MSM Ignoring That Private Ford Is Badly Beating Socialized GM, Chrysler

Ignore amy not be the best word. More like what I call some of my students when they take a class they have to take, but don't wat to - passionate disinterest. And no - that's not an oxymoron. Earlier this month, there was much anticipation around here of sales numbers from the big-3. The Detroit Free Press ran this articler on July 2: June sales forecast has signals of auto recovery. Buried at hte bottom of that piece were the expectations:

...sales will fall by 31.9% for Chrysler, 31.7% for GM, 31.5% for Toyota, 27.2% for Nissan, 19% for Ford and 18.1% for Hyundai.

No comment on why the numbers for GM and Chrysler were so bad compared to the Ford prediction. Then the actual sales numbers were released one by one. Here are the percent differences from a year ago:

• GM: 33.4% drop
• Chrysler: 41.9% drop
• Ford: 10.7% drop
  

A bit of a difference between Government Motors and Obama-Chrysler and Ford, no? Of course, the local MSM amazingly couldn't wait to poo-pooh the Ford numbers. Just check out this article in the Detroit News from July 2: Ford's big day not enough. Media bias - exhibit A. Fortunately, the blogosphere exists, in part, because real news is being reported there. From NewsBusters: Press Continues to Ignore the Public's Shunning of Bailed-out GM and Chrysler, Part 1: The Big Picture. (HT: Doug Ross @directorblue)

We are now six months into the failed Auto Bailout Era. Looking at the industry's four biggest companies, it has become clear that Ford is on the rise, General Motors continues to slip badly, Chrysler is fading into minor-player status, and Toyota's ongoing struggles continue.

In May, after April's sales results came out, two Associated Press writers noted Ford's ascendancy and uniquely hinted at its likely basis:

Detroit’s Big Three is becoming Ford and the other two.

While its rivals stay afloat with billions in government aid, Ford grabbed a bigger slice of the American car market in April .....

..... Most of ..... (Ford's) gains came at the expense of General Motors and Chrysler, which unlike Ford are dependent on federal help.

Other than that, there has been virtually no press recognition of what has to be seen as the most likely reason for the shift: Enough consumers to matter are continuing to shun the unsuccessfully bailed-out.

Here's the telliung graphic ("Source Data: Wall Street Journal monthly Auto Sales Chart for June 2009 and June 2008; USA Today for Dec. 2008 and Dec. 2007; Web-Archived WSJ Auto Sales Chart for June 2007"): (click for higher-resolution) Note that Ford is eating away at market share. Later, NewsBusters had a follow-up: Press Continues to Ignore the Public’s Shunning of Bailed-out GM and Chrysler, Part 2: Telling Details.

Quick:

1. Which company sold the most light trucks in the U.S. in June?
2. Which company came in at Number 9 in car sales in June, down from Number 7 a year ago?
3. Aren't smaller players in the auto industry obviously gaining ground on the big guys because of their small, fuel-efficient cars?

If you don't know the answers to these questions, it's because the press has been doing a poor job of covering what's really been going on in the industry since the Era of the (Failed) Auto Company Bailouts began in December of last year.

Yes it has. The answer, however, lies in this graphic from the Wall Street Journal:

Tom Blumer then goes on to answer his own 3 questions:

The answers to the three questions are as follows:

1. (in white on blue above) In June, Ford sold more light trucks than General Motors for the first in many, many years. Just a year ago, GM had a lead on Ford of over 50%.
2. (in black on yellow) In June, Chrysler was the Number 9 seller of cars in the U.S. Even a year ago, it was only Number 7, miles behind the top five in the category, and even badly trailing Hyundai. In the past year, Kia has passed Chrysler and established a bit of distance. VW outsold Chrysler during June, for the first time in probably forever -- and remember that this was a month when the 25% of dealers that were terminated had going-out-of-business deals going. It seems more than a little likely that BMW will catch Chrysler in the coming months.
3. (in white on green, for irony) While many of the larger makers have focused their efforts on smaller cars, the rest of the pack, contrary to established non-wisdom, has made significant inroads in generally higher-profit light trucks. While light truck sales at the six biggest players are off over 25% in the past year, the smaller players are down less than 9%.

If the establishment press was doing its job covering the industry, the first two items would be widely-known stories. The third, though a bit less obvious, certainly throws into doubt the conventional wisdom that going small is the ticket to success.

Any reader of this blog shouldn't be surprised by the above, except maybe the level of liberal bias in the media. I wrote this post all the way back on June 8: The Result Of The Govt Bailout Of GM, Chrysler: Americans are buying Fords. In that post, I had this graphic of how Ford's market share is increasing while their incentives are decreasing, a curious tend that can only be explained by consumer bias away from nationalized auto makers and toward the one remaining private domestic company:I shared my sentiments regarding this situation in that prior post, and I hold to them today. As a loyal GM customer for more than 24 years now, I can firmly say that I will not buy a vehicle from Government Motors. Nor will I buy from Chrysler, but that won't be a loss since I've never bought one. I've never bought a Ford wither, but that is exactly where I will go should everything stay the course. How justified am I in my assumption that a statistically significant chunk of the consumer population feels the same as I?