Vehicle Sales

The decision by General Motors Corp. to lay off 209 production-line employees at its plant in East Baltimore shows that even workers making the once-popular minivans won't be spared the effects of the recession.Starting Monday, the workers will be on a "long-term" layoff that could last 36 weeks, according to Terry Youngerman, personnel director at the Broening Highway plant. The layoffs, he said yesterday, are intended to cut production of the Chevrolet Astro and GMC Safari vans due to "lack of sales."

The decision by General Motors Corp. to lay off 209 production-line employees at its plant in East Baltimore shows that even workers making the once-popular minivans won't be spared the effects of the recession.Starting Monday, the workers will be on a "long-term" layoff that could last 36 weeks, according to Terry Youngerman, personnel director at the Broening Highway plant. The layoffs, he said yesterday, are intended to cut production of the Chevrolet Astro and GMC Safari vans due to "lack of sales."

DETROIT -- General Motors Corp. and Ford Motor Co. yesterday reported higher May U.S. vehicle sales as price discounts and a strong economy raised expectations that industrywide sales had hit their strongest monthly pace of the 1990s.GM sales rose 13 percent and Ford's rose 2 percent from May 1997, both better than expected. Chrysler Corp. reported a 27 percent increase. Toyota Motor Co. and Honda Motor Co. also rose, and industry sales were up 16 percent through yesterday.May's annual selling rate is expected to exceed December's 16.2 million, the highest since January 1990.

DETROIT -- General Motors Corp., Toyota Motor Corp. and Honda Motor Co. posted higher-than-expected December sales, benefiting from strong truck demand and big discounts in the auto industry's second-best U.S. sales year. GM said yesterday that its domestic sales rose 2.8 percent. That beat estimates of a 4.6 percent decline and pushed its stock to a 52-week high. GM's stock, up about 10 percent since Monday, rose $3.4375 to close at $78.0625. Toyota shares surged 19 percent yesterday as its Camry sedan captured top-selling U.S. car honors for 1998, surpassing Honda's Accord again.

The steep drop in gas prices might not be enough to save Detroit, but cheaper fuel undoubtedly has made it easier for dealers to unload the trucks and sport utility vehicles that have been gathering dust ever since oil's record price spike this past summer. That's not to say automakers are selling more of these vehicles than they were last fall. They're not. Everything from Ford's industry benchmark F-Series pickup to Toyota's venerable Land Cruiser are still seeing big drops from a year ago. But these days, that could be as much a function of the grim economy as anything else.

When Vicki Kriner was ready to replace her Suburu GL, she did something she hadn't done in years: She bought American. In fact, Ms. Kriner, who owns an Owings Mills day care center, bought a vehicle made by Chrysler, a company whose brushes with bankruptcy symbolized the problems of U.S. automakers in the late 1970s and 1980s."

Maryland new car and truck dealers posted a second consecutive month of higher sales during July, according to figures released yesterday by the Motor Vehicle Administration.The nearly 2 percent increase in sales last month contrasted sharply with the 8.8 percent decline in U.S. car and light truck sales, due primarily to the strikes at General Motors Corp."I met with a lot of GM dealers last month and I was surprised at how many cars they had in inventory," said Peter Kitzmiller, who recently took over as president of the Maryland New Car and Truck Dealers Association.

Maryland consumers tightened their purse strings and sat out the surprising new-car buying frenzy that swept much of the nation in October, according to figures released yesterday by the state Motor Vehicle Administration.The 1.2 percent decline in new-vehicle sales in the state during October contrasted sharply with the 10 percent boost in car and light truck deliveries nationally."Dealers that I've have talked to said that October was a pretty good month," said Robert C. Russel, president of R&H Motor Cars Ltd. in Owings Mills and chairman of the Maryland New Car and Truck Dealers Association, a trade group representing 320 new-car dealers in the state.

DETROIT -- General Motors Corp., the world's largest automaker, said its U.S. light-vehicle sales fell in April, declining 4 percent with both cars and trucks trailing the year-earlier month.Analysts had forecast an increase of about 0.4 percent from April 1998, when GM got a head start on rivals by raising incentives to lure buyers.Its results follow increases reported Monday by Ford Motor Co., DaimlerChrysler AG and Toyota Motor Corp.GM shares fell $4.8125, or 5.1 percent, to $88.9375."Except for the new full-size pickup trucks, the foreign brands are eating their lunch," said Burnham Securities Inc. analyst David Healy.