Nissan LEAF Sales Exceed 2,000 in October

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Nissan LEAF Sales Exceed 2,000 in October

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Nissan LEAF

"Nissan LEAF sales are up in October, as the automaker reports selling 2,002 units. This figure represents a 26.8% increase over LEAF sales of 1,579 in October 2012.

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Nissan LEAF

Nissan’s YTD tall for the LEAF now checks in at 18,078 units, compared to 6,791 units sold through the end of October 2012.

Nissan’s Erik Gottfried, Director of Electric Vehicle Sales and Marketing, told us this in connection to LEAF sales for October:

“LEAF sales in October set a monthly record for the eighth month in a row with improved availability of the popular S trim driving further sales in new wave markets such as Houston and Boston. Atlanta held on to the title of No. 1 LEAF market for the third month in a row, narrowly edging out San Francisco. As LEAF sales continue to diversify geographically, we saw particularly strong sales in the Central Region led by Denver and Salt Lake City.”

Since March of this year, sales of the Nissan LEAF have remained strong and consistent, prior to that production constraints in Smryna, Tennessee severely limited sales.

After ironing out those constraints, LEAF sales have hovered around the 2,000-unit mark for the majority of the year:

January: 650 (production constrained)
February: 653 (production constrained)
March: 2,236 (production in full swing in Tennessee)
April: 1,937
May: 2,138
June: 2,225
July: 1,864 (production constrained or was it an allocation/trim level issue?)
August: 2,420 (all-time record for Nissan LEAF sales in a single month)
September: 1,953
October: 2,002

[IMG]http://insideevs.com/wp-content/uploads ... 00x200.jpg[/IMG]Nissan Worker Assembles LEAF Battery in Tennessee

InsideEVs learned awhile back that Nissan did decide to increase monthly capacity up to around 2,700 units (from an initial plan to produce approximately 1,900 per month) after realizing that demand has been high since slashing the base MSRP of the LEAF down to $28,800.

Unfortunately, it takes some time (5 months, according to Nissan) to get production up to that volume. However, the impact of increased production seems to now be making it to dealerships, as Model Year 2013 inventory approached 3,000 units for the first time ever. That’s roughly 1,000 units above inventory levels at the end of September.

Nissan expects the full 2,700-unit production capacity to make a big impact starting in November. That’s when the Model Year 2014 LEAF enters production, too. Those 2014 LEAFs are expected to hit dealerships in December."

Em: http://insideevs.com/nissan-leaf-sales- ... n-october/