U.S. Auto Sales Rebound In May As Automakers Embrace Online Sales And Incentives

The coronavirus hammered U.S. auto sales in April as a number of brands posted declines of more than 40%.

Fast forward to today and the picture is notably brighter as auto sales have almost return to pre-pandemic levels.

While most companies have transitioned to quarterly results, the handful of automakers that post monthly sales figures give us an indication of what’s likely happening industry wide.

Jumping into the numbers, Hyundai sold 57,619 vehicles in the United States last month. That’s down from 66,121 units last year for a decline of roughly 13%.

That’s not bad considering Hyundai sales were down nearly 39% in April and forecasts called for a 33% decline in May. More importantly, retail sales actually climbed 5% but they were more than offset by 79% decrease in fleet sales.

Hyundai Motor America’s Randy Parker described this as a “remarkable retail sales rebound” and credited it to a combination of digital retail tools, incentives and their dealer partners. He also noted the company’s inventory pipeline is in a “good place.”

Moving on, Mazda reported its U.S. sales almost returned to normal as they sold 24,933 vehicles last month. That’s down 1% compared to the 25,192 units sold in May of 2019.

The new CX-30 deserves a lot of credit for helping to boost sales as the crossover was the company’s second best-selling vehicle with 3,583 units sold last month. Sales of the MX-5 Miata and CX-9 were also up 30.7% and 20.8%, respectively.

Lastly, Genesis reported sales of 1,350 units in May. That’s down nearly 42% from last year.

Of course, Genesis has a relatively limited lineup and consumers could be waiting for the new G80 and GV80. Given this, it’s not surprising that sales of the outgoing G80 plummeted nearly 55% to 319 units.

Those sentiments were echoed by Genesis Motor North America President Mark Del Rosso who said, “With the announcement of our Genesis Concierge program, the coming arrival of our all-new 2021 G80 and our first-ever SUV – the GV80 – I’m confident that our performance will exceed expectations in the latter half of the year.” He went on to say the company has already received more than 1,600 reservations for the new G80 and over 11,000 reservations for the GV80.