,750)
Gasoline prices plummeted all month. It started at $2.768 per gallon and the price steadily fell, ending at $2.465. The fall was so steady, I felt compelled to show it in a graph. The blue line is the trend and the red lines are actual prices on the date indicated at the bottom of the chart. As you can see, the day-to-day changes were almost all negative.
My vehicle sales, in November 2018, continued to struggle. The table to the left of the chart has cells highlighted in red, if my sales were below my historical average for the month and green, if above average. Thanks to my move back to the main showroom, November became one of only three months where my monthly sales were above my historical average for that month. That being said, the first week of November returned to form with zero sales. The first week of November 2017 has been the only one where I made a sale. I made two in that week last year. I really should vacation that week…
My seven November 2018 sales were comprised of one Bolt EV, three Volts, a Camaro, a Malibu and a Colorado. My lifetime Volt sales now total 99. Who’s next?
My 2018 plug-in sales, have rebounded slightly, but are nowhere near what they were the previous November.
Inventory of Bolt EVs is still very constrained. The announced end of the Volt, has spurred many who were considering the Volt, or replacing an older Volt. Sales are starting to spike. I hate to see the Volt come to and end, as it has been a steady sales performer for me for the last three years. This coincides with the 2nd generation Volt’s debut in Texas, in March of 2016 (2017 model year).
Plug-in sales, compared to the same month a year ago, were almost entirely up. The only lowered sales were for the Model X, and its drop was slight (3%).
- Chevy Volt: UP 131% (3,930 vs. 1,702)
- Chevy Bolt EV: UP 1% (3,025 vs. 2,987)
- Nissan Leaf: UP 545% (1,128 vs. 175)
- Plug-in Toyota Prius: UP 26% (2,312 vs. 1,834)
- Tesla Model S: UP 106% (2,750 vs. 1,335)
- Tesla Model X: DOWN 3% (3,200 vs. 3,300)
- BMW i3: UP 73% (490 vs. 283)
- Ford Fusion Energi: UP 55% (1,131 vs. 731)
- Honda Clarity BEV & PHEV: UP 308% (1,894 vs. 464)
- Tesla Model 3: UP 5,306% (18,650 vs. 345) **Model 3 debuted in July 2017
One note on the Clarity & Model 3: November 2018 was compared with only the fifth month of these vehicles’ availability, and they really didn’t sell in volume until December. Due to that, the percentages are more skewed than if they had a “normal” month’s volume to compare to. The Nissan Leaf, in November 2017, was in a long, slow wind-down of the first generation Leaf.
On a final note, a comment on Facebook asked me to comment on where I obtain my sales figures. I use several sources, including InsideEVs, GoodCarBadCar, CarSalesBase and hybridCars.
