GM Pickup Sales Drop - Media Forgets Why

Gorehamj · September 5, 2018

John Goreham
Contributing Writer, GM-Trucks.com
9-5-2018

According to Bloomberg , who has journalists with sources within GM willing to leak information, truck sales declined last month and helped account for a pretty substantial 13% overall decline in sales for General Motors. For comparison, Toyota's sales were flat last month compared to August 2017 with a decline of 1.2%. The industry as a whole declined about 7% in August. GM dropping by 13% is huge - but unsubstantiated - news. It is unsubstantiated because GM has stopped providing sales data on a monthly basis. Times like this are exactly why they did so. There is no upside to bad news.

Buried way down the page in the story, Bloomberg mentions briefly that GM has just started to build the new 2019 Silverado. The story's headline and main gist are that GM's lower truck sales are due to scaled back incentives. No place does it mention that GM is having a well-planned short-term lack of inventory as the company moves out of 2018 models and into 2019s. In February of this year, GM-Trucks.com noted that GM will lose about 120,000 truck sales in calendar 2018. We also predicted at that time that the mainstream media would likely report the reasons incorrectly. (Injures arm patting self on back) Our story noted that GM would have about one-third less Silverado and Sierra inventory to sell in the first quarter of its product launch. Which we have just entered in the month of August. Watch for sales to continue to remain soft through fall. Then sales will take off barring any unfortunate and unforeseen circumstances. The media will then report that sales increase as a huge triumph over the competition. Rather than pent-up demand being satisfied as owners (like us) waited for delivery.

Aside from all this blather and re-reporting is the GM-Trucks.com truck we have on order and would be happy to take possession of. During an initial launch, there are often willing (or enthusiastic) buyers wanting the vehicle, but things can take time to happen. GM's sales are very likely down. Reporting that incorrectly as a surprise is just a lack of depth on the part of the mainstream media's automotive reporting.