Re: how many sports cars could Alfa sell in the U.S.?

["John Hertzman" <johnhertzman@domain.elided>]

Andrew Watry writes "Sports sedans are great (you don't have to convince me),
but with the possible exception of the 164 (and probably its absolute sales
figures are pretty low), Alfa could never get it together in the US with a
four-door.  They always sold way more Spiders than anything else by far,
right?"


Wrong, I think. Also wrong, I suspect, on the 164 being the significant
exception.


In the Golden Year of 1967, when Alfa was selling Duettos, Sprint GT Veloces,
Giulia Supers, Giulia T.I.s, and probably 2600 Sprints and 2600 Roadsters, the
sales totaled 1,552, which is about what Alfa had sold here annually from 1961
on; 1550 +/- 50, which suggests the possibility that the total Alfa market
here was relatively stable and relatively inelastic, and which raises the
further possibility that it was based largely on positive impressions which a
small number of people had formed about Giuliettas in the context of the
fifties.


(Caveat, in advance: I suspect that all the sale figure one will see are for
calendar years rather than model years, and for cars sold to dealers rather
than final sales to customers.)


Sales in 1968 dropped to 913, and 1970 was again 1,550, both undoubtedly
affected by the rapidly changing regulatory climate.


1969, 1971, '72, and '73 saw sales of 2,553, 2,550, 2,372, 2,758 cars, for an
average of 2,558. Why the thousand-car bounce? Hard to say, except that the
larger engines, and greater refinement in both the Berlina and the smooth-nose
coupes, may have helped. I wouldn't attribute much of the increase to the
squaring of the Spider tail.


I don't have a number for 1977, but the other Alfetta years - '75, '76, '78,
'79 - more than doubled the sales of the 115 years; 5,418, 5,327, 6,137,
4,011, average 5,223. Why? That may be debatable, but again I don't think it
was the Spiders that made the difference.

Here I must drag in the 164, the one car which Andrew says Alfa could get it
together with as a four-door. The two top years of combined Spider and 164
sales, 1990 with 3,482 units and 1991 with 3,478, don't look all that good
compared to the Alfetta years with fifty percent more, despite all the
advantages of Chrysler's sales know-how, deep pockets, wide dealer network,
and the 164's state-of-the-art ubiquitous fwd layout.


Alfa could never get it together in the US with a four-door? Perhaps not, but
Andrew left out the Milano years: combined Spider and Milano sales in
successive years of 8,201, 6,300, 4,476, and 2,912. (See a pattern there?) The
8,201 looks fairly good compared to the under 3,500 best years for sedans and
Spiders in the 164 years, and the around 1,500 in most of the sixties.


I don't know that any of this proves anything much. From the Giulietta on,
Alfa apparently has had an annual market here for something around a thousand
to fifteen-hundred Spiders, max, and usually spoke of the ten-thousand-car
year as a target, which they tried to develop by selling the sedans which were
the company's base everywhere else. They never made it. Will they in 2005? I
don't know how many of the people on the digest who can't wait to buy a 147 or
156 ever bought a new Alfa; several undoubtedly did, but I doubt they are a
majority. I'm well up in the derided Cadillac-Buick-buyer demographic, and I
did buy five new Alfas, four of which I still own, and while it is conceivable
that I might buy another if I could I think it is highly unlikely; some of my
core preferences haven't changed but the cars and the companies have. Nor do I
think it matters to GM; they have no reason to be interested in the kinds of
people who bought the few Alfas in the sixties, seventies, eighties, and
nineties.


Enjoy yours, whenever-

John H.
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