and since the new sonata is likely to be more luxurious than the acura tl, and the genesis has no acura equal, i guess we must consider hyundai a luxury player.

 

Ultimate fail . If GM was the "top luxury automaker", then where exactly can I buy these cars that have big, bold GM badges on them? Not at the Chevrolet dealership, not at the Buick dealership, and certainly not at the Cadillac dealership either. I wonder what dealership sells the GM luxury brand? Fact is, there is no such thing.

 

Agree 100% with this as well. There are only 4 true luxury brands that are accessible to the common man. Audi, BMW, Lexus and Benz. End of discussion.

 

Did you not read the title of the list? It lists the top luxury automakers, not brands. Cadillac is a brand & Buick is a brand. Both are under the automaker General Motors. Why is that so hard for you to understand? No, those vehicles will not carry GM badges

 

Ladies and Gents please ignore him. He has come in here the last two months solely to inform us that Buick+GM is #1 and Lexus is #2. Lets forget that every single list posted has Lexus as #1 and I posted the link showing BMW trying to beat Lexus. BMW is not trying to beat GM.

Ladies and Gents this is another sad case of some sort of anger that Lexus is #1, doing well even in this economy. Not sure why one would come in a sales thread accuse others of spin, then SPIN the numbers by adding two brands.

Its quite amusing.

Everyone, we will continue to provide sales results and if some people want to do whatever it takes to make Lexus seem worse, so be it. Imagination land is a wonderful place!

I wasn't going to entertain you but you disrespect me saying my typical "spin"? Who are you? You come in here the last couple of months to post on a Lexus forum, to berate Lexus in the sales thread Andrew and myself put together. So you wait until things are published and compiled TO SPIN THEM. You then actually use a thread I STARTED to somehow back your "spin"! HILARIOUS!!

You are the "spinner". All we did was post the figures. You are in here trying to add GM's figures to beat Lexus.

Not sure why it pains you that Lexus is #1 in sales (again) and we have to go through great lengths to make them #2.

Everyone knows I shoot straight (sometimes too straight) and I try my best to bring Lexus and automotive news here. How DARE you come in this thread and accuse ME of "spinning".

At this point, no one agrees with you and you are still trying to "spin" your results.

 

Let me also add we mostly admire Buick here and respect what the brand has done as of late. Personally I AM A HUGE fan of the brand and have been for sometime. I hate that someone's "spin" is making it seem we do not like Buick when that is so far from the truth.

Buick has two nice vehicles, one only around a couple years (Enclave) and a brand new one (Lacross). While very nice, you don't become a luxury brand with two vehicles in two years. It takes time and results prove themselves.

I believe the reasoning most share is if Acura can be a luxury brand, then we HAVE to include Buick as one. As someone stated, BOTH are entry level luxury brands.

Kudos to Buick for their improved product.

 

infiniti's right on the edge i'd say. they lack a flagship for now but their line is pretty luxurious.

 

lol, we don't cross post but my numbers are taken here, then "spun" on other forums..

For instance the HS starts at 34k and some asshat but it in the pre entry level class. It STARTS at 34k and has tech cars in the pre luxury class can only dream of.

I've also seen the IS put in the pre entry level class, that is about the dumbest spin I've seen ever. The IS is an ENTRY LEVEL LUXURY VEHICLE. My goodness, it offers IS 250, AWD, manual, IS 350, F-sport parts and IS-F. How the HELL is that a pre entry level vehicle? It starts at 30k and goes to 65k.

The Lexus hate is immense and you look pretty damn dumb moving cars into a lower class b/c you hate them for whatever reason.

The Gene pool could use some chlorine. I cannot believe how desperate and dumb people can be.

At this rate, I'm going to make up classes and combine all sorts of cars and brands together to make Lexus look bad and make haters happy

I'm going to put the LS in the mid level class and the SC in the SUV class. I am going to put the RX in the Big SUV class. I will combine Nissan and Renault figures and I will also combine Toyota and Suburu. Next month Audi and VW will be combined as well. Mini and BMW figures will also be combined.

Any other stellar suggestions???

 

+1 to get some riled up you should offer a combined IS/ES/HS figure for entry level sales (I miss the previous IS/ES figure). I wish there were a way to keep people from stealing the stats off of CL, just as a certain 'spy' website likes to pull photos off of others and put their watermark on them.

 

If you remember, I said, when this car first came out, that I seriously questioned the need for it in the Nissan lineup. I'm not saying it isn't an impressive supercar (it certainly is), but it has accomplished little other than some Nurburgring figures. Nissan, IMO, could have used the money and resources that went into the GT-R project in more useful ways.

 

Well Ghosen said he won't produce a car that won't make money so I assume its made at least $1. I think its done a great thing for Nissan showing how incredible their engineering can be and containing to show they are by FAR the sportiest of the Japanese brands.

I think it was a pretty good way to spend money, IMO.

 

plus i think the GT-R's 'tech' CAN flow down the product line in various ways. i'm sure they've learned a lot about reliability from that screaming tt v6, and of course handling, transmission, etc.

 

Sales race is interesting and in different groups..

Top spot Lexus vs BMW separated by 5k units
Benz solid 3rd
Acura/Caddy/Buick fighting for 4th place separated by 4k units
Infiniti/Audi/Lincoln separated by 600 sales!!

The last quarter will get VERY interesting! My predictions are holding pretty true/close.

As I've stated, the "DOWNTURN" is RIPE for opportunity for growth/solidifying legacy and missteps now will net a worse result than missteps when the economy was good. It is also CRYSTAL CLEAR the big 3 will be the big 3 good or in bad times (Lexus/BMW/Benz)

YTD 2009
Lexus- 149,408
BMW- 144,223
Mercedes- 135,413
Acura- 76,628
Cadillac- 73,024
Buick- 72,389
Infiniti- 59,886
Audi- 59,518
Lincoln- 59,236
Volvo- 46,729
Saab- 6,928

 

Cadillac and Buick could potentially outsell Acura! That would be a great achievement for GM, and it would be a joke and slap in the face for Honda and their Acura brand.

 

With the LaCrosse and SRX, I am pretty sure that Buick and Cadillac will push past Acura before the end of the year. The entire Acura lineup is suffering badly and the SRX and LaCrosse are both going to be volume sellers. In fact, I think they could both pass Acura by December.

Harder to tell with Lincoln, Infiniti, and Audi because I don't think any have any truly mainstream new products on the way. The MKT might bump Lincoln up but I don't know that it will be enough to oust Audi who has been selling strong all along. Infiniti seems stable with the G but everything else is tapering off...