Full sized pickup trucks are the only segment in the US car market to improve sales in the first quarter of 2020 as all other classes are down and the overall car market loses 13% on 2019, which was already a new annual sales record for this type of vehicle. The US just can’t get enough from their large pickup trucks.
Traditional leader Ford F-Series is losing ground with sales down 13% and its share down from 40.9% to 34.5%. And just when the RAM Pickup in a historical event defeated the Chevrolet Silverado for second place of the segment in 2019, the Silverado strikes back in 2020 thanks to generous incentives by General Motors. The Chevy is up 27% and gains 5 percentage points of market share, while the RAM Pickup is up “just” 7% to still a record quarter for the model. The Silverado’s twin GMC Sierra does even better and is the best performer in the segment with a 31% gain. General Motors now holds 36.6% share of this segment and reclaims the top spot from Ford as the largest manufacturer of full-sized pickups in the United States. The Detroit 3 have improved their grip on this profitable market as the strong start of 2020 is not shared with their Japanese rivals, with the Toyota Tundra down 14% and the Nissan Titan down 41% on it already low volume. The two import brand pickups are now down to just 4% and 1.1% market share respectively, leaving nearly 95% to the domestics.
US large pickup sales 2020-Q1
| Large Pickup segment | 2020 | 2019 | Change | Share | |
| 1 | Ford F-series | 186.562 | 214.611 | -13% | 34,5% |
| 2 | Chevrolet Silverado | 144.734 | 114.313 | 27% | 26,8% |
| 3 | Ram Pickup | 128.805 | 120.026 | 7% | 23,8% |
| 4 | GMC Sierra | 53.009 | 40.546 | 31% | 9,8% |
| 5 | Toyota Tundra | 21.658 | 25.100 | -14% | 4,0% |
| 6 | Nissan Titan | 5.732 | 9.683 | -41% | 1,1% |
| Segment total | 540.500 | 524.279 | 3% |
Source: Manufacturers.