Pains of $4-plus gasoline and tight consumer credit are finally driving a stake through the heart of the auto industry’s gas-guzzlers.
General Motors, which yesterday posted a sharp 30 percent drop in total US sales for May, is also mulling jettisoning the king of the gas hogs, its 9-miles-per-gallon Hummer.
GM also will permanently shutter four pickup and SUV factories – and fire up to 10,000 people – to cut costs.
Ford yesterday said its May sales tumbled 19 percent, but it could have been worse except for the wide popularity of its economical small car, the Focus, which posted a 53 percent jump in May sales, while its midsize Fusion gained 27 percent.
Ford’s early start into the two economical cars helped offset the end of the sales supremacy of the venerable F-Series pickup, which held the title as the bestselling vehicle in the US for 26 years – until yesterday.
Honda’s Civic outsold Ford’s popular F-Series for the first time, and claimed the title as best-selling vehicle. Toyota’s Camry and Corolla, and Honda’s Accord also outsold Ford’s pickups in May.
Even Toyota’s popular pickup, the Tundra, dropped 31 percent.
Chrysler, meanwhile, reported a 33 percent decline in car sales and a 22 percent drop in pickups.
GM and Ford have made about 60 percent of their sales from pickups and SUVs for decades.
Their executives, however, told Wall Street analysts that high gas prices could be here to stay, with GM chief Rick Wagoner calling gas pump gouging “a structural change, not just a cyclical change.”
Some analysts see $5-a-gallon gas arriving later this summer unless refiners decide to stop hiking gas and start eating more losses from crude’s skyrocketing price.
GM also approved production of the long-stalled dream of an electric car – the Volt – which can be charged on a home electric outlet and driven for 40 miles without switching to its small onboard gas engine.
Wagoner said that 18 of GM’s next 19 vehicle introductions will be small, new gas-misers or cross-over vehicles.
“It is a watershed month. It’s a sign of the times,” said Ford’s marketing chief Jim Farley, who joined Ford last year after 17 years at Toyota.