NSX Sales figures > 1st of March

Small question just out of curiosity
Why is '17 viper listed twice with differing #s .
perhaps they are '16 and '17?

blue_myriddn said:

Without knowing the production numbers of other cars, I can't answer that.

I can comment on the sales numbers though since that data is available. Over a 5 month average, it is lagging behind all of its rivals but only losing badly to the BMW and Mercedes. The R8, GTR and Viper are doing better but only by a bit. My read on this is that there just aren't that many buyers out there for cars in this price range. Maybe the prices climbed too high too quickly, I don't know. It seems to be impacting ALL the vehicles in this segment though rather than being a NSX specific problem.

By the way, Cars.com lists
- 330 2017 Mercedes AMG GTs
- 197 2017 Audi R8s for sale
- 219 2017 Dodge Vipers
- only 34 2017 BMW i8s
- only 42 2017 Dodge Vipers

From that, Dodge and BMW are the clear winners. Dodge by probably keeping production very low (they have a LOT of customization) and BMW by keeping their cost lower with a weaker performance.

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oops - mistakenly wrote viper when i meant to write Nissan GT-R. Don't even want to know how my brain did that, but there you go the magical mystery of my thought process on full display!

I am looking at multiple scenarios.

The Spring thing for geographies that experience winter should on it's own increase sales, let's say 46 becomes 60.

The test drive program should also help if run correctly (target audience, supported by knowledgeable staff, supplemented with wine/tasty snacks) and that could bring you 10 cars sold a month.

And if the race car program yields some positive results, maybe another 10-15 cars per month.

So high case would be about 85 per month in the US, but we should expect less than that.

I'm in central Ohio literally 25 min from the plant but have yet to drive one. Any idea where test drives will be on eastcoast?

I didn't receive any details about timing or which dealers will be coordinating the test drives

I will keep following up on this

Much appreciated! Enjoy the detailed and inside info!

Bricks and Bio said:

I didn't receive any details about timing or which dealers will be coordinating the test drives

I will keep following up on this

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i heard it was signed off earlier this week. no additional info given.

i'm sure we'll hear more at the top salesmen meeting in los angeles in 3 weeks.

They need to get things sorted quickly

I recently saw a reasonably spec'd new one in VA offered for over $12K off sticker

https://www.cars.com/vehicledetail/detail/695064589/overview/

powdbyrice said:

i heard it was signed off earlier this week. no additional info given.

i'm sure we'll hear more at the top salesmen meeting in los angeles in 3 weeks.

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Congrats on your Gold (or is it Gold Master?) status. My job code doesn't allow me to participate in the COSE program, we get something else on the fixed ops side.

Bricks and Bio said:

The way the system is set up, Acura essentially gave each participating dealer the right to receive a certain number of cars per year and at this point dealers having been taking all they receive an in a few cases transferring some of the allocation to bigger volume dealers

For the time being Acura is kind of stuck with their production rate.

i drive past a small dealer in Highland Park every day and now they have 2 in their tiny show room, and I believe they still have the first one they received that they wanted $50k over a >$200k sticker.

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Highland Park means they must still be thinking it's the Michael Jordan era! LOL

The folks in Highland Park and the towns around there appear to print money.

You should see the Porsche store "the Exchange" folks built. They move Audis like they were beers at a Cub game. They have been adding to their physical site and it looks like they are about to build another huge store.

The family that owns the Lexus store built what appears to be a store triple the size of their original one and they kept the original one for used cars.

Then let's go up the road to Lake Bluff and the Knauz folks have a complex full of MB and BMW goodies and then for the finale, stop into Lake Forest Sports Cars for your fix of Aston Martin, McLaren, Ferrari, Koenigsegg and Lotus (OK, no one cares about Lotus but they still carry them).

Those numbers are comparable to the competition. I don't know why owners or prospective buyers would want it to match or exceed 911 or even GTS numbers. Neither of which are truly considered "exotic" especially due to the larger sales numbers.

The greater question is can the upcoming MY NSX over the next decade or so remain relevant to maintain consistent sales numbers and not drop off like the 15 year run of the first gen. Progressive updates and refreshes are expected obviously.

Bricks and Bio said:

I am looking at multiple scenarios.

The Spring thing for geographies that experience winter should on it's own increase sales, let's say 46 becomes 60.

The test drive program should also help if run correctly (target audience, supported by knowledgeable staff, supplemented with wine/tasty snacks) and that could bring you 10 cars sold a month.

And if the race car program yields some positive results, maybe another 10-15 cars per month.

So high case would be about 85 per month in the US, but we should expect less than that.

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i would personally have to think that those numbers are highly, highly optimistic...

I also think some fire sale pricing will increase sales numbers.

definitely see the inevitable fire sales coming in the not-too-distant future...

Do we have the production numbers for Feb?

N Spec said:

Those numbers are comparable to the competition. I don't know why owners or prospective buyers would want it to match or exceed 911 or even GTS numbers. Neither of which are truly considered "exotic" especially due to the larger sales numbers.

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I buy a car because I like it, not because of how rare it is. If anything, I wish the NA1/NA2 had sold more units--so that Honda wouldn't be discontinuing spare parts so soon. (Just my preference, not necessarily everyone's.)

Tom239 said:

I buy a car because I like it, not because of how rare it is. If anything, I wish the NA1/NA2 had sold more units--so that Honda wouldn't be discontinuing spare parts so soon. (Just my preference, not necessarily everyone's.)

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No one buys anything based solely on one factor. However, it's not all that special when Sally down the street has your cherished sports cars either and so does Joe Guy. Balance of numbers is always the question at hand.

it's all relative. i'm in Orlando at the moment, and haven't seen a 911 or GTS since i've been here. not one of either, nor an R8 for that matter. if i were in L.A., i would have seen 20 911's a day, but probably still wouldn't have seen a GTS. the Merc isn't as common to see as its sales numbers might suggest. even 500 a month nationwide wouldn't equate to seeing very many in southern California among its 18,500,000 million inhabitants. certainly wouldn't be like spotting a Prius every 4 seconds.

considering the GTS is in its second year of production, its sales numbers are very impressive. Merc is laughing their way to the bank.

what would be your consensus if the tables were turned and the NSX was blowing away the R8 in sales each month? or if it was selling at 500 a month instead of 50? would you then say it wasn't exotic?

fastaussie said:

what would be your consensus if the tables were turned and the NSX was blowing away the R8 in sales each month? or if it was selling at 500 a month instead of 50? would you then say it wasn't exotic?

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I would say it's not exotic if it was doing 500 a month and hence 6000 cars a year. So a 4-6 year run would equate to about 20K cars in the US market. That's typical sports cars numbers, not low volume numbers that are associated with exotic cars like Ferrari or Lambo.

Porsche is the only sports car that I know of that can do those numbers with such a high price tag. They've also been doing it for decades. Ferrari could probably do it if they want to with their brand, but they know that the exclusive factor is what makes Ferrari special.

i'm not sure about the exact numbers, but didn't the first generation R8 pull roughly those numbers? almost 30,000 cars in about ten years?

3000 a year let's say? and it is still considered an exotic...

Nearly 29K R8s sold. Many people have considered the R8 not exotic enough, especially the V8 variant. I myself have never considered the R8 or 911 exotic. Supercars yes, but not exotic supercars. Best selling supercars sure. The Germans know how to sell luxury cars. It's not always a good thing to have such a high volume, especially if it's a flagship car.

Think about this for a second. The ~$25K BRZ has about ~30K cars sold so far since 2014. There are just as many R8s as there are BRZs on the road, and I've seen plenty of those Subarus riding around. Nothing exotic about that.

BRZ's aren't exotic, nor are they Supercars.

i saw several of them today, haven't seen an R8 in weeks (at least). regardless, there is no comparing the two in any way other than having four wheels.

i think we're getting into two many categories now. the R8 is an exotic Supercar, plain and simple...

N Spec said:

The greater question is can the upcoming MY NSX over the next decade or so remain relevant to maintain consistent sales numbers and not drop off like the 15 year run of the first gen. Progressive updates and refreshes are expected obviously.

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If Honda is planning to make this another 15 year car then that's going to be pretty heartbreaking. However, that's probably the best case scenario here since sales aren't going to justify another substantial R&D spend on a new model.

Sales fall off in subsequent years for any sportscar as it ages. There is usually a one, maybe two year surge of sales followed by a harsh decline. This is why most of the successful sportscar companies have a short product cycle between updates, refreshes and redesigns.

Arguably the sales have already dropped off on the NSX since there has been no apparent initial deluge of sales. Or more likely, we are in the initial deluge and it's going to peter out from here, barring a substantial price cut or act of god. I very much doubt that we're going to get any periodic updates and refreshes on this as Honda is likely going to be unwilling to make any changes when they're only moving a handful of cars per year.

fastaussie said:

i would personally have to think that those numbers are highly, highly optimistic...

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Absolutely.

Buyers at this level know what they want. Sure you might be able to wine-and-cheese a couple more buyers, but every manufacturer actively markets their cars, has some sort of GT racing program, experiences the four seasons, etc. That shit is all already factored into the equation- they are not going to add sales. New sportscars don't sell X units at launch, and then a year later start selling X + 50%, or X + anything. Only way there is an uptick in sales like that is when you're coming out of a severe recession (eg 2009-10) or you have some equally severe price cut. This car launched into a strong market, so the only way for them to substantially boost sales would be to slash the pricetag.