[Envoy4Life]

Is Lincoln Killing the 1 Thing Cadillac Has Left?
Motley Fool
October 3, 2014
By: Bret Kenwell

This year has been somewhat lopsided for the two crosstown luxury auto rivals, especially compared to last year. In 2013, General Motors' (NYSE: GM) Cadillac brand boosted sales by 22% on the back of several hot new models, while Ford's (NYSE: F) Lincoln brand saw sales fall 0.6%, as the overall auto market hummed higher by 7.5% for the year.

This year, however, has been completely different. Through August, Cadillac has seen sales drop 4.7% while Lincoln has seen sales increase 13.4%. It has been a good year for Lincoln, a head-scratching one for Cadillac.

But there's one storyline in particular that's become even more head-scratching: the slump in SRX sales.

Through August 2014, the ATS and XTS -- the two top-selling Cadillac models behind the SRX -- have seen sales plummet 20.3% and 22.5%, respectively. And with CTS sales down on the year, the SRX was the company's only shining star.

Through the first six months of 2014, SRX sales were higher by over 20%, which is pretty darn good for your top-selling model, if you ask me. However, this trend seems to be reversing.

Full article available at link.

 

[Envoy4Life]

A pretty terrible article overall, especially because the SRX and MKC are only tangential competitors at best. But, it does highlight an important issue at Cadillac, which is the lack of crossovers outside of the SRX. With the next generation SRX supposedly moving up both in price and size, Cadillac can't afford to wait any longer to introduce an MKC competitor. They need it ASAP.

 

[JimmyDiablo]

I really can't wait until Cadillac redesigns the SRX soon...the malarkey in this article is strong. The SRX is how old now? And still outselling the spankin new MKWhocares?

 

[63GrandSport001]

That chart is a really bad chart......

It measures % sales gain for the SRX and measures total sales for the Lincoln..... a bit confusing but once I noticed that makes me wonder what they are doing. They just wanted to make a positive article about Lincoln and this crossover gave it to them. Though it is likely that the Lincoln has been taking sales away from Cadillac, it becomes moot when you consider how old the SRX is and how long it has been on the market.

 

[Envoy4Life]

I really can't wait until Cadillac redesigns the SRX soon...the malarkey in this article is strong. The SRX is how old now? And still outselling the spankin new MKWhocares?

I wouldn't call it the "MKWhocares". It's a very impressive vehicle and I think it'll help turn Lincoln around:

It's a looker too. It looks far better than the SRX does IMHO.

 

[JimmyDiablo]

That's a face only a mother could love IMO, however, granted, the SRX is pretty ugly by today's A&S2.0 standards. Again though, how old is the SRX? I bet anything the upcoming redesign blows this thing back to projectile vomit status.

 

[autoplaybook]

A pretty terrible article overall, especially because the SRX and MKC are only tangential competitors at best. But, it does highlight an important issue at Cadillac, which is the lack of crossovers outside of the SRX. With the next generation SRX supposedly moving up both in price and size, Cadillac can't afford to wait any longer to introduce an MKC competitor. They need it ASAP.

Exactly. And the SRX still outsold the MKX and MKC and MKT COMBINED for the month and is way ahead on all three combined for YTD. So perhaps words like "killing" are, I don't know, incredibly stupid to use given the actual circumstances?

Maybe? Just a little?

 

[jpd80]

Kind of a funny article that uses actual percentages form each brand to draw very questionable conclusions.
Lincoln is not taking anything form Cadillac and vise versa.

The fact that Lincoln finally has new / refreshed products coming and is seeing an uptick is welcome news
but that in no way is having any influence on Cadillac's fortunes and the writer's attempt to suggest that is
feeble to the point of insulting. Both brands are different enough to pursue different customer sets who buy
or prefer the respective brands for different reasons.

All this articles did was bring out the worst in GMI fans who then feel justified to trash Lincoln in order to defend
Cadillac's honor. Instead, we should honestly look at the money spent on both brands in the past 12 months
and gauge for ourselves the success or otherwise of those results and using sales as your only metric is as
superficial as the OP article.

Cadillac has spent huge to raise the perception of the brand, has it achieved that?

What has Lincoln done to improve its cars and dealership image, how much has Ford really spent?

 

[Mr. Burns]

Cadillac's crossover strategy seems unclear, and it's not just Lincoln that will eat GM's lunch in these segments, soon there will be a number of brand new compelling alternatives.

Naturally if they let the SRX wither on the vine with no signs of replacement soon, sales will begin to slump. But this doesn't give Lincoln much advantage, Lincoln still lacks the product in other key segments to truly be relevant.

 

[Dr.Show-Me]

Mötley Fool and Consumer Reports should stay out of the car business analysis, as they either don't understand it or enter the discussions with a bias. Not Good!

 

[BlackGTP]

I look at that chart and see that Mr. Fool ignored a blatant piece of research. The July decrease is barely a blip at 344 unit decrease and in line with many other month's for 2014. Then we see the huge, dramatic 37% drop in August. But Mr. Fool needs to explain why August 2013 sales were so high, that data point is an outlier as it is far above any other month in 2013 and 2014. And again, August 2014 continues to be in line with the balance of 2014 sales. My guess is Cadillac had some huge money on the hood in August 2013 and moved a lot of metal and did not have comparable rebates in August 2014. Story over.

It's poor journalism to draw the conclusion that Lincoln is eating Cadillac's lunch without explaining why August 2013 was so high.

And "the 1 thing Cadillac has left"? Really? Aren't Escalade sales way up? And what about the CTS, though volume is down, the ATP is up, is success measured only on volume? Yes, the ATS appears to be an issue, but I don't understand why the AMERICAN media wants to paint the only real AMERICAN luxury make as a loser when it isn't necessarily all bad.

 

[JBsZ06]

Cadillac needs three sizes of CUVs .....small medium and large...

I think Lincoln's first move after the wildly successful MKZ and mKs is the small cuv MKC which is a ford escape derivative.

It's been on the market for a few months and I would imagine its sales are doing well comparatively in its market segment?

I think it's a size down on the SRX and it's the MKT? That's sales volume would be segment to segment....

I'm not sure how the MKT is selling....although I've seen a few with the town car chrome livery label on them...this way the dispatch can say to the customer we are sending you a TOWN CAR ...

I hope Lincoln does well in America and Europe as well as Asia....

I'm not sure I've heard any sales announcements on Lincoln on Europe or japan....although I. Believe china unit volume for Lincoln must be strong.

I did see for September Cadillacs total unit sales were appromately double Lincoln in the USA...

Percentages are nice yet so is actual unit sales ...

.

 

[logansowner]

I work for Ford, so I would have been a bit biased perhaps if this article wasn't awful, but I can assure you, Lincoln isn't killing anything. Lincoln is making nice vehicles, but they are still doing what Cadillac did years ago, rebadging Ford vehicles. They just aren't competitive. I don't think Cadillac has anything to worry about. Especially since Lincoln does an absolutely awful marketing job.

 

[dslay04]

Once again. Another crack pipe article from that site.

 

[kevinahcc20]

Cadillac's sales dip this year has one root cause...pricing!

 

[SavoieRF]

A pretty terrible article overall, especially because the SRX and MKC are only tangential competitors at best. But, it does highlight an important issue at Cadillac, which is the lack of crossovers outside of the SRX. With the next generation SRX supposedly moving up both in price and size, Cadillac can't afford to wait any longer to introduce an MKC competitor. They need it ASAP.

LoL Oh no! There's a winning strategy: Take a hot selling car and move it up in size and price! We all know that works so well for Cadillac!

 

[SavoieRF]

Cadillac's sales dip this year has one root cause...pricing!

Yup! and you can include bizarre option packages and styling more focused on winning over the Chinese then the home front.

 

[chevypowa670]

lol what a trash article...

1. No mention of the Escalade which is freaking killing it right now with a monster ATP. Lincoln would kill to have those kinds of numbers with the Navigator.

2. How is the SRX sales decline "head scratching"? The vehicle is a 100 years old and desperately needs a new model. Thankfully, one is coming very soon. Unless GM overprices the next SRX it will do just fine, like it has over the last 5 years...For all the hate the SRX took on this site it really has been a solid seller and profit maker for GM.

3. Cadillac needs another crossover. The consumer is crossover crazy at the moment and GM is doing itself a disfavor by not capitalizing on it as much as they can. I understand you want to diversify your line-up but I don't think another crossover or two would kill anything in the overall GM lineup.

 

[sonjaab]

Lincoln SURE is killing Cadillac in ONE department...............
UGLY!

Lincoln sure has some UGLY cars!
Those beaks are terrible..................

 

[BlackGTP]

Cadillac's sales dip this year has one root cause...pricing!

LoL Oh no! There's a winning strategy: Take a hot selling car and move it up in size and price! We all know that works so well for Cadillac!

But we don't know about profits, my assumption is that volume is down, but profits are up. Though we have no way of knowing, increased profits are Cadillac's goal, I'd rather Cadillac sell half the volume but have twice the profits.