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San Antonio Express-News, 6-4-08:

Pickups are driven from No. 1 sales slot


By Sean M. Wood
Express-News

The pickup's ride as the dominant vehicle on the American roads has come to an end.

For the first time in 151/2 years, a pickup is not the best-selling vehicle in the monthly industry sales report. Not one, but four cars — Toyota's Corolla and Camry and Honda's Accord and Civic — outsold the stalwart Ford-150 in the May sales report.

The last time that happened was December 1992, when the Ford Taurus topped the F-series.

“It's a sign of the times,” said George Pipas, U.S. sales analysis manager for Ford. “I was convinced and several others of us were convinced that this would be a watershed month.”

Ford isn't the only manufacturer facing a grim future for its trucks. General Motors announced Tuesday that it was shifting from a truck and SUV-dominated product mix to more of a car-based mix.

It also plans to close four truck plants and possibly sell the Hummer brand.

And Toyota, which invested $1.3 billion in a new Tundra plant and supplier park in San Antonio, saw sales of its full-size pickup fall 31.5 percent in May from a year earlier.

“Given current market conditions, we know we're facing challenges in this segment,” said Bob Carter, general manager of the Toyota Division. “All of our previous assumptions are off the table.”

Toyota announced this year it would scale back production of the full-size Tundra, but said there are no plans to cut any full-time jobs at the plants in San Antonio or Princeton, Ind., where the trucks are built.

Industrywide, sales of pickups are down 40 percent in the first five months of 2008 compared with the same period last year.

Manufacturers —particularly Ford, GM and Chrysler — once counted on full-size trucks and SUVs to fuel their profits. But the shift to fuel-efficient cars has them scrambling to change their product mixes.

“A lot of smart people at the various car companies see that with (high) fuel prices, full-size pickup trucks and full-size SUVs, for that matter, maybe are going to be a thing of the past,” said Jack Nerad, executive editorial director and executive market analyst for Kelley Blue Book. “The future market ... is going to be somewhat different than what we're seeing now.”

In April, Nissan announced it would stop building the Titan by 2010. A Dodge Ram-based truck built in Mexico will replace the Titan. On May 22, Ford outlined a business plan that called for an accelerated shift away from large pickups and SUVs. And on Tuesday, GM made its announcement about closing plants in Ohio, Wisconsin, Mexico and Canada.

The pickup market is in critical condition, said Jesse Toprak, senior analyst for Edmunds.com.

“This is really the time we'll probably go back and look at in 10 years,” Toprak said. “Spring of '08 was a big change in the U.S. market.”

Toyota officials are not taking as grim an approach.

“One month doesn't necessarily mean a fundamental change in the entire industry,” Carter said. “We're seeing some segment declines. Most of the consumers are reporting that fuel prices and housing are the primary factors as to why they're changing their buying patterns.”

Carter said Toyota expects that once market conditions improve and the housing industry starts to pick up in 2009 and 2010, the demand for trucks will increase.

“The core buyer of a full-size pickup can't substitute with a Corolla,” he said. “We know a core group of those buyers are delaying their purchases right now. We remain, in the long term, confident of where the full-size pickup truck is going. The confidence is still there that this is going to be one of the most viable segments in the industry.”

But those core pickup drivers have an almost rabid loyalty to the domestic brands, according to auto analyst Rebecca Lindland of Global Insight, who said she could see the truck segment recovering s