Sales of Autos Made in U.S. Rise Sharply

Sales of domestically built cars and light trucks rose 31.1% in mid-December, led by huge across-the-board gains at General Motors Corp.

Auto makers reported figures for the Dec. 11-20 period Thursday. Car sales were up 25.5% and light trucks, including sport utility vehicles, pickups and minivans, rose 38.4%.

Led by GM, car sales sold at an annual pace of 7.4 million, the strongest since mid-October. Over the last 30 days, the selling rate has been 7.2 million. Light trucks sold at an annual pace of 5.4 million. Over the last 30 days, light trucks have sold at an annual rate of nearly 5.6 million.

Few dealers said business was particularly good, suggesting that at least some of the mid-December gains may have been in deliveries to rental car companies to meet holiday travel demands.

“It’s a time of year when you don’t expect to make a lot of money,” said Dick Cowan of Ferrante Oldsmobile in Vandegrift, Pa. “I’ve always said not too many people buy cars for Christmas presents.”

Cowan’s experience contradicts Oldsmobile’s sales surge in the period. The GM division’s sales were up 96.1% in mid-December, but the numbers came against abysmal sales in the year-ago period when Olds was fighting rumors of its death after 95 years in business.

GM’s overall car sales in the period were up 39.7%, with all six car and two truck divisions reporting higher period-over-period sales. It was the eighth consecutive period of higher overall car sales for GM, pushing the world’s largest auto maker to its best model year start since 1988.

GM truck sales were up 39.1%, for an overall vehicle sales improvement of 39.5%.

“The bulk of these gains are in the retail business,” GM spokesman John Maciarz said.

At Ford, where truck sales were up 44.2% and car sales rose 9.6% for an overall gain of 25.2%, one sales manager said his dealership is beating the typical December doldrums--thanks to a lease program on F-Series trucks and early demand for the redesigned Mustang.

John Mathews, sales manager at Northside Ford in San Antonio, said a $229-a-month lease offer on the F-150 pickup has attracted customers who previously had shunned leasing.

The two-year program, which requires $1,500 down, has helped Ford widen its lead over Chevrolet in the annual showdown for top sales among pickups. Through Dec. 20, Ford’s F-Series led Chevy’s C-K series 534,878 to 491,440, guaranteeing they would finish the year 1-2 in best-selling vehicles.

Mathews said the high-end, 5.0-liter Mustang convertible, which costs about $25,000, has been selling well. “A lot of them are Christmas gifts, surprises for girlfriends, that kind of thing,” he said.

Estimates of Chrysler’s sales by the trade journal Ward’s Automotive Reports showed the No. 3 auto maker’s car sales were up 20.9% while its light truck sales were up 25.5%, for an overall gain of 23.7%.

Big Three vehicle sales were up 31.1%, the same percentage as the overall domestic industry gain.