Who Sold the Most Pickups in 2013?
In an unfortunate precedent, when each of the major pickup truck manufacturers report their monthly sales data, they lump all their full-size pickup categories into one pile; that includes half-tons, three-quarter tons and one tons. Additionally, truckmakers that manufacture Class 4 and 5 pickups (4500 and 5500) can lump those numbers (albeit a much smaller total) into the pile as well.
We wanted to offer you a more accurate look at actual sales data for mainstream pickups, so we went to our in-house data-crunching experts to find out how the 2013 pickup sales data mapped out. We used several sources for this sales data, including our Cars.com dealer network database. To be technically correct, the sales figures we present here are "approximations" (albeit a very close approximation) based on this collected data.
In the accompanying charts we've broken down all the information by make and model and grouped all the popular segments together. Some of the sales data is from new registrations as collected from Jan. 1 to Dec. 31, 2013, while other information comes from the manufacturers themselves. As you can see in the highly competitive half-ton segment, the Ford F-150 was, once again, the champion, but we should note that when the Chevrolet Silverado 1500 and GMC Sierra 1500 are combined, the story is quite different.
In the three-quarter-ton segment, the fact that Ram made some significant changes to its 2500 heavy-duty trucks seems to have given Ram a slight advantage over the Chevy models in 2013. The fact that the Ram 2500 HD now offers coils springs, a new 6.4-liter Hemi V-8 and several other class-exclusive options pushed Ram just ahead of Chevy. As expected, Ford's F-250 ran away with this category once again.
In the one-ton segment, the Ford Super Duty F-350 continued to dominate but it may surprise some that the Ram 3500 HD came in well ahead of the third and fourth finishers. You can bet that has a lot to do with the strength of the Cummins name.
Finally, in the midsize segment, no surprises here. The Toyota Tacoma had almost twice the sales of the entire segment combined.
In all, 2013 was a much stronger year for all the truckmakers, with bigger sales in every category. Ford won the brand battle that GM won in 2012, but we have no doubt 2014 will shape up to be even more competitive.
For 2012 pickup sales information, click here.
Comments
@pickuptrucks.com
Is it possible to see charts like this for the past ten years or so?
If ford pulls off the new 2015/16 releases they have coming, they are going to extend their lead significantly. Time will tell, they are picking a good time to have new trucks hitting the market.
Going to be an interesting year or two.
This gives a clearer picture of who is doing what. I like it.
This also shows that Ram are betting on a diesel 1500 to replicate the success that Cummins has given the larger pickups.
Ram appears to be half of what either Ford or GM (combined) are achieving. Even with a diesel, Ram will find it awkward to catch either the GM twins or Ford.
It will be interesting to see the graphs in a couple of years after the CAFE changes come into effect in all classes of pickups.
I think some will be quite surprised.
Nice to see the breakout according to class.
"Data! Data! Data! I cannot build bricks without straw!" Big fan of the "by sefment" break-down :-)
On a related note, does anybody else find it amazing (maybe sad) that we buy this many new trucks every year?!?! This is a big ol country and we've lots of folks but, millions? Every year? Almost seems impossible...
@Mark Williams - AWESOME!
"by segment" ^^^^^^
No big surprises. Ford owns heavy duty work, with Ram not terribly far behind. GM owns the light-duty segment and more than half of those GM half tons have been lowered with oversized rims...
With the new Colorado and Canyon coming out, GM will add to their number of pickups sold.
Well, GM has just announced a recall of an additional 1.3 million vehicles for fault electric power steering:
http://money.cnn.com/2014/04/01/news/companies/gm-recalls/index.html
This brings the total number of GM recalls this year to just under 7 million vehicles, which is the greatest number of vehicles recalled by a manufacturer in a period of a year. The closest anyone has got to the number of vehicles recalled this year was in 2010, where 4 million GM vehicles got recalled. When is this mayhem going to stop? The car buying American public has the right to safety and knowing their car is going to be trustworthy from the moment they buy the car, not 10 years after the fact.
Well you can see GM outsells Ford in the half ton segment, everyone knows the Sierra and Silverado are the same trucks.
Sorry for the delay on this. We think we've found a way to keep track of this information (broken down by half-ton, 3/4-ton, and 1-ton) in a way that will allow us to post updates and recaps like this a few times per year. We didn't have that capability or budget before but we know you like so we'll get more of it you. Thanks for your patience.
Thanks mark williams for doing this. We've been asking for it. I'm surprised to see that GM combined 1/2 ton sales actually outsold the f-150 by a decent margin. The f-150 just SEEMS a lot more popular than GM. I think the reason the super duty is so dominant is the spacious cab, huge door openings, and large windows and mirrors. Makes it so much better for big men and their tools to get in and out of the truck and also very important to have good visibility out of the windows and mirrors in a work truck where you are often backing up at a work site surrounded by obstacles. The 6.7 powerstroke also seems to be very popular so far. I know a few people that rave about it.
@Mark Williams,
any chance you can go back for the previous couple of years and post those?
Maybe a cost issue but never hurts to ask.
I think an important thing that always gets overlooked in a "professional" comparison of vehicles is the area of the windows, the ride height of the driver's seat off the ground, and the area of the mirrors. It would be nice in a comparison to see the numbers for that.
GUTS
GLORY
CLOSING THE SALES GAP EVERY DAY
RAM
I agree Bebee, this would be a good measure. Take for instance the GM trucks, they have a lower driver seat but they really don't have the lowest clearance as everyone says, its only the airdam that hangs low and it can be removed if needed.
I can't wait for March numbers.
RAM is gonna crash you.
This is a great comparison. I suppose know way to break it up by cab style? I would be interesting to see Crew Cab to Crew cab and regular cab to regular cab. This might give us a little bit of info on personal use v.s Work truck at least in the half ton.
I still don't see GMC and Chevy being that much different, at least in hardware, so I think they should be lumped together, at least in one graph. I think it is fascinating that they've been able to produce two brands of trucks all these years and one didn't get chopped in the restructuring. Imagine if Chrysler had been able to keep Desoto or Fargo alive?
Very nice. Been wanting to see it broken down by class.
@ Mark Williams
I don't mean to place any additional burden on you or your staff but could you go one step further and scratch up the numbers in the 1.5 and 2 ton segments between Ford and Dodge? I think that would be an interesting piece of supplementary information to this.
Mark Williams is going to want a big raise if he provides everything everyone is asking for.
I'd like to know the breakdown of diesel vs gas in the 25x and 35x category.
@ Shop cat - data from a few years ago indicate that there is only 5-8K worth of F450 - F550 trucks in the mix. It has been reported that Ford and Ram only count F450/4500 with pickups.
Not totally clear but not enough to change the data significantly.
@ Toycrusher - Ram sells roughly 1/2 the number of HD's that Ford does so that is more than "Ram not terribly far behind".
I know it's not possible but I would love to see the percentage of trucks used (by brand) for towing and hauling vs those used as expensive toys, and no I am not implying there is anything wrong with that.
@Greg - GMC has always sold more 1/2 tons combined.
What is telling and a bad sign for GMC is the fact that Chevrolet 1/2 ton trucks used to outsell Ford F150.
Ford F150 has gained market share in the 1/2 ton segment and handily outsells Chevrolet.
Slice it any way you want and put any GMC fanboy spin on it you want....................
GMC is still making serious marketing mistakes.
To big to fail doesn't cut it any more.
Ram does not have the current plant capacity to catch GMC but at the rate GMC is imploding - it will eventually happen.
Alex, Ford said in a piece back in 2011 that 80% of buyers use their trucks for hauling or towing.
@ Dave - that is vague and based on what frequency: Once a month? weekly?daily?
What constitutes hauling?
Towing is obvious.
IIRC 1/2 of pickups are used for work i.e. on the job as a tool or source of revenue generation.
Is that included in Ford's data?
There are 5 categories of truck buyers: contractors; farmers and ranchers; towers, or people who pull RVs and boats; fleet customers, and so-called appearance buyers, or those who just like the look and image of a pickup. The appearance buyers are the ones who don't haul or tow.
In 2004, nearly one-fourth of pickup truck buyers, 24.8 percent, fell into this appearance category, CNW data shows.
Today, they make up less than 6 percent of pickup buyers.
http://lakeexpo.com/news/top_stories/article_051a3468-9c50-5a24-837d-c0060f16a13e.html?mode=jqm
A shocker PUTC your telling me that Ram is closer in sales to Toyota than GM combined in which the Silverado and Sierra are 90% of each other. When you have platforms that similar it probably doesn't cost GM that much to engineer 2 platforms. I wouldn't be surprised if 2014 ends the same way. With the huge lack of fleet sales (virtually none) and no HD sales Toyota doesn't do that bad. I in no way think Toyota should engineer an HD pickup they would be lucky to move 30,000 units. Combine the fact that Toyota has no spent a huge amount of money to update their platforms they are probably well into the black. I guess if you don't sell the huge numbers the big 3 do you just make fewer updates.
The figures on the mid-size trucks interests me, since if I had to replace my 03 Ranger, I'd do it with a Tacoma or a Frontier. I really don't know why the Tacoma sells so much better than the Frontier. Yes, the Tacoma wins a lot of awards every year from Tuck Trend/Motor Trend, but I just don't see that much of a difference.
New Ford Bronco announced just in time for April 1.
http://www.trucktrend.com/future/concepts/1404_2016_ford_svt_bronco_coming_soon/
@Dave, 100% of Ram trucks are used for hauling or towing!
RAM 100% > Ford 80%
GUTS
GLORY
RAM
http://www.allpar.com/trucks/ram/2014-heavy-duty.html
The 2014 Ram 2500 Heavy Duty starts at $29,600, plus $1,095 destination. The 6.4-liter Hemi option is $1,495. The Ram Heavy Duty has an unsurpassed five year, 100,000 mile powertrain warranty with gas or diesel engines, including, if needed, free towing to the nearest dealership.
@Alex - April 1st............... A 2 door SUV is classified as a pickup meaning same CAFE, Safety, Emission rules as a pickup.
Being short also means the same footprint class as a compact truck.
As much as I'd like to think this is true...........
@Alex I hope that's a joke cause that thing is butt ugly made me throw up in my mouth!
More people buy Ram trucks to haul and tow than any other brand.
More people buy Ram trucks to be hauled and towed home than any other brand.
Posted by: HEMI
I fixed your typo buddy :)
@johnny doe - the ability to retrieve important information from one's brain is simply referred to as "recall".
GMC has been having major problems with that lately.
This post is not about recalls you dummy!
Funny how Lou doesn't want recall posts, but he will troll with recalls in non-recall posts.
@Lou, April 1 is definitely a good day to do some real market research. If the idea is a flop, you can dismiss it as a prank. I think a Bronco like that would be very popular.
Screw GM!
https://autos.yahoo.com/blogs/motoramic/gm-faces-congress--furor-over-deadly-ignition-defects-165526760.html
@Lou_BC
Your recall quip is quite entertaining. I think Johnnydope is annoyed ;)
Who really is Johnnydope?
Ram outsold Silverado this month!!!!! EcoDiesel has made a Difference. Why to go Dodge Ram!!!! Hahaha!!!
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