The 40 largest auto dealers in Orange County combined for $5.3 billion in sales for the 12-month period that ended June 30, based on this week’s Business Journal list. That’s up 5.9% and ahead of the 4.4% growth pace of U.S. auto sales in the first six months of the year.
About 94,010 new vehicles and 38,641 used ones were sold here in the fiscal year. Twenty-one dealerships reported sales increases, and six showed declines. Figures for the other 13 are Business Journal estimates.
• Fletcher Jones Motorcars in Newport Beach, ranked No. 1, reported $668.7 million in sales, a 6.6% year-over-year increase. The dealership sold 7,099 new cars and 2,585 used ones, and it employed 292 sales and service personnel.
• Wilson Group owner and Chief Executive David Wilson bought Villa Ford in Orange from Fletcher Jones for $30 million in June 2014, and it looks like the deal is paying off. The dealership, No. 22 on the list, posted a 2,598.9% increase in sales to $96.6 million. It sold 1,885 new and 835 used vehicles and employed 64 service and sales personnel.
• Elmore Toyota of Westminster, No. 33, posted the second biggest gain in the group, with a 27.3% sales uptick to $65.8 million. Its new-car sales were up 41% to 1,701, and used cars were up 13% to 440. It employed 80.
There are 122 dealers in the county, and according to the Orange County Automobile Dealers Association, they collectively generated $11 billion in sales in 2014—198,616 new vehicles and 76,738 used.
National vehicle sales were up 13.6% in October, adding 1.5 million cars and light trucks, and are on track to reach 18.2 million for the year.
Automakers
The six automakers with U.S. operations based in Orange County combined to employ an estimated 1,864 local workers, up 1% over the year-earlier period, according to this week’s Business Journal list.
The companies accounted for 1.7 million vehicles sold during the 12-month period, up 4.6%.
• Mazda North American Operations, ranked No. 1, increased its headcount by 9.3% to 519 employees at its Irvine office. It sold 308,367 vehicles, a 4.4% year-over-year increase.
• Fountain Valley-based Hyundai Motor America Inc., the largest automaker with operations here, sold 732,434 vehicles through more than 830 dealerships. The subsidiary of South Korea-based Hyundai Motor Corp. has 481 local workers, good for the No. 2 spot on the list. It recently launched a stand-alone brand of premium vehicles named after its Genesis luxury sedan that will operate side by side with Hyundai’s existing offering of economy sedans and SUVs—similar to Honda’s approach with the Acura nameplate or Nissan’s Infiniti.
• Kia Motors America Inc. in Irvine, part of Hyundai Motor Group, employs 316, a 5% uptick. It sold 593,773 vehicles, up 6.9%.
• Cypress-based Mitsubishi Motors North America Inc. reduced its staff by 16.5% while continuing to post double-digit sales increases. It sold 87,515 vehicles during the period, up 22.5%. It has sold 80,683 so far this year, a 25% uptick over the same period last year.
“This year the U.S. is the top-selling country for Mitsubishi, and as a result we get more attention from the parent company,” Mitsubishi Executive Vice President Don Swearingen said at the Los Angeles Auto Show earlier this month, when the automaker revealed the 2016 Outlander Sport and 2017 Mirage. “That means they are more interested in what we have to say as far as new product to bring into the market, and they are very interested in investing resources and money to bring product so that we can sell more cars in the U.S. … We are not going away.”
• Costa Mesa-based Karma Automotive, No. 6, was formerly known as Fisker Automotive and Technology Group. The automaker was bought last year out of bankruptcy for $149 million by Wanxiang Group, a China-based auto parts maker.
Karma notched a deal this month to integrate BMW components into its vehicles. BMW will supply the automaker and its flagship Karma plug-in hybrid vehicle with power components, including battery-charging systems. The company has said it plans to relaunch the Karma next year.
