Mr. McDowell, remember March 2 of this year when you said you expected a rise of more than 30% in year over year sales for MINI in 2009? Then, on March 3 February's sales figures came out which showed a decrease of 34.7 percent over the 24,190 vehicles sold in the same month of 2008 and year-to-date sales volume of 30,119 vehicles, down 26.8 percent, compared to 41,125 vehicles in the same period of 2008. You said about those losses, “The economy slowed so much in December and January that MINI felt the pain,” said Jim McDowell, Vice-President of MINI USA. “In February however, sales were up 36 percent compared to January ‘09 and we’re now seeing some who had been on the sidelines putting their feet back in the water shopping for cars as evidenced by increasing website traffic and online configurations being sent to dealers.”
Well Jim, it looks like you were again a wee bit optimistic. BimmerFile reports that BMW USA sales were down 24% for March. MINI USA reported sales of 3,605 automobiles, down 15.9 percent from the 4,289 cars sold in March 2008. For the first quarter, MINI USA also reported sales of 8,513 automobiles, a decrease of 16.2 percent, compared to the 10,164 cars reported in March 2008. And when you were asked about the losses Jim you are quoted to have said,
“In March, we saw a mixed cocktail of good, bad and ugly signals in the market and for us, I’m happy to say we’re starting to see a bit more of the good. Our sales were stronger than expected back at the beginning of the month and a bit of spring lift puts us in the premium market lead in March and the first quarter as well. No celebrating, however, because further loosening of the credit reins is needed to see even more buying action.”
Jim, are we missing something? Where is the good in these numbers? Also, how were "sales stronger than expected" when you said last month you expected stronger sales? A 15.9% drop in sales just doesn't seem to be "stronger than expected." Sounds more like "ugly."
