DETROIT - gasoline prices hit a sweet spot for automakers last month. They fall far enough to boost sales of the truck, but remained so high that cars sold well, sometimes in a few hours only after reaching dealer lots.
As June a good month for General Motors and Ford, which have traditionally relied on sales of truck and now have queues of high expectation of the smaller models and energy-efficient as well.
Toyota and Honda could not take advantage, however. Their sales decline more than 20% as they are short cars due to the current problems by the earthquake of March to the Japan.
These cuts - and the continuing weakness of the US economy - meant sales grew more slowly in June they might have. The United States sales increased by 7% to 1.05 million. Analysts expected a gain to two digits.
Sales are not supposed to choose back until fall, when the Japanese production is at full capacity.
"Some consumers have decided to sit on their hands and their purchases, to delay," said Don Johnson, vice President of GM sales in the United States.
General Motors Co. and Ford Motor Co., said that their turnover increased by 10%. And the small car Chevrolet Cruze arched past perennial bestsellers such as the Toyota Camry and the Honda Civic to become the car more sold in America. The Chrysler Group sales increased by 30% thanks to popular like the Jeep Grand Cherokee and 200 new products Chrysler sedan.
Price of gasoline on average $3.68 per gallon in June, less than in may but not really cheap. It was enough to change the behaviour of some buyers.
"There are some of the consumers who respond to gas prices almost daily, and they decide what to buy on these prices, said Jesse Toprak, vice President trends of the industry and ideas for car of TrueCar.com site pricing.
The decline in prices of gasoline has attracted buyers more pickup truck. Chrysler has reported an increase of 35 per cent of Ram truck sales, while sales of Chevrolet Silverado has increased by 5%. No pickup sales jump help Detroit automakers, who sell more than five times more numerous pickups as based marks abroad. But even Nissan Motor Co. received. Sales of his small truck Frontier increased 51 percent.
Ford said pickup same buyers had their eyes on the price of gasoline. More than half of the F - 150 buyers chose small V - 8 s V-6 engines. It was as the first engines more small greatest winning time since the 1980s.
Also, small cars remained hot sellers. Sales of the Cruze has more than doubled those of the car, it replaced the Chevrolet Cobalt, while sales of subcompact Ford Fiesta 438 percent since last June.
But the automakers could sell more cars without the disruption of supply to the Japan. Sales of the Toyota Prius hybrid fell 61 percent to 4,340, their lowest level for seven years, according to the TrueCar.com, while sales of Honda Civic fell 35%. Automakers sold U.S. as small cars that they could do, but they could not meet the demand for small cars only.
The industry began June with a supply of 30 days of compact cars and the subcompact, and inventory received only more tight, top U.S. sales analyst George Pipas Ford said. Chevrolet has only 18 days worth of the subcompact Aveo to sell. Some small news cars Ford Focus sold within hours of his arrival at dealers. An offer of 60 days is more typical.
Toyota said it expects to deliver some 36 000 hybrid Prius to U.S. dealers this summer and finally top sales last year. Don Esmond, Senior Vice-President of Toyota for the automotive operations, said that the company expects production to the Japan to be back to normal levels later this month, while the North American production will be 100 per cent in September.
But the concerns of the weakness of the economy are suspended over the industry. Unemployment rate remains high, incomes are flat and confidence of consumers - an important measure which not to sell cars - slipped to a minimum of seven months in June.
Some analysts are lowering their expectations for the year. Don Johnson, vice President of GM of sales to the United States, said he hopes now that the total industry sales to be at the low a range of 13 to 13.5 million vehicles. J.D. Power and Associates has lowered its forecasts slightly to 12.9 million of sales throughout the year.
"Things are not quite as healthy in the current environment as planned earlier this year,", said the Executive Director of Jeff Schuster, J.D. Power forecast global.
The rate of auto sales has slowed considerably since before the earthquake in the Japan. Automakers have started to 2011 on the runway to sell cars and trucks of over $ 13 million this year. But if sales remain at the pace seen in June, the annual sales would be instead of $ 11.5 million. Also recently in 2005 annual sales are approaching $ 17 million.
Yet, there is reason to believe that the demand is there. Ford said the average age of a car on the road has increased to a record in 11 years, and many of these cars will need to be replaced soon.
After Honda and Toyota are back in the game, they must also offer many bids to win back customers who have been competing shopping such as Hyundai and Nissan, said Jack Nerad, Kelley Blue Book Editor. This will allow buyers to get back into showrooms.
Other manufacturers automotive reporting Friday:
• Volkswagen AG reported its sales rose 35 percent on the strong demand for its sedan sized Jetta and other models.
• Nissan Motor Co., said sales rose 11.4 percent on strong demand for smaller vehicles. Sentra car compact sales increased by 31%.
• Sales of Hyundai Motor Co. increased by 15.6%, led by the Elantra compact car. The Korean manufacturer has sold 59,209 vehicles in June, 51,205.
• Kia Motors Corp. has reported its best month of June ever with sales up 41% to 45,044. The hottest seller was the new Optima of 7,099 medium-sized sedan. It is almost six times more Optimas that have been sold to a year earlier.
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Auto writer Bree Fowler in New York contributed to this report.
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