Luxury Cars Comparison — Top Sellers In 2014 (USA)

February 22nd, 2015 by Zachary Shahan

Quite awhile back, we saw that the Tesla Model S was beating the big competitors in the large luxury cars segment in the US. We now have full-year numbers for 2014. Granted, as I note below, Tesla is supply limited. I wonder what the situation would be if it wasn’t, if it was advertising, etc. Anyhow, check out more thoughts and details in this EV Obsession repost.

I noticed an interesting sales comparison on the Tesla Motors Club forum today (thanks, RobStark). It was a table showing 2014 sales data for the top large luxury cars in the USA… minus Tesla, since Tesla doesn’t report its sales (read: deliveries). Rob noted an estimate for Tesla, which was pulled from the table source, Good Car Bad Car. However, based on my very well informed estimate of USA Tesla Model S deliveries in 2014, let me first point out that I think the Good Car Bad Car estimate (which it got from elsewhere) is a couple thousand short.

Anyhow, I threw my Tesla estimate into a new table and also created some charts for 2014 and 2013, which you can view here:

Large Luxury Car Models 2014 2013 % Change Mercedes-Benz S-Class 25,276 13,303 90.00% Tesla Model S 18,480 15,585 18.58% BMW 7-Series 9,744 10,932 -10.87% BMW 6-Series 8,647 9,762 -11.42% Lexus LS 8,559 10,727 -20.21% Audi A7 8,133 8,483 -4.13% Mercedes-Benz CLS-Class 6,981 8,032 -13.09% Audi A8 5,904 6,300 -6.29% Porsche Panamera 5,740 5,421 5.88% Jaguar XJ 4,329 5,434 -20.33% Total 83,313 78,394 6.27%

Aside from the obvious, one important point to note are: Tesla is supply-limited, so we have no idea how many cars it would have sold in the US in 2014 if it were not. Also, as Elon noted on the recent quarterly conference call for Tesla, 1,400 deliveries slipped from 2014 to 2015 due to severe weather, buyers being out of town on holiday, shipping issues (with ships), and other factors.

Still, the Model S was a clear second, and deliveries increased 18.6% year over year. Pretty cool. And certainly not bad for a company that isn’t even a teenager yet.

Now, if this newbie can dominate such a refined segment of the market in such a short time, imagine what it can do in the SUV/CUV and affordable car categories once it launches vehicles there! Well, we don’t have too long to find out. The Model X is coming out this year, and the Model 3 should be coming out in just 2–3 years.









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