GM extends its employee discount promotion after a big gain in sales; Ford offers a similar promotion to match.
For US auto buyers, the GM Employee Discount for Everyone promotion was a huge success. Sales increased dramatically for the month of June, giving GM its best sales month in 18 years.
The one month promotion worked so well, GM has extended it to the beginning of August. Ford and the Chrysler unit of Daimler Chrysler will begin similar promotions on July 6.
GM sold 558,092 vehicles in June, the highest monthly figure not seen since September 1986. It was 47 percent more than June 2004 sales for the Detroit automaker. GM saw its plummeting market share increase seven percent from May to 33 percent of the market.
That kind of success doesn’t get ignored for long in the highly competitive auto marketplace.
“It was inevitable that the others followed,” said Maryann Keller, an auto analyst with Maryann Keller & Associates in a Bloomberg report. “This was a very successful and compelling promotion on GM’s part. GM was able to garner a huge market share in June.”
Meanwhile, one Japanese competitor has moved in the other direction with prices. A Toyota spokesman said his company had no plans to match the promotions. “We just had a price increase,” said Xavier Domenicis. Camrys will go up $150 USD in 2006, while the RAV4 and Prius will each go up $300.
David Utter is a staff writer for Murdok covering technology and business. Email him here.
